[SOLVED] IS this the right forum to post to get help?

[[email protected]]

Hi,

 

Been going through a heck of a time since my mobo died, I have many alot of progress, but I still have a few outstanding issues.

 

The other posts are not getting responses, so I thought I would try here?

 

Please help!

 

Dave

 

[DaleWilliams]

Probably.

I see you've been posting to individual boards...the Motheboards forum, the Hard Drives and Controllers forum, etc.

If I understand where you're at:

You've bought an ASrock mobo and it has the LSI SAS 3008 controller chip. You can see your drives in the BIOS, but not in unRAID.

I got the SAS3008 fixed, and it is now flashed in IT mode with the new BIOS.  PHEW!

 

When I boot it up, it shows all the drives, and I can go into the SAS BIOS and it shows everything now, as well as on the boot screen.

 

The problem I have is that in unRAID, the drives do not show up.  I pulled 5 drives and placed them on the mobo SATA ports, and those show up.

 

Do I need a driver for the LSI SAS 3008 to work, even if it is in IT mode?

[[email protected]]

Hello,

 

Thanks for the reply!

 

Yes, I can see the drives when I boot the new mobo, and I have gone through alot to get to that point.

 

However, I can only see the drives in unRAID if I plug them into the mobo SATA, and not when I plug them into the LSI SAS3008.

 

I went through the re-flash process of the LSI SAS3008 and used the IT BIOS instead of the IR one (after flashing the wrong BIOS 3 times, got lucky I didn't brick it).

 

I also downloaded and updated to 5.0.5 from 5.0.1 beta.  I also installed my key now, so it shows 23 possible drives to be added.

 

So I could use some help to get my system back up.  I also did a UTILS --> NEW CONFIG, that did not  help either.

 

Thanks,

 

Dave

 

 

 

[itimpi]

I am not sure what your current problem is?    If you did a "new config" and an see all drives then you need to go through the process of allocating the drives to the array.  Do you iow which drives are data drives and which (if any) are the parity and cane drives.

[[email protected]]

Hello,

 

When I go to the drives and click the drop down, nothing shows, this is my problem.  If I plug the drives into the mobo STA ports, I can see them, but not when plugged into the LSI SAS 3008.  I have 13 drives, so I need to make use to the SAS 3008, mobo only has 6 ports.

 

Dave

[[email protected]]

Here are pics of the RAID controller and booting the mobo and that it sees the drives.

 

[[email protected]]

6.0-beta4 installed, then it saw all my drives from the LSI SAS 3008 with the IT BIOS.

 

I did not even lost any data, and it is doing a parity rebuild now, but I can browse and see all my files.

 

Not happy I have to use a beta, but al least my server is up with the new hardware and all my files are accessable now...

 

Dave

 

[bkastner]

6.0-beta4 installed, then it saw all my drives from the LSI SAS 3008 with the IT BIOS.

 

I did not even lost any data, and it is doing a parity rebuild now, but I can browse and see all my files.

 

Not happy I have to use a beta, but al least my server is up with the new hardware and all my files are accessable now...

 

Dave

 

for what it's worth, even though it's beta you should not face any issues. Most of us have spent more time using beta UnRAID software than RTM. Since UnRAID 6.0 is built on Slackware 14.1 it likely includes the necessary drivers, while UnRAID 5.0.X is still based on Slackware 13 (I think), which may be the cause of your issues.

 

Either way, glad to hear you are up and running, and I wouldn't sweat the fact you are on a beta release. Tom's  beta releases are historically very solid and stable.

[[email protected]]

I can honestly say, UNRAID is THE MOST AMAZING NAS OS EVER.

 

Here is why, and I told all my friends if I got through this, no other NAS would be worth a crap.

 

I got anew job with Cisco/Sourcefire, and I needed to config my home lab, required for the job.  I decided to use an ESX server I had lying around, all I needed was some drives.  So, I went and bought a new 3TB drive to replace any of the 1TB drives in my unRAID server, figured I would upgrade whenever I could.

 

So, I pulled a 1TB drive and paired it with another I had not being used to make the 1TB mirror in my ESX server.  No biggie, I would just rebuild the unRAID with the new 3TB and enjoy the extra space.  Well, wouldn't you know it, my dated nForce DFI LP4 board with a 4800+ CPU would not get past post when I tried to reboot, it would just hang after mem count.  I thought crap, I have a spare board just for this case.  Well, my spare board was a SuperMicro with only 4 SATA ports, and I had a 16 port adaptec I thought I would use.  None of the controllers, the Adapter or the onboard SATA supported 64 bit LBA, so they would not see the 3TB drives, only the smaller ones.  I was stuck, so I decided to buy a ASrock z87 extreme11-a/c with 22 SATA/SAS ports.  I figured since it was such a new board, it would have to support the bigger drives, and I would also not have to deal with a controller, everything off the mobo.  (my DFI LP4 had 8 sata ports, and then I used a Highpoint 4 port to cover the other drives).

 

Well, then the Asrock arrives, and it does not support JBOD.  I go through the trouble of flash the wrong BIOS with the SAS2FLASH utility, and after 3 bad flashes I get to the point that the controller BIOS no longer even shows up.  I think I am OK because the flash utility still sees the card, just no BIOS is installed that works.  After looking around, I find the SAS3flash util, and what I think is the correct IT BIOS for my onboard LSI SAS3008 controller.  A little luck and I flash the correct BIOS, and all my drives show up in the BIOS now.

 

Well, then I have unRAID problems.  I can only see my drives when plugged into the onboard SATA controller, and the LSI card, with the IT BIOS, will not show up.  This never gets solved, so I decided to go with the 6.0 BETA of unRAID.  Upon 1st boot, the BETA sees everything and I begin to rebuild my volume.  While it is rebuilding, I can see most of my data.  I think there are a few directories missing, ones that were on the drive I pulled, and while I am doing a parity rebuild, I am not sure I did everything correctly.  I reset the unRAID config when I was trying to get the drives detected, and I think this messed up my rebuild of what was on the drive I repurposed.  In the end, I have about 90%+ of my data back, which is good enough.  I think I lost my Technet ISO files, which I can easily re-download.  Many of the important things I have backed up elsewhere, like on my Thecus N5200pro and my Drobo Pro 8 drive model.  Once I get everything 100% on the unraid, I will sync my volume with the last backup I did on the other NAS'.  All in all, I am surprised I went through such drastic changes after a mobo failure, and the fact I lost so little data, and could have lost none if I knew what I was doing.  Happy and amazed at how well this NAS OS handled what I threw at it.  My last unRAID was the 5.01 BETA, and that ran for over a year, so I guess I am good wit the 6.0 BETA.

 

Here is the IT BIOS:

 

www.davelikesbeer.com/lsi_it_mode_sas3008.zip

 

and if you want to go back to stock IR mode and make RAID0/2/10 array, like the way it shipped:

 

www.davelikesbeer.com/lsi_ir_mode_sas3008.zip