USB 3(.x) to 5G/10G Ethernet Support?

patrickjp93

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Jan 3, 2020
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Hi Team,

It seems the last time someone asked about this was 2016, and the answer at the time was "mostly no." These days, is there support for USB 3 to 5G/10G Ethernet adapters? Only specific ones like Intel/Aquantia? (since Realtec was garbage back then apparently...).

The reason I ask is I'm torn between going with a native 10G motherboard with 2 OcuLink ports adapted to 8 SATA drives, or going with 8 native SATA ports and being stuck with 2 1G NICs or 1 5G NIC in an M-ITX form factor. If I can just adapt a 10G NIC to a USB 3.1 port, then that saves me close to $200 in motherboard, ECC RAM, and adapters for the OcuLink.
 

sretalla

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How robust are you expecting your FreeNAS server to be?

That will basically drive your answer. USB adapters are not robust.
 

sretalla

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USB controllers are known to be problematic and therefore less reliable than board-integrated or PCIe devices.

They can also be more prone to accidental removal. The fact that they are removable and the connector is designed to facilitate that is also problematic.

I won't comment further on the fact that you mention it runs reliably for you on a PC rig.
 

patrickjp93

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Jan 3, 2020
Messages
48
USB controllers are known to be problematic and therefore less reliable than board-integrated or PCIe devices.

They can also be more prone to accidental removal. The fact that they are removable and the connector is designed to facilitate that is also problematic.

I won't comment further on the fact that you mention it runs reliably for you on a PC rig.
Do you have any sources on this lack of reliability? And more to the point, does the current version of FreeNAS now support using these kind of devices?
 

sretalla

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