Recommended controllers for Unraid

[JorgeB]

12 minutes ago, Hannes Ganauser said:

wich usb card could you recommend me for an vm that i can passtrough

If you mean a USB controller, sorry but cannot recommend any since I never used one, this thread is for disk controllers.

[PANiCnz]

I'm looking to buy a SATA card to replace my existing LSI HBA in search of some power savings and APSM support to achieve lower C states. 

 

It seems ASM1166 cards are widely recommended for this purpose, but I would prefer the M2 form factor with the SFF-8087 connector. It looks like these cards most commonly use ASM1064 instead. Does the ASM1064 support APSM and allow me to achieve a similar outcome to the ASM1166

Edited August 22 by PANiCnz

[JorgeB]

1 hour ago, PANiCnz said:

It looks like these cards most commonly use ASM1064 instead

That makes sense, since one SFF-8087 for 6 ports would not do.

 

1 hour ago, PANiCnz said:

Does the ASM1064 support APSM and allow me to achieve a similar outcome to the ASM1166

Not sure about that, recommend asking here:

 

[mokopoko]

I just got this one for testing:

https://www.amazon.de/-/en/dp/B0BDMSZR41?psc=1&smid=A3JWKAKR8XB7XF&ref_=chk_typ_imgToDp

 

I already use an ASM1166 (6 ports) for more than two months with no issues 

 

I wonder if i can use both of them on a 2x or Quad PCI NVMe adapter with a motherboard/chipset who support bifurcation   

 

Edited September 4 by mokopoko

[ChatNoir]

50 minutes ago, mokopoko said:

I just got this one for testing:

https://www.amazon.de/-/en/dp/B0BDMSZR41?psc=1&smid=A3JWKAKR8XB7XF&ref_=chk_typ_imgToDp

This uses a port multiplier and will reduce available throughput.

JMB585 is a 5 ports chip and you are using it for 8.

[Galooch]

Thanks for this thread @JorgeB as it has been extremely helpful!

 

I am just starting out my first Unraid build and wanted to confirm a few choices as I find myself getting confused sometimes regarding lanes and throughput etc. 

 

My motherboard is an Asrock Z790 PRO RS WIFI which has 4 m.2 slots.  I would like to add 10 SATA ports.  Based on reading this thread, I think I should be good with 2x JMB585-based cards (avoiding port multipliers).  Here is the current plan for my m.2 slots:

• M.2 Slot M2_1: 1TB NVMe SSD (WD Black SN850X) - zfs mirrored cache

• M.2 Slot M2_2: JMB585 5-port SATA expander (IOCREST SATA Expander)

• M.2 Slot M2_3: 1TB NVMe SSD (WD Black SN850X)  - zfs mirrored cache

• M.2 Slot M2_4: JMB585 5-port SATA expander (IOCREST SATA Expander)

 

My questions:

• Thoughts on the JMB585 card selected? It looks to match the criteria of the original recommendations, but it does mention "Can support port Multiplier that is not in a RAID configuration" in the description but not sure what that means since it is only 5 ports and is JMB585. Does that sound like a red flag?
• Thoughts on my m.2 slot plan? Would I have any bottlenecks with this setup?
• None of my PCIe slots are in use today, but I would like to maybe add a mid-range GPU down the road in the PCIe5x16 slot.  Would my m.2 and PCIe slots be competing with each other and hurting performance?

 

Thanks again in advance to any one who might be able to help!

Edited September 21 by Galooch

[JorgeB]

11 hours ago, Galooch said:

Thoughts on the JMB585 card selected?

Can't speak for that specific model, but JMB585 works very well generally, if you want one extra port you can also use ASM1166 based controllers. 

 

11 hours ago, Galooch said:

Thoughts on my m.2 slot plan? Would I have any bottlenecks with this setup?

No bottlenecks if you are going to use HDDs with the controllers. 

 

11 hours ago, Galooch said:

None of my PCIe slots are in use today, but I would like to maybe add a mid-range GPU down the road in the PCIe5x16 slot. 

That would be a CPU slot, so the PCIe lanes are dedicated. 

[Galooch]

Perfect! Thank you again @JorgeB.   Thanks for the ASM116 reminder as I do plan on using 6 of the SATA ports to start giving me 4 slots for future expansion. However, the ASM116 will give me those 6 so I only need one for now leaving one of my nvme slots open if/when I need it.

 

One last question on potential expansion...you mentioned HDDs but I my final 4 slots in the future will be SSDs.  When that time comes, I assume I could simply plug those SSDs directly into my MB SATA ports and move 4 HDDs to the ASM1166s so that those two controllers will only be handling HDDs.  Is that the best way to handle that and avoid bottlenecks?

[JorgeB]

18 hours ago, Galooch said:

Is that the best way to handle that and avoid bottlenecks?

Yep.