BUILD How can we add USB3.0 support to older baseboards

[AndyB78]

Hello,

My FreeNAS server is based on older hardware:

- Supermicro X8DTL-i
- E5520 CPU
- 6GB DD3 triple channel (3 x 2GB SuperTalent DD3 @ 1333Mhz working at 1066Mhz)

This leaves me without USB 3.0 support. Considering I have to download from the NAS ~1.3TB of data each week, this is inconvenient. Now I am FTPing from a PC with USB3.0 support to perform the download but I'd like to ditch this method.

In an extremely far fetched attempt I have purchased a LogiLink PC0054A PCI Express USB3.0 adapter. I have reinstalled FreeNAS 9.3 but of course it hasn't picked it up.

Is there any way to get USB3.0 support other then purchasing an entire new platform (baseboard, CPU)?

Thanks!

 

[mattbbpl]

As I understand it, USB 3.0 is poorly supported/unstable in FreeNAS anyway and isn't currently recommended - regardless of your hardware platform.

 

[AndyB78]

Oh...this means I shouldn't invest any significant amount of money (i.e. new server platform) for this. Thanks!

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

Oh...this means I shouldn't invest any significant amount of money (i.e. new server platform) for this. Thanks!

If you want to pull data directly from your FreeNAS, eSATA is a better bet than USB<anything>.

<obligatory>You have less than the minimum required RAM for FreeNAS 9.3.</obligatory>

 

[AndyB78]

Hi,

I also don't have eSATA but I guess I could use a SATA 2 eSATA bracket but then again I don't know how to connect the external USB3.0 HDDs (this is what I use for offloading the data from the NAS) to the eSATA port. Are there eSATA - USB3 convertors?

As for the RAM, yes I know and it bothers me too but unfortunately this is how I received the platform and all the 3 available dimm slots are all used. I'll have to replace the dimms when I'll receive some budget for it but for now (6+ months) it seems to work fine. I am not using deduplication and the compression is lz4 (apparently used with a ratio of 1.00) and the incoming data rate is about 5-15MB/s and the outgoing is about 70MB/s. I have not noticed any RAM shortage related issues (but I am also not sure what to look for).

Kind regards!

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

I don't know how to connect the external USB3.0 HDDs ... to the eSATA port.

You don't. You use an external enclosure or drive dock with eSATA. Note that this doesn't necessarily mean discarding the USB drive you already have. Most likely you can shuck the disk.