Dell PowerEdge R710 storage controller

[Execut1ve]

Hi all,

I am a new Unraid user playing around with the good old R710. I read up on some of the known R710 issues beforehand, so I picked up an H200 storage controller card to replace the H700. I understand the H200 can be crossflashed to IT mode firmware, enabling it to pass through the disks in JBOD fashion, while the H700 cannot. So far everything is working well - my one gripe is that I can't seem to use the crossflashed H200 in the R710's dedicated storage slot. It complains about an invalid pcie device and will not boot, though it works fine in any of the other slots.

 

Does anyone know of a way to get the H200 working in the dedicated storage slot? Perhaps a firmware version that enables IT mode while satisfying the R710 or some other workaround?

 

Failing at that, is there another storage controller card that would work for Unraid and also in the dedicated storage slot?

 

I have been browsing the forums and internet in general looking for info on this problem and haven't found anything yet.

[Execut1ve]

Thought I'd post an update on this - user Transient messaged me privately and pointed me to a Reddit thread:

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/homelab/comments/7p2lzq/how_to_keep_crossflashed_perc_h200_in_dell_r710/

 

Following those steps, the card is now working in the dedicated storage slot. It looks like flashing the card FIRST to the H200i firmware from Dell (i for integrated, not m for modular or a for adapter) makes the difference.

 

Thanks Transient!

Edited February 13, 2018 by Execut1ve

[scubieman]

How has this been running for you with the H200 card?

[Execut1ve]

Been running like a champ - I don't think I've had any issues regarding the H200 storage controller or the drives, once I got it all configured.

[scubieman]

You did a pass through right? Also h200 was mounted in the back so you need longer cables?

[Execut1ve]

I did need to buy longer cables, as the ports on the H200 are in a different spot that can't really be reached with the stock cables (even using the dedicated storage slot) barring really janky ugly cable routing.

 

I am passing through some video cards and peripherals, though not entire drives. I let Unraid handle all the drives.

[scubieman]

Thinking about doing this. I am limited to 2 TB drives each. 

 

What cables did you use?

 

Also you care if I bug you to help with the setup?

 

[Execut1ve]

I am currently using 2 of these, having no trouble whatsoever with them: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812117662

 

You do have to turn a tight right angle with them to get them plugged into the backplane - if you don't mind doing more research and probably spending more, I'm sure you can find a version of this cable that has a 90 degree connector

 

I'm happy to answer any questions about my setup that you might have, though I can't provide a ton of more general advice beyond what worked for me and what I tried that didn't work. I'm currently using 3 2T drives in the array, and 3 SSDs for the cache. My next upgrade will probably be larger SSDs

[scubieman]

You have the 3.5" drive version or 2.5" drive version?

[Execut1ve]

3.5"

[scubieman]

See that changes a lot.

 

I have the 2.5" which finding anything over 2TB is very expensive. It would be almost cheaper to add on a powervault-md1000 so then i can use 3.5" drives.

 

Only seagate makes 2tb and above. there is some enterprise stuff but then your talking hundreds per drive.

[Execut1ve]

Yeah I considered that when making my purchase - the 3.5" allows you to use spare drives from regular PCs too, whereas 2.5" spinning drives are almost all server grade hardware (or shitty laptop drives) that most folks don't have laying around the house.

 

It may be worth switching to the 3.5" - I'm sure you could sell your current server on ebay or something pretty easily and recoup some of your cost

[scubieman]

I just bought mine a few weeks ago. dangit!

[Execut1ve]

I had to go through a few different versions of a couple components before I could get everything to play nice together - I found that the chassis itself seems to be the most expensive component, crazily enough.

 

If you are already happy with the other hardware, ie cpus, ram etc, you might consider picking up a bare bones 3.5" R710 and migrating all your stuff into it, then try to sell what's leftover unused. In the long run, once cost of drives is factored in, this will probably be cheaper.

 

If you are looking to do something weird like put high powered video cards in your setup, or use one of the big boy cpus that are compatible with the R710, there are additional things you'll want to check before you commit

[scubieman]

Here is my 3.5 drive ha ha. I got four cables to do this

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

[scubieman]

yeah for me not sure what to do yet. I can add a powervault on if I want to go way overboard. However I dont think I need that much storage. if I get 2tb x4 drives then is 8 TB. i usually done use much over 2-3.

 

setup when complete..... Hope by christmas

I have 2 cache drives. 600GB 10k

soon to be 1 priority drive handing off the side.

and 1 ssd I use for VM's but may replace with another 600 GB.

rest will be 2 TB for storage array.

[Execut1ve]

Heh if you keep it up with that ghetto cabling, your server will look as cool as mine:

[Execut1ve]

I don't see why what you've proposed won't work. In theory, alls you really need is the 3.5" backplane, and you could frankenstein together an enclosure for it and the drives if you don't mind having it sit on top like where you have that drive now. Or you could pick up a premade 3.5" drive enclosure and run a bunch of SATA / power cables from the 2.5" backplane out to it.

 

I'd recommend thinking hard about using SSDs for your cache - I can't imagine the price point being more hateful than 2.5" 10k rpm server drives, and performance will be better.

 

What's your eventual intended usage for this beast - VMs to play around with, any heavy lifting as far as CPU / video, pure storage, media server, something else?

[scubieman]

Mess around with, VM's, huge is plex but I normally dont store long term. Backup of my personal PC. also a NVR(blue iris)

 

I may just run cables out the front for now or buy a expansion card for iscsi or isata in the rear and get like a 4 drive enclosure.

[scubieman]

It's organized I swear

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

[Execut1ve]

If you aren't pressed for PCIe slots like I was, an additional storage card(s) is always an option, and there are plenty of them out there, both server grade and for the enthusiast level PC. Though I couldn't advise you on how to get it to play nice with Unraid.

[scubieman]

Right now I have nothing in my PCIe slots. I could do some major things with it ha ha.

 

For your cache do you have 2 drives or 1?

 

[Execut1ve]

3, actually. 2 250G and 1 500G SSD for a total of 500G usable cache space. My next upgrade will most like be swapping in some larger SSDs and probably going down to 2 drives in the pool, that way I have room for another big spinning array drive if needed

[scubieman]

you fill your cache drives? 

 

I was wrong. I have 2 300GB using hardware raid(1 mirror) using perc6. Besides a little extra speed. Do i really need more? I do fill it if I am doing big data transfers or odd occasions

 

[Execut1ve]

I like a lot of cache because I have a couple daily driver type VMs that live entirely on cache, including a hundred G or so apiece for games, frequently used programs etc. Each VM also has storage space on the array for bulk items that don't need to be fast.

 

The general thinking is your cache should be large enough to comfortably hold an entire day's worth of new writes to the array. Then, when the Mover is run, it all gets written to the array and you start over fresh the next day. My understanding is if the cache fills up and you need to do still more writes, you'll write directly to the array and lose any of the speed gains you have from the faster cache.

So you should determine your cache size based on how much data you expect to write in a day to your array.