Recommended controllers for Unraid


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On 1/24/2024 at 7:11 PM, xreyuk said:

I'd have no idea how to pull it if someone could tell me I wouldn't mind. 

 

I bought the card off Amazon UK, it was the MZHOU one everyone else appears to be buying.

I don't think it is as easy as we think - running some software to dump the ROM. Logic dictates it is possible to read the ROM if we can write to it, but this software doesn't exist today. There is something about an SPI ROM programmer being an option. You connect a device to the rom on the board and dump the firmware directly from it.  I have one laying around, maybe I give that a go to establish if it is possible.

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On 1/24/2024 at 7:11 PM, xreyuk said:

I'd have no idea how to pull it if someone could tell me I wouldn't mind. 

 

I bought the card off Amazon UK, it was the MZHOU one everyone else appears to be buying.

On extracting a copy of the latest rom... I couldn't get it to work. It seems you have to desolder the chip first and then read the rom. My soldering skills are quite poor... so even if I manage to remove the rom chip, it isn't going back on again 😁

 

Spoiler


I used a CH341A programmer, process similar to what is described here. For those who want to try: first of all, I believe the CH341A programmer you have needs to be able to supply the rom with the correct voltage. My CH341A programmer does 5v, but the rom chip on the ASM11xx is either EN25F40 or P25Q40H, and these need between 1.8V-3.3v according to their respective datasheets.  You can see the rom type from the RomUpdWin tool, or remove the heatsink from your ASM11xx card, locate the chip and read the text on it. You have to remove the heatsink to find the rom chip that you are going to be reading anyway. I modified my programmer do to 3.3v.

 

On some chips you can read the rom as they are in place on a card, but on the ASM cards it is as if it tries to power up (LED's turn on then off, but should remain off as we are just reading the contents of the rom), and when I read the rom it is empty. Issue is probably as described here.

 

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hi all

my goal is to replace a H310 flashed to IT mode to see if i can get the power consumption down on my server

 

ive read and done the power top steps, does the tips and tricks tweaks yet my server will not go above C2.

 

would a 10x port ASM1166 card like this https://www.amazon.co.uk/MZHOU-PCIE-SATA-Card-Ports/dp/B08L7W8QFT/ref=sr_1_3?crid=260P7Q805IW7N&keywords=ASM1166&qid=1706948796&s=electronics&sprefix=asm1166%2Celectronics%2C153&sr=1-3&th=1

 

use similair powerto the 6x port variant like this: https://www.amazon.co.uk/MZHOU-PCIE-SATA-Card-Ports/dp/B08F56WKW7/ref=sr_1_3?crid=260P7Q805IW7N&keywords=ASM1166&qid=1706948796&s=electronics&sprefix=asm1166%2Celectronics%2C153&sr=1-3&th=1

 

or would 2x 6 port cards be better option?

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46 minutes ago, bigup said:

This one must use a port multiplier and that's not recommended.

The 3rd image shows 1166 and 575, I would guess that it means ASM1166 controller + JMB575 port multiplier.

 

If you need more than 6 ports, two controllers should provide more performance.

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8 minutes ago, ChatNoir said:

This one must use a port multiplier and that's not recommended.

The 3rd image shows 1166 and 575, I would guess that it means ASM1166 controller + JMB575 port multiplier.

 

If you need more than 6 ports, two controllers should provide more performance.

thanks, will have a think and decide which way to go with this, stick to H310 or mocw to sata pci.

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8 hours ago, bigup said:

 

or would 2x 6 port cards be better option?

The 6 port card you listed is 4x interface but is only 2x is supported.  There is a great post on testing of sata cards some have the wattage listed.  A similar card to the 6 port is tested in the post with wattage listed.

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On 2/5/2024 at 3:39 AM, JorgeB said:

Should be, assuming it's genuine. 

Sorry for the noob question - do these cards work natively or need to be flashed, like the PERC h310? 

 

Also, what card is recommended for a backplane that has SFF-8643 connector? 24 - bay.

 

 

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On 2/5/2024 at 6:45 PM, boombastik said:

I registered to provide a link with the new firmware of asm1166.

It is uploaded from a winraid user (Leland).

It is the firmware 221118-0000-00 that support hot-plug.

-https://winraid.level1techs.com/t/latest-firmware-update-for-asm1064-and-asm1166-fix-compatibility-issues-with-intel/98543

I have just got an ASM1166 6 port card from Amazon and it has 211108-003E-00 firmware, does this fw still work or do I need to flash it to 221118-0000-00?

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Ordered 2x https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B097MQ6K31?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details for my unraid server to replace a Perc H310 connected to 8 drives.]

 

cards were flashed using fw: 221118-0000-00 from https://winraid.level1techs.com/t/latest-firmware-update-for-asm1064-and-asm1166-fix-compatibility-issues-with-intel/98543, very easy in a windows machine.

 

Working fine, swapped over and unraid just worked.

 

2 of these cards are about the same power as 1x PERC H310, plus now I have 4 extra sata ports for more drives.

 

power top autotune working fine.

 

just running a disk clear on a 12tb I just added to the array, getting 265.0 MB/sec.

 

A good result.

Edited by bigup
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Just a note to people looking to upgrade I found that my old SATA JMB585 card (recommended here) that worked on my old UnRAID system doesn't play well with a new motherboard.

 

Old card - "IO CREST Internal 5 Port Non-Raid SATA III 6GB/S Pci-E X4 Controller Card for Desktop PC Support SSD and HDD with Low Profile Bracket. JMB585 Chipset SI-PEX40139" - https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B07ST9CPND?th=1

 

Old UnRAID System - ASRock B75 Pro3-M motherboard, Intel® Core™ i5-3330 CPU

 

New UnRAID system - Gigabyte Z790 Gaming X AX motherboard, Intel Core i7 14700K 20 Core LGA 1700 CPU

 

With the JMB585 card plugged in the system just won't boot even to BIOS at all. I've got the latest BIOS for the motherboard and tried a number of different settings on the limited options in the BIOS. I was hoping to find some sort of legacy PCI config but there didn't seem to be one.

 

Nothing on the monitor at all. I can see on the motherboard it flashes the CPU LED, Then moves to the DRAM LED and stays there forever. Power off and take the card out and the system boots just fine.

 

I've since ordered a LSI 9207-8i which I'm hoping can resolve this issue.

 

 

Edited by phoenixdiigital
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On 2/4/2024 at 9:12 PM, s1l3nce said:

New to unraid here.

I guess this card should work nicely with Unraid, right?
 

https://es.aliexpress.com/item/1005005481527291.html

I'm asking because it seems to be too cheap and I'm not very confident on my purchase haha


It just arrived home and this is what I got. Is it the correct BIOS for good compatibility with UNRAID?

 

PXL_20240211_214810145.jpg

Edited by s1l3nce
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I have á 10 port Sata controller, JMicron JMB585. Motherboard is Gigabyte Z370M D3H-CF. My onboard Sata controller is: Intel Corporation 200 Series PCH SATA controller [AHCI mode]

Details on the 10 port Sata is: ASMedia Technology Inc. ASM1062 Serial ATA Controller (rev 02)

 


installed in my unraid, put one disk on it. Works fine, then I got new disks and when rebuilding the array my server always freezes, getting kinda nervous about this.

Any tips on another controller or something else I can do? 
I have tried to move all disks to the controller, changed all cables and more, my only conclusion is the problem is with this controller 

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13 minutes ago, JorgeB said:

That controller has SATA port multipliers and is not recommended, see the 1st post for some alternatives. 

Ok, not sure how I can see that.

But lets see if I am understanding this correctly. If I use Sata Controller with JMicron JMB585 Chip I should focus on 5port version?

 

And thank you for quick reply 

Edited by russi
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47 minutes ago, russi said:

If I use Sata Controller with JMicron JMB585 Chip I should focus on 5port version?

Correct, JMB585 is OK, your controller is a two port Asmedia chip likely with two JMB575 port multipliers, which is not the same as JMB585.

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Alright. So here's where I'm at. 

I have a HP DL380Gen8 and a Promise Vtrak j830s expander. 

I grabbed this on amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M9GRAUM, a LSI 9200-8E card. Had tons of NMI issues at POST when first installed. Flashed new firmware using this guide, and was able to get past boot. got Unraid to see the drive in the expander, but would have tons of NMI IOCKs, type 61 and 71 when writing to the drive. To test in a different machine, dropped the same card in a IBM System x3850, wasn't getting the NMI debug interrupts, but was getting lots of IO errors. Tested different drives, same result. 

 

At this point, I'm convinced it's the card, or at least the card type i'm using. 

 

Can anyone suggest a reliable external HBA that can be flashed to IT mode without making me want to rip my eyeballs out? As long as I can make a downstream connection over SFF-8088, i should be fine. Preferably, i'd like to go SFF-8088 on both ends, because that's what I have on hand, but i'm not above buying another cable/cable bundle in addition to a card. 

 

Or maybe I did something stupid, and someone can call me out on that, and then I can move it to a general help topic elsewhere, but right now, just looking for advice on a good card for the system i'm running. 

 

I'm burnt out lol. 

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