Confused about that LSI card? Join the crowd ...

Status
Not open for further replies.

jgreco

Resident Grinch
Joined
May 29, 2011
Messages
18,681
Some 2308 based cards support 1024 devices.

Which isn't really meaningful since 512 devices per SAS multilane (4 x 6Gbps) gets you 3 GBytes/sec, which if divided by 12 drives gives you 250MBytes/sec to each drive, but if divided by 512 gives you 6MBytes/sec to each drive. I'm sure that'd be useful on archival systems but on a ZFS pool it's ... limiting.
 

Ericloewe

Server Wrangler
Moderator
Joined
Feb 15, 2014
Messages
20,175
Which isn't really meaningful since 512 devices per SAS multilane (4 x 6Gbps) gets you 3 GBytes/sec, which if divided by 12 drives gives you 250MBytes/sec to each drive, but if divided by 512 gives you 6MBytes/sec to each drive. I'm sure that'd be useful on archival systems but on a ZFS pool it's ... limiting.
Let's just call it an asymptotic approximation of infinity for all practical purposes.
 
Joined
Nov 11, 2014
Messages
1,174

Ericloewe

Server Wrangler
Moderator
Joined
Feb 15, 2014
Messages
20,175
In this case you can run a small datacener with 1 card. Awesome !:))))
At some point, a highly-trained gorilla handling tapes might just be faster...
 

marbus90

Guru
Joined
Aug 2, 2014
Messages
818
Which isn't really meaningful since 512 devices per SAS multilane (4 x 6Gbps) gets you 3 GBytes/sec, which if divided by 12 drives gives you 250MBytes/sec to each drive, but if divided by 512 gives you 6MBytes/sec to each drive. I'm sure that'd be useful on archival systems but on a ZFS pool it's ... limiting.
And then you put an 1 or 10Gbe interface behind that and your point is moot because those pipes aren't fast either. Also, IOPS.
 

jgreco

Resident Grinch
Joined
May 29, 2011
Messages
18,681
And then you put an 1 or 10Gbe interface behind that and your point is moot because those pipes aren't fast either. Also, IOPS.

Really? Try it. Put a pool with a large number of drives behind a 24Gbps multilane and then run a scrub. You'll find that you're suddenly getting all sorts of bizarre performance artifacts.
 

GrahamBB

Explorer
Joined
Sep 6, 2014
Messages
77
So, I have the IBM card, I have wade through the advice here, and have ended up with not a one of the win machines having the ability to accommodate the card so that I can flash it.

Has anyone used the BSD option and flashed the card in (in our case installed but not yet configured) Freeness system? If so, is there a how to anywhere (I can't find it, but am hoping)?

When using this card, should we leave the original (Dell) controller in the machine or remove it?

Finally, does the IBM card require any control cables - to be clear I mean anything other than the SATA connectors?

Cheers
 

jgreco

Resident Grinch
Joined
May 29, 2011
Messages
18,681
You don't necessarily need to do all the steps on a single machine. In fact, sometimes you cannot (especially if you're bringing across some of the Dell controllers from Dell to LSI mode, the flasher for that's DOS-only). You can do the sas2flash portions on the FreeNAS box if that works out better.

You may as well remove the Dell controller since it is only going to burn watts, but you don't have to. The M1015 merely requires the SFF8087 cables, though if you have a backplane that uses them, you might want to get cables with sideband support.
 

GrahamBB

Explorer
Joined
Sep 6, 2014
Messages
77
I'll try on the FreeNAS system, thanks!!!
 

GrahamBB

Explorer
Joined
Sep 6, 2014
Messages
77
OK, so after frustration after frustration (and 2 days of buggering about so far) we still have not managed to get the card flashed.

Is there a source of ready flashed cards? Or an alternative card that does the job and is 'ready to plug in and go'?

Cheers
 

Ericloewe

Server Wrangler
Moderator
Joined
Feb 15, 2014
Messages
20,175
Have you followed the instructions from servethehome? They work, you just need to do the sas2flash part from EFI instead of DOS.
 

GrahamBB

Explorer
Joined
Sep 6, 2014
Messages
77
That was the first line of attack. I can boot the FreeNAS system using UEFI, but in that mode the LSI card is not found.

We have tried the BSD install, by mounting a USB drive and running it from there, and ditto (IIRC, my notes are in the office),

We tried on a Vista PC using the DOS version, all failed there. We tried compatibility mode too.

Now put into a modern Dell, running Win7, and the machine will not go into setup mode to try the UEFI version.

Q do we need to load a windows driver so the card can be seen on e.g. w7 or Vista?

Of course it's also possible that I'm missing something or mixing things up. The actually command line seems to be different using different methods........

Confusingly so!

Cheers
 

Ericloewe

Server Wrangler
Moderator
Joined
Feb 15, 2014
Messages
20,175
Windows should have a driver for the card. The tools shouldn't require it, though.

At what point are you? Has the card been wiped with megarec?
 

GrahamBB

Explorer
Joined
Sep 6, 2014
Messages
77
We finally made it, after much swapping between systems and splitting the operations between those machines.

Thanks for all the help!
 

mstang1988

Contributor
Joined
Aug 20, 2012
Messages
102
Tonight I flashed an LSI 9207-8i to IT mode and installed it in my system. The LSI controller itself is recognized and I can access it in the BIOS but no disks that are attached to it. I put the disks back on my intel integrated SATA ports and they are fine so I know the physical disks themselves are fine.

Any ideas or thoughts on how to debug?
 

Ericloewe

Server Wrangler
Moderator
Joined
Feb 15, 2014
Messages
20,175
Tonight I flashed an LSI 9207-8i to IT mode and installed it in my system. The LSI controller itself is recognized and I can access it in the BIOS but no disks that are attached to it. I put the disks back on my intel integrated SATA ports and they are fine so I know the physical disks themselves are fine.

Any ideas or thoughts on how to debug?
Have you checked if the disks are visible in FreeNAS?
The P16 BIOS extension ROM has a known issue where it fails to properly display disks at times.
 

mstang1988

Contributor
Joined
Aug 20, 2012
Messages
102
It was the cable. Oddly enough the same cable was used in a server and had no issues until I pulled it. The cable was a mini-sas -> 4 sata.
 

mstang1988

Contributor
Joined
Aug 20, 2012
Messages
102
Just upgraded to 9.3.0.0 and it's complaining about my firmware level on my LSI adapter. I have P20 and the driver is P16. I don't see a P16 firmware level available for the 9207-8i. Has somebody been able to find one?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top