SOLVED - TrueNAS SCALE - Hard Drives Visible in lsblk but Not in GUI

[bhk]

Hi everyone,

I've recently encountered a peculiar issue with my TrueNAS SCALE setup that I'm hoping to get some insight on. I have several hard drives that are properly connected and appear to be functioning normally. When I use the `lsblk` command in the Linux shell, these drives are listed as expected. However, when I switch to the TrueNAS SCALE GUI, these same drives are not showing up under the "Disks" section.

This is quite puzzling as it indicates the system recognizes the drives, but they're not being reflected in the GUI. I've checked the usual suspects like connections and drive health, but everything seems to be in order. I'm wondering if there's a configuration step I might have missed or if this is indicative of a deeper issue.

Has anyone else experienced this? What steps did you take to resolve it? Any suggestions on troubleshooting methods or settings to check would be greatly appreciated. I'm eager to get these drives properly integrated into my setup.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Error from notification center:

Error: (sqlite3.IntegrityError) UNIQUE constraint failed: storage_disk.disk_identifier [SQL: INSERT INTO storage_disk (disk_identifier, disk_name, disk_subsystem, disk_number, disk_serial, disk_lunid, disk_size, disk_description, disk_transfermode, disk_hddstandby, disk_advpowermgmt, disk_togglesmart, disk_smartoptions, disk_passwd, disk_model, disk_rotationrate, disk_type, disk_bus) VALUES (?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?, ?)] [parameters: ('{serial_lunid}ZR53LS130000C201CDJ7_5000c500d7a0bc03', 'sddf', 'scsi', 18128, 'ZR53LS130000C201CDJ7', '5000c500d7a0bc03', 18000207937536, '', 'Auto', 'Always On', 'Disabled', 1, '', '', 'ST18000NM004J', '7200', 'HDD', 'SCSI')] (Background on this error at: https://sqlalche.me/e/14/gkpj)

 

[Arwen]

First off, MegaRAID SAS cards are not really supported with TrueNAS or ZFS. If that specific card can be set to IT firmware, that is different. But, I don't have knowledge about that...

From the error message, it appears that the disk is behind a RAID or USB controller, which hides the disk serial numbers. TrueNAS uses disk serial numbers to keep separate which disk is which disk.

If you can give the exact disk layout and how they are connected, it would help. Please include all the disks make and models.

 

[bhk]

We also have an adaptec SmartRAID 3154-8e card, but it does not work. We have 106x 18 TB Seagate Exos X18 hard drives in a JBOD. The JBOD is attached to a head node.

 

[bhk]

It seems TrueNAS recognizes one drive more after each reboot of the head node.

 

[PhilD13]

You mention EXOS drives but no model number. Are the drives the EXOS X18 drives or are they the EXOS 2X18 drives?
Can you provide the model number of the drives you bought?

 

[Arwen]

From what you have written, your disks are on a SAS Expander in JBOD(s). That should work. But, you need to check your disk controller;
MegaRAID SAS 9341-4i Single, 4-Port Int.(SFF-8643), 12Gb/s SAS/SATA, PCIe 3.0 x8, LP + FH
because ZFS & TrueNAS don't support hardware RAID controllers.

What's all the noise about HBAs, and why can't I use a RAID controller?

1) An HBA is a Host Bus Adapter. This is a controller that allows SAS and SATA devices to be attached to, and communicate directly with, a server. RAID controllers typically aggregate several disks into a Virtual Disk abstraction of some sort...

www.truenas.com

This mentions the possibility of cross flashing a MegaRAID SAS controller with IT mode firmware. I have no other knowledge about this doc;

Cross-flashing Dell H310 & H710 Mini to IT Mode

You might remember fourlynx's guide on flashing the H310 Mini Mono to IT Mode - been working with him on coming up with a similar guide for all variations of the H710 Mini as well so you no longer have to pay 4x the card price to get one...

www.truenas.com

Edit: Put in the correct link to cross flashing MegaRAID...

 

[bhk]

The model number is ST18000NM004J.

You mention EXOS drives but no model number. Are the drives the EXOS X18 drives or are they the EXOS 2X18 drives?
Can you provide the model number of the drives you bought?

 

[bhk]

From what you have written, your disks are on a SAS Expander in JBOD(s). That should work. But, you need to check your disk controller;
MegaRAID SAS 9341-4i Single, 4-Port Int.(SFF-8643), 12Gb/s SAS/SATA, PCIe 3.0 x8, LP + FH
because ZFS & TrueNAS don't support hardware RAID controllers.

What's all the noise about HBAs, and why can't I use a RAID controller?

1) An HBA is a Host Bus Adapter. This is a controller that allows SAS and SATA devices to be attached to, and communicate directly with, a server. RAID controllers typically aggregate several disks into a Virtual Disk abstraction of some sort...

www.truenas.com

This mentions the possibility of cross flashing a MegaRAID SAS controller with IT mode firmware. I have no other knowledge about this doc;

What's all the noise about HBAs, and why can't I use a RAID controller?

1) An HBA is a Host Bus Adapter. This is a controller that allows SAS and SATA devices to be attached to, and communicate directly with, a server. RAID controllers typically aggregate several disks into a Virtual Disk abstraction of some sort...

www.truenas.com

The drives should be recognized when using the SmartRAID 3154-8e card set to HBA mode.

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

"SmartRAID set to HBA mode" != HBA. Anything but a true HBA with HBA ("IT") firmware is not supported and likely to lead to data loss.

 

[bhk]

I see. Not all disks are reporting their status after pool creation.

"SmartRAID set to HBA mode" != HBA. Anything but a true HBA with HBA ("IT") firmware is not supported and likely to lead to data loss.

 

[Arwen]

I've corrected the second link which may help cross flashing a MegaRAID SAS controller to IT firmware. Don't know anything about it, but here is the link;

Cross-flashing Dell H310 & H710 Mini to IT Mode

You might remember fourlynx's guide on flashing the H310 Mini Mono to IT Mode - been working with him on coming up with a similar guide for all variations of the H710 Mini as well so you no longer have to pay 4x the card price to get one...

www.truenas.com

 

[bhk]

I've corrected the second link which may help cross flashing a MegaRAID SAS controller to IT firmware. Don't know anything about it, but here is the link;

Cross-flashing Dell H310 & H710 Mini to IT Mode

You might remember fourlynx's guide on flashing the H310 Mini Mono to IT Mode - been working with him on coming up with a similar guide for all variations of the H710 Mini as well so you no longer have to pay 4x the card price to get one...

www.truenas.com

Got it, but the JBOD is attached to the SmartRAID 3154-8e card.

 

[Arwen]

Got it, but the JBOD is attached to the SmartRAID 3154-8e card.

Well, if you can't change that SmartRAID 3154-8e card to IT mode type firmware, ZFS & TrueNAS are not suitable for that server. If that is a requirement, look elsewhere for NAS software unless you want to risk your data integrity...

While ZFS can work on plenty of computers, their are many things it won't work on. For example, today, x86_32, ARM32 or any 32 bit architecture is not recommended for OpenZFS. (And TrueNAS does not work on anything except x64 hardware.)

Hardware RAID is another restriction. Consumer, and simple server hardware RAID is just not suitable for ZFS.

 

[bhk]

Well, if you can't change that SmartRAID 3154-8e card to IT mode type firmware, ZFS & TrueNAS are not suitable for that server. If that is a requirement, look elsewhere for NAS software unless you want to risk your data integrity...

While ZFS can work on plenty of computers, their are many things it won't work on. For example, today, x86_32, ARM32 or any 32 bit architecture is not recommended for OpenZFS. (And TrueNAS does not work on anything except x64 hardware.)

Hardware RAID is another restriction. Consumer, and simple server hardware RAID is just not suitable for ZFS.

Thanks, I've got this manual from the support for the installation of the driver https://download.adaptec.com/pdfs/user_guides/adaptec_smarthba_smartraid_iug_7_2023.pdf. Since Scale is Linux-based, would it be possible to use the linux shell for installtion?

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

That controller is fundamentally unsuitable for ZFS even with a vendor provided driver. Don't use.

ZFS was designed to replace RAID controllers not work on top of them.

 

[Arwen]

Thanks, I've got this manual from the support for the installation of the driver https://download.adaptec.com/pdfs/user_guides/adaptec_smarthba_smartraid_iug_7_2023.pdf. Since Scale is Linux-based, would it be possible to use the linux shell for installtion?

TrueNAS SCALE is NOT a Linux distribution. It is more of a firmware OS based on Linux:

Welcome to TrueNAS SCALE - Beginners Intro

Since mid 2021 we have had many new users of TrueNAS wanting to try SCALE. Here are some things that are helpful for new TrueNAS SCALE users to know; SCALE is a specialized & targeted OS based on a Linux distro. However, SCALE is NOT a Linux...

www.truenas.com

Trying to add drivers or other packages to the OS side will not last. Any TrueNAS update would not include such changes.


As I've said before in other threads, there is no perfect free NAS software. TrueNAS, SCALE or Core, both have limitations, (some are the same).

 

[bhk]

Please see attached the debug files.

 

[PhilD13]

Drive model numbers indicate standard SAS drives. Looking at LSBLK, the Smart Data, and pci data, it appears that the serial numbers of the drives are not being passed through to Truenas. That is a requirement if you wish to use Truenas. Truenas currently has no way of knowing what drive is what or where it is located in the system. A result of not passing the drive serial numbers is the duplicating each drive (maybe each time they are accessed?). Currently there appear to be around 34 duplicate entries for each drive in the Smart data which corrousponds to the amount of duplication seen in LSBLK. You are using 2 RAID cards the MegaRaid with the megarais driver and the Adaptec RAID card with the Adaptec card using a RAID driver. One or both cards are not set to IT mode or passtrough mode and Adaptec products are generally not recommended to be anywhere near Truenas from what I understand as they just do not work.

Vendor: SEAGATE
Product: ST18000NM004J
User Capacity: 18,000,207,937,536 bytes [18.0 TB]
Logical block size: 512 bytes
Physical block size: 4096 bytes

RAID bus controller: Broadcom / LSI MegaRAID SAS-3 3008 [Fury] (rev 02)
Subsystem: Broadcom / LSI MegaRAID SAS-3 3008 [Fury]
Kernel driver in use: megaraid_sas
Kernel modules: megaraid_sas

Serial Attached SCSI controller: Adaptec Smart Storage PQI SAS (rev 01)
Subsystem: Adaptec SmartRAID 3154-8e
Kernel driver in use: smartpqi
Kernel modules: smartpqi

I would recommend you do away with the Adaptec card and possibly the Megaraid card too, and get an LSI cards that are pcie3 compatible. and are already in (or flashed to and setup for) IT mode. If the Megaraid is onboard then don't use the onbord SAS connectors as most board level Megaraids chips can't be properly set to IT or passthrough mode.

Once things are sorted, you could set the ashift value to 12 for 4096 as that is the block size native to the drive. Ashift should be set to the physical block size to avoid read-modify-write cycles that happen if you set it smaller than that which slows down access some.

 

[Ericloewe]

If the Megaraid is onboard then don't use the onbord SAS connectors as most board level Megaraids chips can't be properly set to IT or passthrough mode.

It's a SAS3008. It's probably already in IT mode (sas3flash -listall and if it isn't, it's easy to crossflash.

 

[Ericloewe]

Well, what's the output of sas3flash -listall?