9305-24i install issues - let's start with the basics plz

[BLKMGK]

I'm attempting to consolidate two previous SAS controllers to just using this single controller. I've had this on my shelf awhile but had never attempted to install it since it required a complete recable. I believe I have the correct breakout cables sourced and it's wired to a SuperMicro backplane that has individual SATA connections. Upon bootup (Asrock Taichi) I see no BIOS for this adapter during POST and nothing in the UEFI concerning it either. unRAID boots fine except I see NO drives. When I examine my system using one of the unRAID plugins I've installed I see a line that mentions an LSI SAS3224 SAS-3 card so I believe the card is at least seen. 

 

My thought at the moment is to install this into a Windows machine I've got and attempt to access it with SAS3Flash for which I believe I've found a current copy w\latest firmware. What I'm unsure of is what configuration may be needed, my understanding is this card is IT Mode out of the box - correct? Should I be seeing any options to access it during POST? Should there be notifications from it during POST? Having NO experience with this particular card I'm not sure what needs to be done - my hope had been it would simply work (lol). My system is down until I can get back to working on it this evening, but I'd appreciate any pointers on basic configuration of it - thanks!

[JonathanM]

Are you sure the slot you are using has enough lanes available? Can you try different slots?

[BLKMGK]

It's a full-length slot, I tried yanking the NIC out and no change. I'll see about putting it in the slot where the NIC had been and see if that makes a difference, but it will interfere with my USB stick. It does occur to me now that you've mentioned this - I now have a full complement of 3 M.2 drives onboard. I seem to recall that these may also use PCI lanes. I will do some research and see if filling each of those impacts the slots. A distant ringing memory says that's the case but I'll verify it! Putting this card in another machine might also help as if it shows a BIOS there and not in my server it'll be a clue. I'll report back in a bit, thanks for the nudge!

[BLKMGK]

Well, no dice. I removed the NIC - no change. I removed the 2 added M.2 drives, no change. I updated the woefully out of date BIOS on the mobo, no change. At that point the only thing in the box was the GPU, my M.2 cache, and the new adapter but at no point were the drives recognized nor was I ever able to see anything from the adapter card that would allow me to configure it in any way. I did see an entry in the unRAID logs that mentioned it else I'd have concluded the card was dead.

 

At some point I'll get this card running in another machine and try out some of the SAS tools. For now, my machine has been down a day and I need it running so I've rerun all of the older cabling and booted on the old PERC and 9203-16i  It seems to have come up fine but I need to format the new cache drive to be complete. If anyone can tell me more about this 9305-24i adapter I'm all ears! I won't be racking this for a little while so I can screw with it but once I shove it into the rack I'm not going to be super excited about dragging it out

[JorgeB]

On 7/27/2023 at 1:22 AM, BLKMGK said:

I did see an entry in the unRAID logs that mentioned it else I'd have concluded the card was dead.

You can post the diags to see if the HBA is being detected and initialized correctly.