Reuse older servers - suggestion recommendation

[DAXQ]

Well I tried to take the second card out and cannot see for sure how to get it outa there, did remove some components and video it, but don't think its much more help than the photo: https://photos.app.goo.gl/AUz6BKEpzwGQJGLt5 - i'll keep trying though.

 

[PhiloEpisteme]

Yeah, that looks exactly like the expander I use, IBM 46M0997.

 

[DAXQ]

Got it:

FRU 46M0997 = IBM LSI 16 port SAS Sata 6gbit Raid Expander Card

Was in there tight!, Gotta hold a bunch of clips opened, and have your tongue twisted just right!

 

[tfran1990]

There you go. now just a HBA.
you may want to boot to centos to see what FW that expander has on it. you need to have FW 634A.

There is a very good tut on youtube that will help a ton.

 

[blueether]

Not much room in there with the expaned in the slot is there ;)

In this case I'd just get the m1015 and flash that, all done for $15US

 

[DAXQ]

K you guys totally have me sold on getting a different card - since I am getting the different card, would this be a wise move:

The one thing I would point out is that the M1015 is a PCIe 2.0 card and the older tech tends to run a little hotter. If you are looking to buy a new (to you) card, you might be better served to go with one like this:
- HP H220 6Gbps SAS PCI-E 3.0 HBA LSI 9207-8i P20 IT Mode for ZFS FreeNAS unRAID
https://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-H220-6G...0-IT-Mode-for-ZFS-FreeNAS-unRAID/162862201664
It is a PCIe 3.0 card with a newer chipset. Does the same job, but it runs a little cooler.

Or just stick with the M1015?

 

[tfran1990]

K you guys totally have me sold on getting a different card - since I am getting the different card, would this be a wise move:

The one thing I would point out is that the M1015 is a PCIe 2.0 card and the older tech tends to run a little hotter. If you are looking to buy a new (to you) card, you might be better served to go with one like this:
- HP H220 6Gbps SAS PCI-E 3.0 HBA LSI 9207-8i P20 IT Mode for ZFS FreeNAS unRAID
https://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-H220-6G...0-IT-Mode-for-ZFS-FreeNAS-unRAID/162862201664
It is a PCIe 3.0 card with a newer chipset. Does the same job, but it runs a little cooler.

Or just stick with the M1015?

Right now that h220 card is the cheapest hba that does pcie 3.0 i am waiting on mine to come from china, i was able to get one for 26$ free shipping. cant go wrong with a h220

i will have to flash mine,tho. if you can flash it your self and have no problem waiting for the shipping, its a good deal.
This one

 

[PhiloEpisteme]

- HP H220 6Gbps SAS PCI-E 3.0 HBA LSI 9207-8i P20 IT Mode for ZFS FreeNAS unRAID
https://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-H220-6G...0-IT-Mode-for-ZFS-FreeNAS-unRAID/162862201664
It is a PCIe 3.0 card with a newer chipset. Does the same job, but it runs a little cooler.

If I'm not mistaken the board in question is a PCIe2.0 board. If that is true I'd think that you'd only save on power/heat with a newer card and not performance.

 

[DAXQ]

On the MB is a PCI-X slot - was trying to determine if the card would work, but if it runs cooler, and will work in that slot, might be the way to go. The documentation calles em:

PCI expansion slots:
v Two PCI Express riser cards with two
PCI Express x8 slots (x8 lanes) each,
standard
v Support for the following optional riser
cards:
– Two 133 MHz/64-bit PCI-X 1.0a slots
– One PCI Express x16 slot (x16 lanes)

 

[DAXQ]

Right now that h220 card is the cheapest hba that does pcie 3.0 i am waiting on mine to come from china, i was able to get one for 26$ free shipping. can't go wrong with a h220

i will have to flash mine,tho. if you can flash it your self and have no problem waiting for the shipping, its a good deal.
This one

OK enough debating - ordered the $29.99 in ur link (guess they raised the price from 26$) from China, suppose if I cannot flash it myself, shouldn't be doing it!

 

[DAXQ]

Just got the card today, put into the server and got this:

So next will be figuring out how to flash the SAS controller FW 634A
And then to flash the H220 card!

 

[DAXQ]

Well having issue, I used the sas2flsh.exe from freeDos

Says it flashed fine, and when I try and run sas2flash.exe -f 9204.4~1.bin I get:

That NVData Image Does not match subsystem ID

And right now cannot do anything with it but, give it a FW to use. Any suggestions?
(had really hope to make this work without having to come back to you guys, but I suppose this is how we learn!) - I do have teh card installed in the server, and connected tot eh expander board (which I havent flashed yet either - is that the subsystem its talking about or that its a HP branded card? Just not sure where to head next.

 

[DAXQ]

Think I made some progress, much searching and seems I had to use an older version of sas2flsh.exe - P14 - took forever to find that and download it, but finally managed. Flashing finished, and now I have:

New problem is I don't see the LSI raid configure in the boot up any more? Gonna keep plugin away and Googleing, then will try and flash the expander next. Any insight or tips would be great!

 

[blueether]

Did you wipe the card's bios when flashing it?

 

[DAXQ]

The instructions I was using had me:
sas2flash -listall (worked fine)
then sas2flash -o -e 6 (which also worked fine)
then sas2flash -f 9204.bin - which got me to the broke state above.

Trying to resolve broke, another post I was reading, lead me to running:
megarec -cleanflash 0 (which ran fine)
then megarec -writesbr sbrempty.bin (which never ran correctly, complained about something I cannot recall)

And finally I found the post that lead me to the P14 version
sas2flsh(p14).exe -f 9204.bin (which wrote the flash and started listing the version 20, but my LSI config at boot seemed to disappear.)
I also added the sas2flsh(p14).exe -o -sasadd withmyaddressnumber just in case that was causing the no boot issue.

If I cleared the cards bios with those commands - then probably.

 

[blueether]

Not sure on your card but there may be an extra step needed to flash the boot rom (sas2flash -b mptsas2.rom on the IBM cards)

megarec -cleanflash 0 wipes the boot rom as well I believe

 

[DAXQ]

Well I took a break from the H220, and tried the expander flash - this dude

at this link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw4TTI_HYqM is figgen awesome. The Expander went literally without a hitch.

So now I seem to need to find the ROM (wish I had found the P14 before the megarec!)

Onward!

 

[blueether]

Do you need the boot rom if you are only running it as a HBA?

 

[DAXQ]

I duno - will stick some drives in it and see what she does!

 

[DAXQ]

Well slick my willy looky there:

Come to think of it what would I need the configuration part for? Would there be any pros or cons to running like this?