Recommended controllers for Unraid

[JorgeB]

6 minutes ago, wildchild22 said:

I assume only the LSI D3307-A12 can be flashed to IT mode.

Correct, the expander is always plug and play.

[Meridius]

Hi all. I bought the startech 8 way SATA card and the cables that come with it are way to short which I am not happy about as they’re only half a meter.  I am struggling to find an extension cable that extends the mini-sata cable. Is there any help on this

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B09FY9FBTN/ref=ox_sc_saved_image_8?smid=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&psc=1&th=1

 

thanks  

[JorgeB]

By meter long cables, plenty available, search for SFF-8087 to SATA, make sure they are forward breakout, reverse breakout look the same but won't work for this.

[HostCentricUK]

Hi guys,

 

I have just started deploying my home server with the view of it eventually having around 40-100Tb of storage space (I am a game streamer and save all my videos).

 

I found this card online and wanted to know if it will be ok working with unRAID.

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08DFSC5R4/ref=ox_sc_act_image_3?smid=A3CN81AGS5D0VV&th=1

 

Thanks in advance.

[JorgeB]

7 hours ago, HostCentricUK said:

I found this card online and wanted to know if it will be ok working with unRAID.

It has a SATA port multiplier so it's not recommended. 

[articulateape]

Just bought two MZHOU PCIe SATA Card 6 Ports 1X PCIe SATA Expansion Card - 6 Gbps SATA 3.0 PCI Express Card - SATA Controller Expansion Card with 6 SATA Cables and Low Profile Bracket (Chipset ASM1166) from Amazon, doesn't work in unraid at all.

 

They are using ASM1166 chipset which could be an issue. Mobo is an AsRock Riptide z690

[JorgeB]

18 hours ago, articulateape said:

They are using ASM1166 chipset which could be an issue. Mobo is an AsRock Riptide z690

Like mentioned in you other thread the controller is not being detected, see a few posts above, some controllers require a firmware update to work with some newer Intel chipsets 

[articulateape]

5 hours ago, JorgeB said:

Like mentioned in you other thread the controller is not being detected, see a few posts above, some controllers require a firmware update to work with some newer Intel chipsets 

 

is there a list of HBA cards that work out of the box with gen 12 intel CPU and Z690 boards? I'm not keen on downloading zip fles from random sites and then flashing cards that might void warranty

[JorgeB]

17 hours ago, articulateape said:

is there a list of HBA cards that work out of the box with gen 12 intel CPU and Z690 boards?

Not that I know of, but haven't heard of any issues with JMB or LSI based controllers.

[daniel.boone]

On 3/26/2023 at 11:55 AM, articulateape said:

 

is there a list of HBA cards that work out of the box with gen 12 intel CPU and Z690 boards? I'm not keen on downloading zip fles from random sites and then flashing cards that might void warranty

I'm running that combo (i7) with IT mode flashed IBM and Dell HBAs. Zero issues so far but its only been a month. The month included dual parity upgrades along with a disk rebuild and installation of the H310. It was fine with the IBM and Supermicro HBA as well. Both from my old system. Swapped out the Supermicro because of the Marvell chip.  

[articulateape]

On 3/30/2023 at 5:45 PM, daniel.boone said:

I'm running that combo (i7) with IT mode flashed IBM and Dell HBAs. Zero issues so far but its only been a month. The month included dual parity upgrades along with a disk rebuild and installation of the H310. It was fine with the IBM and Supermicro HBA as well. Both from my old system. Swapped out the Supermicro because of the Marvell chip.  

 

Any help with flashing? lot of guides online are dated too. I have LSI HBA 9220-8i (technically an IBM M1015)

Edited April 2 by articulateape

[daniel.boone]

Flashing HBA card with the my new MB, ASRock Z690 Pro RS didn't go well. I found it impossible to boot into FreeDOS. Contacted ASRock and they told me to enable CSM but I'm using the igpu so the option was grayed. Took forever to get them to understand. Multiple contacts over a 2 weeks. They always got stuck on 'don't need DOS to flash the MB' so I moved on.

 

I used my old MB to flash my h310, predominately followed Fohdeesha's guide. You wont have trouble finding that. Did lots of reading reading including sanderh.dev UEFI flash method.

 

My advice is to boot into the necessary sessions. Get comfortable switching boot methods. Learn to list your card(s), get your SAS address and backup the old firmware before you even consider flashing. I used FreeDOS since UEFI commands didn't respond as expected. You do not want to get into the middle of flashing to find commands not working. Flashing is a bit scary but super easy. Your card should be even easier if its a LSI branded card. I'd follow the vendor flashing recommendations. 

Edited April 2 by daniel.boone

[articulateape]

3 hours ago, daniel.boone said:

Flashing HBA card with the my new MB, ASRock Z690 Pro RS didn't go well. I found it impossible to boot into FreeDOS. Contacted ASRock and they told me to enable CSM but I'm using the igpu so the option was grayed. Took forever to get them to understand. Multiple contacts over a 2 weeks. They always got stuck on 'don't need DOS to flash the MB' so I moved on.

 

 

Having the exact same issue here, nearly impossible to get FreeDOS, DOS via Rufus or anything else, doesn't work. Also experienced the iGPU annoyance too, am considering buying a graphics card to get around this issue for CSM capability.

 

Can't believe this is such a tricky process. Might buy an old circa 2008 pc just to get this firmware updated or even pay a fellow unraider to have this done.

[Ancan]

After ordering a new controller I think I might have made too littile research first. I'm currently using a LSI 8-port HBA, which have started to give errors on my partity drive (even after replacing both cable and drive) so I thought I'd replace it and go for a plain SATA-card instead since they are supposed to have much lower power consumption.

 

However, looking at the order now, I see that the 10-port card is using a JMB575 port multiplier and just read that those are not recommended for unRAID. So now I ask, what may go wrong with this card? Am I loosing performance or are there more serious downsides?

[JorgeB]

49 minutes ago, Ancan said:

So now I ask, what may go wrong with this card? Am I loosing performance or are there more serious downsides?

Some can work better than others, but other than the performance penalty there can be disk timeouts, in some causes causing the disks to drop, so they should be avoided.

[Ancan]

20 hours ago, JorgeB said:

Some can work better than others, but other than the performance penalty there can be disk timeouts, in some causes causing the disks to drop, so they should be avoided.

 

Right, I checked around a bit myself, and one showstopper is that if a disk fails, there's a chance that the entire SATA-channel stops responding and makes the multiplexed drives fail as well. Seems like risk of data loss, so I'll be returning this card.

[daniel.boone]

On 4/2/2023 at 2:09 PM, articulateape said:

 

 

Having the exact same issue here, nearly impossible to get FreeDOS, DOS via Rufus or anything else, doesn't work. Also experienced the iGPU annoyance too, am considering buying a graphics card to get around this issue for CSM capability.

 

Can't believe this is such a tricky process. Might buy an old circa 2008 pc just to get this firmware updated or even pay a fellow unraider to have this done.

Seems like a big hurdle at first but its not too bad. Motherboard was on the table so flashing there was easy solution for me.

 

Now I'm not in the middle of upgrade. I just received my 3rd HBA yesterday, another PERC. I have all the time in the world. I'll put the time into flashing using EFI boot. Eventually this is all we will have.  

[MrRog]

Hello at all, quick question, is there a list of controllers that are recommended, I would like to follow your recommendations since I am new to the subject, thank you for that

cheers Rog

[trurl]

1 minute ago, MrRog said:

controllers that are recommended

The whole point of this thread you have posted on.

 

Did you read the first post in this thread? 

[MrRog]

sorry no, was thinking beginn from page 13, my fault, sorry for that, 
but not so easy found a good one 

https://www.amazon.de/KALEA-INFORMATIQUE-Controller-Karte-CHIPSATZ-JMB585/dp/B078875K5Q

nur sure is a card better then this one

or this one

https://www.amazon.de/IO-Crest-ASMedia-Non-Raid-Low-Profile-Halterung/dp/B08J2PK1HF?th=1

thx for a hint so I can order

cheers rog

 

or this one
https://www.digitec.ch/de/s1/product/delock-sata-controller-storage-controller-13491734?gclid=CjwKCAjw9J2iBhBPEiwAErwpeXzCbcELrBo4IBSw4yQInNnJy49HnquojsXZa3RKI8waXPVxqnPk-RoCP64QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

 

Problem, here in CH I dont found the recom one, and not all Amazone will be delifered to CH

Edited April 25 by MrRog

[JorgeB]

47 minutes ago, MrRog said:

but not so easy found a good one 

First two should be fine, 3rd one doesn't mention the chip, I would guess JMB585 which fine, if it's really using that one.

[MrRog]

yes found the chip and you have right is this one 

Chipsatz

• JMicron JMB585

hope this is one that I not must updated, will see thx for your fast help

Edited April 25 by MrRog

[ralop]

Is Intel res3tv360 and 9300-8i still a good working combo with unraid?

[JorgeB]

1 hour ago, ralop said:

Is Intel res3tv360 and 9300-8i still a good working combo with unraid?

Yep.

[RadRom]

On 11/17/2022 at 1:18 AM, cpu said:

9211-8i

Hi,

 

Long-time unRAID user and thread reader, first post though 🙂

Upgrading from just a 'file NAS' to start a home-lab journey.

 

Reading through all the posts, this 9200-81 IT is just fine and works OOB.

Though because of 'some' later model Seagate drives, any of these HBA330 LSI9300-8i cards flashed in IT mode with latest firmware are preferred?

1. Dell PERC H330 PCIe (no brackets)
2. DELL PERC H330 PCIe (Unknown which FW version or mode - seems easy enough to flash)
3. DELL PERC H330 PCIe (latest FW and IT mode)

Q/.  I'm thinking of buying option 2 above.  Will this be ok with my setup and future of unRAID expansion with ZFS being introduced? (option 3 seems pricey for me and I'm still learning ZFS)

 

Parity: 8TB Seagate Ironwolf Pro (build date Dec 2022)

HDD: 3 x 4TB WD Red Plus & 1 x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf Pro (build date Oct 2022)

Cache: 1TB M.2 crucial P3

Setup: MSI Z97 Gaming 5 MoBo, GTX 1080, i5 4690K, 32gb G.Skill F3-12800CL10D-16GBXL 1600MHz DDR3 - recycling an old PC.  Parity and cache drives will be direct to MoBo, any other drives will connect to expansion card.  

*MoBo doesn't take ECC RAM 😕 

 

Will be using unRAID VM Windows and Linux.

 

Thankyou in advance for any info 🙂

 

I really enjoy unRAID and the friendly community help, info and apps 👍.  I've learnt a lot over last couple of years.  Thankyou to everyone for all I've learnt.  Gen7 micro HP I'll recycle as a files back up NAS running Debian