SuperMicro continuous issues! Controller issues...


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I haven't heard anyone here question the power supply. This is the one server weakness that can be the most puzzling to diagnose.  Can you replace the power supply?

 

Yes I can but the PSU is not the issue at hand due to it is not under any kind of load and the server has been behind a APC Battery all of its life.

 

nasrunning.png

I said the same thing once, and after replacing the PSU everything was golden.  What I learned, when nothing else makes sense, change the PSU.

 

PSU or power cabling issues will act like you describe. Are all the drives attached to one PSU power lead? 

 

I agree with you that you aren't subjecting your power supply to high load, but the only way to be sure is to swap it out.

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demonmaestro, I think tr0910 is correct in looking at other causes..

 

I've also heard PSUs can cause some funky issues that are difficult to diagnose and I reckon at the moment you're in an unenviable position with your build. 

 

The way I look at it, if for arguments sake the chance of a controller card failing is 1% then to have two fail would be a 0.1% chance.  Not impossible but certainly worth looking at alternative possibilities.

 

Unfortunately it can sometimes be hard to diagnose these issues and it's kind of a matter of trial and error to try and isolate the culprit.

 

I feel your pain, I've been there myself..

 

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I have to say, after reading the initial OP my first thought was PSU. I've had flaky issues in the past that were due to underpowered PSU, but I actually own the same one you did as I overpurchased to eliminate this issue in the future. That being said, there may be an issue there. I would suggest finding somewhere local with a good return policy and try a new PSU - if it doesn't fix the issue you can always return it.

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unRAID 6 has problems with AOC-SAS2LP cards.  You are experiencing the symptoms - perfectly good drives red-balling and dropping out of the array.  At that point you'll get a bad Smart report - IEC Page Mode, etc.  If you reboot you'll get the drive back and be able to run a clean smart report.  In the meantime your array is hosed, though.  If you search the forums you'll find other examples.

 

This happened to me so many times that I eventually just did a new config and did a parity sync when this happened, rather than rebuilding perfectly good data disks.  For me it happened mostly during parity checks.

 

It is probably more accurate to say that the drivers for the AOC-SAS2LP included with the Linux distro that is part of unRAID 6 have problems when used in certain hardware configurations, rather than saying that unRAID 6 has problems.  The net effect is the same, though.  I solved my problems with a series of workarounds - I moved all my drives onto the SAS2LP from the motherboard (I was on both the motherboard and card previously, and I realize you can't do that), I changed out the power supply, and I set my problematic 6TB drives to never spin down.  I've achieved a measure of stability, but it was painful.

 

My recommendation to you is to swap out the AOC-SAS2LP for another card.  The regular SASLP might be better if you can handle x4 bandwidth, but I'd go with a flashed LSI card like the IBM M1015 or Dell PERC. 

 

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unRAID 6 has problems with AOC-SAS2LP cards.  You are experiencing the symptoms - perfectly good drives red-balling and dropping out of the array.  At that point you'll get a bad Smart report - IEC Page Mode, etc.  If you reboot you'll get the drive back and be able to run a clean smart report.  In the meantime your array is hosed, though.  If you search the forums you'll find other examples.

 

This happened to me so many times that I eventually just did a new config and did a parity sync when this happened, rather than rebuilding perfectly good data disks.  For me it happened mostly during parity checks.

 

It is probably more accurate to say that the drivers for the AOC-SAS2LP included with the Linux distro that is part of unRAID 6 have problems when used in certain hardware configurations, rather than saying that unRAID 6 has problems.  The net effect is the same, though.  I solved my problems with a series of workarounds - I moved all my drives onto the SAS2LP from the motherboard (I was on both the motherboard and card previously, and I realize you can't do that), I changed out the power supply, and I set my problematic 6TB drives to never spin down.  I've achieved a measure of stability, but it was painful.

 

My recommendation to you is to swap out the AOC-SAS2LP for another card.  The regular SASLP might be better if you can handle x4 bandwidth, but I'd go with a flashed LSI card like the IBM M1015 or Dell PERC.

 

I have to say I wasn't really aware of issues with these cards. I've used 2 of them for my drives for a couple of years without issue - other than having to set my WD Red 6TB parity drive to never spin down (though I don't need to do this for data drives). However, I have a Norco case with backplanes, so have always had all my drives on the SAS2LP cards and have never tried to combo them with my motherboard SATA controllers, so maybe was lucky and avoided some of the headaches.

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Most people are using them without issue.  However, a handful of us had problems with them during the unRAID 6 beta cycle and some of the results are very consistent.  The hard resets, bad SMART reports, and perfectly good red-balled drives that the OP is seeing are are exactly what I saw  :(.  Probably some kind of hardware/driver compatibility issue.  It wasn't an issue under unRAID 5, so it came as a surprise under unRAID 6.

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Would this work?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816101334R

SUPERMICRO AOC-USAS2-L8i

 

Or should I just get the SUPERMICRO AOC-SASLP-MV8?

 

I'd get a n IBM M1015 or derivative, tried and tested by many on here.  There's even a thread on how to flash them, although I think firmware v20 is dodgy.

 

Last time I tried to get one I couldn't figure out how to flash it even with the thread.

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Would this work?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816101334R

SUPERMICRO AOC-USAS2-L8i

 

Or should I just get the SUPERMICRO AOC-SASLP-MV8?

 

I'd get a n IBM M1015 or derivative, tried and tested by many on here.  There's even a thread on how to flash them, although I think firmware v20 is dodgy.

 

Last time I tried to get one I couldn't figure out how to flash it even with the thread.

 

I've done a couple now and it can be a bit of a pain but it's possible, I seem to remember the biggest trouble is getting the files.

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Would this work?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816101334R

SUPERMICRO AOC-USAS2-L8i

 

Or should I just get the SUPERMICRO AOC-SASLP-MV8?

 

 

 

I'd get a n IBM M1015 or derivative, tried and tested by many on here.  There's even a thread on how to flash them, although I think firmware v20 is dodgy.

 

Last time I tried to get one I couldn't figure out how to flash it even with the thread.

 

I've done a couple now and it can be a bit of a pain but it's possible, I seem to remember the biggest trouble is getting the files.

 

I found one on Ebay saying it has been flashed already to  LSI 9208 IT. Is that the correct mode?

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Ah. Well I have a new SAS2LP that is suppose to be in the mail today and I have a M1015 that should hopefully get to me by the end of the week. It just really sucks that I have lost over 10TB worth of data. Thankfully it was mostly Movies that I have on DVD that I have put onto the server.

 

Although about 1TB worth of it was my YouTube videos that I do.  :-\

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Ah. Well I have a new SAS2LP that is suppose to be in the mail today and I have a M1015 that should hopefully get to me by the end of the week. It just really sucks that I have lost over 10TB worth of data. Thankfully it was mostly Movies that I have on DVD that I have put onto the server.

 

Although about 1TB worth of it was my YouTube videos that I do.  :-\

 

Are you sure you have lost data?  Controller issues don't usually cause loss of data, just loss of access to the drives.  The data is probably still there, but you can't reach it without a working controller.  Controllers are the bridges to the drive islands.  You are just waiting for a new bridge.

 

(I confess I haven't read back through this)

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Ah. Well I have a new SAS2LP that is suppose to be in the mail today and I have a M1015 that should hopefully get to me by the end of the week. It just really sucks that I have lost over 10TB worth of data. Thankfully it was mostly Movies that I have on DVD that I have put onto the server.

 

Although about 1TB worth of it was my YouTube videos that I do.  :-\

 

Are you sure you have lost data?  Controller issues don't usually cause loss of data, just loss of access to the drives.  The data is probably still there, but you can't reach it without a working controller.  Controllers are the bridges to the drive islands.  You are just waiting for a new bridge.

 

(I confess I haven't read back through this)

 

Well I guess we shall see then.

Let me ask you this. Once the M1015 controler comes in I should be able to pop it into the server and rebuild the drive set and have all the data there?

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