[6.9.2] Cannot see drives connected to LSI 9207 SAS controller [SOLVED]

[Seregur]

I just picked up a new LSI 9217 SAS controller.

Unraid sees the controller in System Devices, but it says: "This controller is bound to vfio, connected drives are not visible." and the drives do not show up in Unassigned Devices. 

 

I can see any drive[s] that are connected in the BIOS and in the controller setup utility, just not in Unraid.

 

I verified from the vendor that the cables supplied are Forward Breakout 8087.

The controller was shipped with the latest BIOS and Firmware 20.00.06.00-IT.

I upgraded the firmware to 20.00.07.00-IT, but that didn't help.

 

Diagnostic bundle is attached.

 

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks,

Ashley

maelstrom-diagnostics-20210526-2128.zip

[JorgeB]

Controller is bound to be used for a VM, you need to edit your bindings, they usually change when you add or remove any card:

 

Processing 0000:02:00.0 8086:10c9
Vendor:Device 8086:10c9 found at 0000:02:00.0

IOMMU group members (sans bridges):
/sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:02:00.0/iommu_group/devices/0000:01:00.0
/sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:02:00.0/iommu_group/devices/0000:02:00.0
/sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:02:00.0/iommu_group/devices/0000:02:00.1

 

Problem is this one, 02:00.0 and 02:00.1 are two NICs, but since they are in the same IOMMU group as the LSI it's bound together.

 

 

[Seregur]

Thank you for that information.

That would explain why, even though the box is not checked for binding, and the controller is not listed in vfio-pci.cfg for binding, that it still does because of the grouping.

 

Is there a way to split the controller out of this group or exclude it somehow?

 

Thanks,

Ashley

 

[JorgeB]

That depends on the board, you can try a different PCIe slot if available or enabling PCIe ACS override, this last option should only be used if there's no other way since it can cause stability issues.

[Seregur]

I do have one available PCIe slot that I can try.  I was hoping it could be done in software.

The motherboard is a repurposed, older Asrock z170m Extreme 4, so nothing special.

 

I will give swapping slots a try later today.

 

Thanks,

Ashley

[Seregur]

I had some time to work on this earlier than expected.

 

I was able to put the controller in a different PCIe slot and it now shows up in it's own IOMMU group.

 

Because of this, it is no longer getting lumped in with the group that had devices being passed through.

 

Thank you for pointing me in the right direction.  I thought that the check boxes allowed each individual device to be selected independently from the rest of the group.  Now I know otherwise.  What was throwing me off was the fact that it wasn't showing configured for pass through in the gui, nor the config file.

Regardless, I can now see the drives.  I have not had a chance to add them to the array yet, but I don't anticipate any issues there.

 

Thanks,

Ashley