Supermicro JBOD Chassis

[andymiller]

 

Ive seen a few of these Supermicro JBOD servers floating around on ebay and am looking to get one to put unraid onto. The manual says the embedded LSI controller will be in IT mode which should be ok and I plan to throw 2 1tb m.2 NVME drives into the x8 pcie slots as a cache drive and a Mellanox x2 10gb card which I already have.

 

Just wondered if anyone has any experience with this chassis or can spot any potential issues running unraid??

 

Thanks.

[electron286]

There are many people using Supermicro servers now with Unraid.  One of the types of cards often used are the various LSI controllers running in IT or JBOD mode.  They are well built and reliable.  There are some specific LSI controllers that have little quirks, but most have NO issues at all.  The prices used server equipment runs at, is also well worth the try, even if you end up buying a different controller later, even if it is just a different model, usually a good controller can be bought used for well under $100.

 

  I can not comment on the m.2 drives, or the 10gb cards, as I have not looked into them, nor used them myself.

[Dr. Ew]

I’ve got several of those. I have two traditional servers, and then two I have swapped out the backplane and use them as storage Enclosures. After a few hiccups on the storage Enclosures, I’m all set up and loving it.

 

As your needs grow, you can add another HBA when needed. The Mellanox NIC’s work just fine. Depending on other machines in your network you want to access the server, you may consider a Chelsio T580 instead. I use both. I thought the Mellanox allowed for QSFP+ to SFP+ breakout cables, but it does not. It’s either 2 40gbe ports or 2 10gbe ports. The chelsio does the same and also allows for the breakout cables. I use the Chelsio to connect to my switch, 2nd UnRAID server, Workstation, and Hackintosh. The Mellanox is used for 40gbe direct connection.

 

you may want to grab a Supermicro add-on card, dual NvME, and save one pcie slot. You can also get a riser card that has dual 10gbe and 2 to 4 NvME ports. I’ve seen them go for as low as $200.