IBM ServeRAID M1015/LSI SAS9220-8i PCI-Express PCIe8-port 6G SAS+SATA FRU46M0861


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Hi

There seem to be a few of these on eBay UK at the moment and I'm in the market for one to finish my server off (brings me up to 14 drives)

 

Is there anything i should be on the look out for as i know next to nothing about these cards apart from they seem to be popular for use with unRaid.

 

They should work with my motherboard right (See Sig)?

 

What type of cable should i get to go with them, uk source.

 

Thanks in advance

 

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I assume you're connecting your hard drives directly, without any form of hot swap bays?

 

In that case, you'll need a SFF-8087 forward breakout cable with a SFF-8087 connector on the controller side and 4x SATA connectors on the drive size. Be sure not to inadvertently get a reverse breakout cable, those look the same, but are for connecting SAS backplanes to onboard SATA ports, and will NOT work for connecting drives to the M1015.

 

Also keep in mind that you will need to flash the firmware on the M1015 to IT mode before using it with unRAID.

 

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Hi

I ended up buying:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/181077906457?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649

 

 

I assume you're connecting your hard drives directly, without any form of hot swap bays?

 

Yes I'll be connecting straight to the hard drives, I have 3x 4 in 3 Coolermaster drive kits with drives in.

 

In that case, you'll need a SFF-8087 forward breakout cable with a SFF-8087 connector on the controller side and 4x SATA connectors on the drive size. Be sure not to inadvertently get a reverse breakout cable, those look the same, but are for connecting SAS backplanes to onboard SATA ports, and will NOT work for connecting drives to the M1015.

 

Looking for the cable I came across loads on Scan and Amazon which one would you recommend, as they don't all list if there forward or reverse.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1/277-4685335-7782353?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=SFF-8087

 

http://www.scan.co.uk/search.aspx?q=+SFF-8087

 

Also keep in mind that you will need to flash the firmware on the M1015 to IT mode before using it with unRAID.

 

For the firmware flash i take it i look in the thread below for the relevent firmware and follow the instructions there, this is the part that scares me the most i dont want to brick the card.

 

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12767.0

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Looking for the cable I came across loads on Scan and Amazon which one would you recommend, as they don't all list if there forward or reverse.

 

I've never used any forward breakout cables, so I can't comment much on this. I'm using one CBL-SFF8087-OCR reverse breakout in my build though, which does its job. So I would assume that the forward breakout counterpart CBL-SFF8087OCF will be a decent choice as well. Should be available in different lengths (0.5, 0.6 and 1.0m) according to your needs.

 

For the firmware flash i take it i look in the thread below for the relevent firmware and follow the instructions there, this is the part that scares me the most i dont want to brick the card.

 

Exactly, that's the thread with the relevant information. Detailed instructions can be found within the "LSI MegaRAID to SAS2008" ZIP file provided at the bottom of the 4th post.

 

Apparently some motherboards are picky and have problems with the flash routine, I had no trouble at all with my five year old desktop board.

 

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I've never used any forward breakout cables, so I can't comment much on this. I'm using one CBL-SFF8087-OCR reverse breakout in my build though, which does its job. So I would assume that the forward breakout counterpart CBL-SFF8087OCF will be a decent choice as well. Should be available in different lengths (0.5, 0.6 and 1.0m) according to your needs.

 

Got 2x 3Ware 60cm CBL-SFF8087OCF-06M Cable

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3ware-cbl-sff8087ocf-06m-mini-sas-to-sata-fanout-06-meters

 

Exactly, that's the thread with the relevant information. Detailed instructions can be found within the "LSI MegaRAID to SAS2008" ZIP file provided at the bottom of the 4th post.

Apparently some motherboards are picky and have problems with the flash routine, I had no trouble at all with my five year old desktop board.

 

I take it I'm to use the LSI MegaRAID to SAS2008(P11).zip - 5.87 MB (DOS, via bootable usb key) file located at the bottom of the thread and follow the instructions within the readme file to flash my IBM ServeRAID M1015/LSI SAS922 to IT mode?

 

Hopefully I wont have one of them picky motherboards.

 

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Hi

 

I updated the card with the  LSI MegaRAID to SAS2008(P11).zip Firmware and all went well using the instructions below.

 

1) Prepare a USB stick you do not mind formatting. You only need about 12MB.

2) Go into the bootable_usb_stick directory and install the HP USB Boot Utility (HP_USB_Boot_Utility.exe)

3) Launch the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool

4) See screenshot "bootable_usb_stick.png" as reference, you just need to select "FAT32" file system
I named the volume KILLMEGA , "Quick Format" otherwise it takes a LONG time, "Create a DOS startup disk"
and select "using DOS system files located at:" and browse to the directory "usbdos" which is a sub
folder under the boot_usb_stick directory where you installed the HP USB Boot Utility.
Click start

5) Once completed, unzip "LSIMega.zip" to the root of the usb stick.

6) Boot up to the usb stick.

7) Launch each step, Step 1, 1.bat (This will dump all the information about your card to a file Named ADAPTERS.TXT
In this file is your SAS Address which will be required for step 6 (6.bat)

Example: 
                HW Configuration
                ================
SAS Address      : 500605b001f31fa0

 Step 2, 2.bat will save your current controllers SBR to a file Mega.sbr, please rename it to the cards model
your using this on, example IBM M1015, rename mega.sbr to SBRM1015.bin and post on the forum (would like
to collect all SBRs)

9) Step 3, 3.bat will wipe your current SBR and clear your controllers BIOs.

10) Set 4, Shutdown your system now, plug your USB stick in another system were you can get at the ADAPTERS.TXT
(that was dumped in step 1) file to write donw your SAS Controllers Address

11) Put back usb stick in the system with the Mega card and boot to usb again.

12) In step 5 you can Flash your card to either IT or IR mode by lauched the respective batch file (5IT.bat or
5IR.bat) This will file your mega controller to SAS2008 firmware P10 (lastest as of time posted)

13) Step 6, 6.bat will echo out the command you need to run manually in a commandline to re-program back your
SAS Address you obtain when you shutdown your system and wrote it down from the ADAPTERS.TXT file

SHOULD for any reason the SAS Address have not been in the ADAPTERS.TXT file, it should be on a sticker on the
back of your controller card, 16 characters without "-" dashes or spaces

14) reboot and enjoy!

 

The onl;y problem is that when I press Ctrl + C It says something about initializing something then carries on.

 

I don't get to see the screenshot on the first post to disable the "Boot Support" as stated here:

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12767.0

 

At the end of the same thread it was stated that P15 was out and it may be in my interest to upgrade to it to see if it solves the problem.

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12767.msg228313#msg228313

 

I was told  to have have a look at following thread about how to update the card:

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=22428.msg199067#msg199067

 

The problem is no matter how many times I look at it its just not making sense lol.

 

Would someone be so kind as to give he an idiots guide on how to update this card from P11 to P15 please, ie 1. 2. 3. 4.

 

Where do i get P15 from also lol.

 

I'm sure once I've done it once ill be OK for the next update if its needed.

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I flashed the card using the usb key created with HP_USB_Boot_Utility.exe and the boot files provided within LSI MegaRAID to SAS2008(P11).zip on me unraid box.

 

The card is in the server with 2 drives attached to it currently pre clearing them at the moment, the drives are 500gb and 250gb.

 

The 500gb has a few pending sectors on it which Im trying to get rid of, and the 250gb just old, these are just a few test drives i stuck in to see if all was working OK.

 

The pre clear script is running through at the moment without any issues that I can tell.

 

250GB

  unRAID server Pre-Clear disk /dev/sdh
=               cycle 1 of 3, partition start on sector 64
= Disk Pre-Clear-Read completed                                 DONE
= Step 1 of 10 - Copying zeros to first 2048k bytes             DONE
= Step 2 of 10 - Copying zeros to remainder of disk to clear it DONE
= Step 3 of 10 - Disk is now cleared from MBR onward.           DONE
= Step 4 of 10 - Clearing MBR bytes for partition 2,3 & 4       DONE
= Step 5 of 10 - Clearing MBR code area                         DONE
= Step 6 of 10 - Setting MBR signature bytes                    DONE
= Step 7 of 10 - Setting partition 1 to precleared state        DONE
= Step 8 of 10 - Notifying kernel we changed the partitioning   DONE
= Step 9 of 10 - Creating the /dev/disk/by* entries             DONE
= Step 10 of 10 - Verifying if the MBR is cleared.              DONE
= Post-Read in progress: 63% complete.
(  157,925,376,000  of  250,059,350,016  bytes read ) 58.2 MB/s
Disk Temperature: 33C, Elapsed Time:  3:42:27

500GB With unallocated sectors

  unRAID server Pre-Clear disk /dev/sdi
=               cycle 1 of 3, partition start on sector 64
= Disk Pre-Clear-Read completed                                 DONE
= Step 1 of 10 - Copying zeros to first 2048k bytes             DONE
= Step 2 of 10 - Copying zeros to remainder of disk to clear it
=  **** This will take a while... you can follow progress below:
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
Disk Temperature: 26C, Elapsed Time:  3:43:25
168340+10 records in
168340+10 records out
353043087360 bytes (353 GB) copied, 4878.6 s, 72.4 MB/s
Wrote  353,043,087,360  bytes out of  500,106,780,160  bytes (70% Done)

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..Ok, I gather you have the card running fine with unRAID then.

 

IMHO, you don't need to do anything, since you don't experience any problems,

Should you want do upgrade, the instructions are here: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12767.msg121130#msg121130

 

You need the "LSI SAS2008 Controllers(P11)Linux.rar" archive.

In that archive, the files are for P11 (which you run already) but it carries instructions and scripts....you need to replace the P11 files with the newest from LSI.

 

Edit: Another fellow user has already put together a single archive for this, I think: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12767.msg226265#msg226265

 

Basic instructions on how  to procedd and where to find files:

You need the Linux - installer for P15: here: http://www.lsi.com/downloads/Public/Host%20Bus%20Adapters/Host%20Bus%20Adapters%20Common%20Files/SAS_SATA_6G_P15/Installer_P15_for_Linux.zip

Exchange the sas2flash utility from the (P11) rar-archive with the one from LSI (P15) zip-archive.

 

You need the Firmware and BIOS for P15, here: http://www.lsi.com/downloads/Public/Host%20Bus%20Adapters/Host%20Bus%20Adapters%20Common%20Files/SAS_SATA_6G_P15/9211_8i_Package_P15_IR_IT_Firmware_BIOS_for_MSDOS_Windows.zip

Exchange the the 2118.it, 2118.ir and mptsas2.rom files from the Linux P11 rar-archive with the ones from LSI (P15) zip-archive.

 

Then follow the instructions from the first rar-archive.

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I've ordered an M1015, should be delivered next week.

 

But i'm not sure if i understand the flashing procedure; i thought i would just get the latest drivers (p15?) and flash it to IT mode, but after reading some topics, i understand it needs to be flashed to p11 first, and only after that, to p15? Is that correct?

 

I was going to use the info and deliverables from here: http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/topic/29059-sas2008-lsi92409211-firmware-files/

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I was going to reply with some general instructions also as I've just had to do this to a fresh M1015.  However Ford beat me to it with a link I'd not previously seen.

 

Maybe this is best asked in the main thread, but as it directly relates to the IBM and it's fresh in my mind, I thought I'd ask here also... I see a lot of forum posts suggesting it's best to use the version of sas2flash which comes in the same zip as the latest firmware.  But that contradicts this from madburg

 

If the card you are flashing is a LSI card you can select the (P10) sas2flash version, if it is a rebranded card with LSI chipset (IBM, etc...) you must use the (P7) sas2flash version.

 

That's taken from the __ReadMeFirst.txt in LSI SAS2008 Controllers(P11).rar from the main thread.

 

I opted to go with madburg and used P7 as I was doing the update on a Win7 x64 system so it wasn't any hassle, but since there's only x86 and x64 versions of this file in his rar, it got me wondering what I'd do if I wanted to flash from USB / DOS.  If I had, then most of the instructions say to exchange the sas2flash binary for the lastest in the firmware zip.

 

So my question is whether his note only applies sas2flash x86 & x64 binaries and if so, what's the reason behind needing to use P7?

 

 

Regards,

overbyrn

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I've ordered an M1015, should be delivered next week.

 

But i'm not sure if i understand the flashing procedure; i thought i would just get the latest drivers (p15?) and flash it to IT mode, but after reading some topics, i understand it needs to be flashed to p11 first, and only after that, to p15? Is that correct?

 

I was going to use the info and deliverables from here: http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/topic/29059-sas2008-lsi92409211-firmware-files/

 

IMHO It is a question what toolchain has proven itself to work.

Maybe in the other forum you linked, more efforts are spend in maintaining a more up-to-date toolchain, so you can cross-flash to a more recent IT FW in one go.

However, this will only steal or save a little lifetime during flash... preparing and maintaining an archive steals more from your life, I'd say ...so kudos to the friendly user who spends his/her time on that.

 

Also, see discussion and thread here http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=22428.msg214918#msg214918 to shed some more light on it.

At some point in your life, when eventually a newer firmware has been released, you will need a procedure to just upgrade...not cross-flash.

If you are lucky, you will find an archive put together by someone else...if not it's either wait or swim  ;)

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I dont understand your comment. All i want to know is why people are flashing in 2 (or more?) stages, first to 11 and from 11 to 15. What's the use? Why not flash to the latest version immediatly?

 

Or is there a difference between 'upgrading' and '(cross)flashing'? And if so, what?

Or do i have to 'crossflash' the device to IT mode first, and upgrade THAT mode? Is that what this is?

 

Every topic i read adds to the confusion...

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Hi

 

My understanding of it is that you cross flash the device to IT mode removing the raid features  so that unraid can find it and used it, please bear in mind I've only just started with this card and the whole flashing cross flashing thing.

 

I'm still try still trying to head around and do the whole flash from P11 to P15 operation.

 

I'll get there as there are lots of bright helpful people on these forums  ;D

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jowi, I don't think there is a specific reason why.  I did a card last week and I must admit that I chose to cross-flash it to P11 first.  Why?  Well, only because I had previously done exactly the same to another M1015 and I knew the rar file had everything I needed and P11 is/was a known working cross-flash.

 

I personally see no reason to cross-flash directly to P15.  A sFord Prefect said earlier, it really depends on if you want to shave off a few minutes in the flash/upgrade process.  I highly doubt there's any specific reason to go to P11 first. 

 

That's my opinion and I'm no expert having only done a couple of cards.  That being said, I've a buddy at work in our infrastructure team that does this all the time and he tells me he's cross-flashed to all sorts of firmware versions in his time, so again I really don't think there's a special need to go to P11 first. 

 

In fact, the main LSI thread also has P10 as an option for the initial cross-flash firmware which leads me to assume it matters not one bit what you go to. 

 

I suspect it's just there there is safety in numbers and no-one wants to brick their card so they choose the safe option and flash to what others have done first.

 

Just my two cents.

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Hi

 

My understanding of it is that you cross flash the device to IT mode removing the raid features  so that unraid can find it and used it, please bear in mind I've only just started with this card and the whole flashing cross flashing thing.

 

I'm still try still trying to head around and do the whole flash from P11 to P15 operation.

 

I'll get there as there are lots of bright helpful people on these forums  ;D

 

Harpz, based on our earlier PM, I've knocked up a document to explain the process of upgrading the firmware.  To be clear of a few things;

 

1. this is work in progress

2. this is work in progress (had to be said at least twice I think)

3. I've only ever flashed two cards so my experiences are limited.  I defer to others more skilled or familiar to this process than I and if there's anything wrong in the below linked document, please tell me!

4. Although I only did a card last week so the process is still fresh in my head, I did it in a Windows environment.  I realise you will probably want to do it from a USB bootable stick.  I've documented both ways, but *I've NOT yet done it via the USB boot method*.  I've culled the information from the various threads and I'm pretty sure this is the correct way to do it.  Please do you're own checks before following the process.  I'd prefer if someone like Ford Prefect could review said docco.  I'll PM him after this.

 

Important Note: the instructions are only for how to upgrade an already cross-flashed card. 

 

Link to the docco (PDF):

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/572553/UnRAID/IBM%20M1015%20Firmware%20Upgrade%20Instructions.pdf

 

There are probably tons of spelling mistakes and for that I apologise.  I've not had a lot of time to review it yet and now have to go make some Papier-mâché fish (don't ask).

 

I've a spare M1015 card and plan to re-do some of the screen shots from a system with a card installed. 

 

Hope it helps.

 

 

Regards,

overbyrn

 

 

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