Supermicro "AOC-SAS2LP-MV8" 8-port SAS/SATA compatible with UNRAID 6

[rbm]

Hi,

 

I'm very new to UNRAID and am currently evaluating v6.5 for use at home (in the 30-day evaluation).  As you see in my signature, I have an older ASUS MB in a Rosewill rack case with 12 bays.  The MB doesn't have enough SATA to support so may bays so I'm contemplating a PCI Express-base card for SATA port expansion.  I read the UNRAID wiki and know that LSI cards are recommended.

 

The card I'm contemplating is the Supermicro AOC-SAS2LP-MV8.  It's an 8-port JBOD mode only card with 2 x SFF-8087 mini-SAS Internal Connectors that supports SAS or SATA up to 6Gb/s.

 

To anyone's knowledge, is this card compatible with UNRAID v6.5?

[JorgeB]

Compatible yes, recommended no, get an LSI instead.

[rbm]

Thanks for the feedback.  I'll continue to experiment with UNRAID v6.5 with my current hardware configuration, meanwhile researching the LSI PCIe SATA offerings.  I'm not in a rush at the moment. 

[HellDiverUK]

The SAS2LP works great if you don't intend running VMs on your unRAID.  When you enable VM support, the wheels fall off the Marvell controller driver, and you'll either get an unstable card, or it just won't work.

 

 

[Squid]

Some users though will have recurring parity check errors on that card.  Regardless if IOMMU is enabled or not.

[MvL]

2 hours ago, HellDiverUK said:

The SAS2LP works great if you don't intend running VMs on your unRAID.  When you enable VM support, the wheels fall off the Marvell controller driver, and you'll either get an unstable card, or it just won't work.

 

 

Is this a driver issue? So it is fixable?

[Squid]

6 minutes ago, MvL said:

Is this a driver issue? So it is fixable?

Yes and no.  Some people have zero problems with that card (myself included)  Others have nothing but problems.  Seems to be highly hardware dependent on whether you're going to see the issues or not.  Unfortunately its too hit or miss to determine ahead of time

[MvL]

Clear Squid. Thanks!

[HellDiverUK]

It's something to do with the Marvell drivers which are a binary blob.  It's something Marvell would need to fix. 

 

Personally I've not had any problems with it.

[demonmaestro]

I've had the Supermicro AOC-SAS2LP-MV8 and had issues with it. Moved over to a LSI MegaRaid. Cost is roughly the same.  I would recommend the LSI as well if your MoBo doesn't have enought sata slots.

[kizer]

I had relatively no issues with that card for several years. 

I think around 6.4 I started having a weird issue where I would have 2 parity sync issues and then after the next parity check they would be gone. Then the following check I would have 2 errors again and of course following the next check they would be gone. 

 

As soon as I took the card out and switched to my current build I've not had a single parity issue. 

[tdallen]

I had the AOC-SAS2LP with an older Asus motherboard.  I do not run VMs on that machine.  I had problems with that setup from the unRAID 6 beta days until I got rid of the card last year.  I think it is a decent piece of hardware but the driver/software compatibility issues on unRAID aren’t worth dealing with.  Get an LSI based card.

Edited April 12, 2018 by tdallen