Good Electrical Connections

[greybeard]

Recently I finished building my second unRAID server.

 

Centurion 590

Corsair 750TX

Supermicro M35T bays

C2SEE, E3400, KVR1333D3N9K2/4G

SASLP-MV8 & JMB362

Variety of 1.5TB and 1TB drives, 15 total.

 

When I first put this together and started testing I was having a variety of drive problems. Reported errors, slow transfers, drive not detected, etc. Isolating the source to a single component (cable, drive, bay backplane, power supply) didn't work. The problems would move from one drive to another, reseating a drive in the drive bay would change the symptoms or make them go away. Moving a drive to another bay would start out working only to see a slowdown popup later. In one test I created a 2 drive array and did the initial parity sync. Then started a parity verify, the verify speed slowed all the way down to 1.4, without ever logging any indication of an error.

 

After a while I thought maybe I did not have good connections somewhere between the drives and mobo. Most likely where the drive plugged into the M35T back plane. I remembering having read an article in Byte magazine about something that helps makes electrical connections more reliable so went searching on the net. Quickly found something called Stabilant 22 and immediatly recognized the name. You apply it to edge connectors before pluggin in cards, cables or drives and it claims to make the connection much better. Maybe it sounds like snake oil but I found a lot of articles and postings saying it works.

 

So I orderd a 5ml kit (not cheap $38 + shipping) and bottle of Isopropyl alcohol (another $8 with shipping) to thin it for applicaiton. When it arrived I took everything appart and applied to the card edge connectors, cable connection points and hard drive edge connectors as I reassembled the system. Did not touch the memory. It only takes a tiny amount (a fraction of a drop) for each connection so 5ml goes a long way. I don't think I even used 5% (about $2 worth) of it.

 

Since I started the system back up I have not had one single error or slow down. I have run 15, 2 pass preclears, all at the same time, created a 15 drive array (9 drives had data, 6 new drives), did a parity calc and verify and ran CRC checks against one of the data drives. All went perfect. While this solved my problem the standad caution always applies. YMMV.

 

Over the years I have built 30+ systems and until now have not had to resort to this. I have learned that most computer problems are bad connections. Most of the time just reseating fixes the problem but not in this case.

 

Jerry

[Rajahal]

Huh, very interesting.  How did you run 15 simultaneous preclears?  I thought the limit was 6.

[greybeard]

Huh, very interesting.  How did you run 15 simultaneous preclears?  I thought the limit was 6.

 

Each preclear ran in it's own "screen" session. I had never read there was a limit but was wondering if it was going to work as I was starting them. Apparently it does work.

[Joe L.]

Huh, very interesting.  How did you run 15 simultaneous preclears?  I thought the limit was 6.

 

Each preclear ran in it's own "screen" session. I had never read there was a limit but was wondering if it was going to work as I was starting them. Apparently it does work.

There are only 6 virtual terminals if using the system console, and only 6 pseudo-tty sessions available when using telnet.  Under screen the limit is more on how much system memory is available for all the concurrent processes.

 

Joe L.

[lionelhutz]

To go back to the original post, it's an interesting solution but I always consider it somewhat of a band-aid. There are no guarantees the solution will last and the connections will likely be an issue again the next time anything is changed, such as when just swapping a disk. The connectors are all gold-plated and they should work reliably as is.

 

Peter

 

[greybeard]

To go back to the original post, it's an interesting solution but I always consider it somewhat of a band-aid. There are no guarantees the solution will last and the connections will likely be an issue again the next time anything is changed, such as when just swapping a disk. The connectors are all gold-plated and they should work reliably as is.

 

Agreed. Should but for some reason didn't. It was like running memory at .05 volts too low. Sometimes it worked for hours and sometimes had problems immediatly and the symptoms would change. To be on the safe side I will reapply Stabilant to the drive edge connectors when I swap drives. The 5ml I have (thined out to 20+ml) will last many years and only takes a few seconds to brush on, that is if I can find it a year from now. It was much cheaper than replacing the M35Ts which is where the problem seemed to be. Only time will tell, few things in life are guaranteed. When I think about what actually goes on inside computers I am amazed that they ever work.

[bcbgboy13]

I have a question for the owners of the C2SEE boards.

 

Are there anywhere on the box or manual references to this board being RoHS compliant. And are there any notes about the actual "manufacturing" date

 

I am not sure of the PCB surface finish as it will be covered by solder mask but they were production problems during the transitional period.

 

These C2SEE are aged boards, some of them may have been made with questionable PCBs, sat for years in a warehouse somewhere before being heavily discounted by Newegg for $19.99. Why???

 

Googling for "black pads", ENIG (electroless Ni/Immersion gold plating) "ROHS" and the related OP and Rajahal problems now may provide for a possible answer.

[Rajahal]

I haven't had any problems with the two C2SEE boards in my possession.  One of them was one of the $20 Newegg boards, and the other was also ordered from Newegg just a few days before (for around $50).

 

I'll check the manual for anything about RoHS and I'll see if I can find the dates of manufacture as well.

[unRaidMe]

Hi greybeard,

 

I just wanted to confirm that you have the Supermicro C2SEE motherboard running with an Intel Dual Core Celeron E3400 processor.

 

Supermicro told me the C2SEE would be compatible with the E3400 before I bought the CPU but now they are telling me that it is not compatible: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=11542.msg110114#msg110114

 

I am unable to get the POST beeps on the motherboard or video out. If you are able to check out my thread and help, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

[greybeard]

Hi greybeard,

 

I just wanted to confirm that you have the Supermicro C2SEE motherboard running with an Intel Dual Core Celeron E3400 processor.

 

Supermicro told me the C2SEE would be compatible with the E3400 before I bought the CPU but now they are telling me that it is not compatible: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=11542.msg110114#msg110114

 

I am unable to get the POST beeps on the motherboard or video out. If you are able to check out my thread and help, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

 

I have the $19 Newegg special C2SEE. Here is a clip from log showing the CPU.

 

Mar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: CPU1: Intel® Celeron® CPU        E3400  @ 2.60GHz stepping 0a (System)Mar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: checking TSC synchronization [CPU#0 -> CPU#1]: passed.Mar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: Brought up 2 CPUsMar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: Total of 2 processors activated (10374.33 BogoMIPS). (System)

 

Hope that helps.

[unRaidMe]

Hi greybeard,

 

I just wanted to confirm that you have the Supermicro C2SEE motherboard running with an Intel Dual Core Celeron E3400 processor.

 

Supermicro told me the C2SEE would be compatible with the E3400 before I bought the CPU but now they are telling me that it is not compatible: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=11542.msg110114#msg110114

 

I am unable to get the POST beeps on the motherboard or video out. If you are able to check out my thread and help, that would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks!

 

I have the $19 Newegg special C2SEE. Here is a clip from log showing the CPU.

 

Mar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: CPU1: Intel® Celeron® CPU        E3400  @ 2.60GHz stepping 0a (System)Mar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: checking TSC synchronization [CPU#0 -> CPU#1]: passed.Mar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: Brought up 2 CPUsMar  7 10:33:41 MiniClops kernel: Total of 2 processors activated (10374.33 BogoMIPS). (System)

 

Hope that helps.

 

Thanks... I got the Newegg special, too... maybe I got a defective motherboard.

[SSD]

If it were me, I would call around and try to find a local Mom and Pop computer store to look at it. Tell them you want them to mount the CPU and HSF and make sure it is working properly. $50 or less and you'll know for sure. My local shop has helped me document 2 bad motherboards and a bad CPU over the years.