1 of 4 new HDD not recognized

[dubya]

Bit of a long story, apologies. I'm brand new to TrueNAS or NAS technology at all, haven't dabbled in tech (computer insides) for almost a decade, so a bit rusty.

I have some older hardware (XFX MB-N780-ISH9 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 780i SLI motherboard, 4-core CPU, 8Gb RAM) with a new cheap Kingston 240Gb SSD and 4 brand new WD Red 4TB drives.
I have TrueNAS installed on the SSD and had it running with 2 test SSD's (Kingston 240Gb; only to test the concept of a NAS) a few days ago. I just acquired the 4 WD Red 4TB drives. I put them in the case and hooked up to the motherboard (replacing the 2 SSD used for testing only), but only 3 are being recognized in the BIOS.
I have tried different SATA cables and different ports, so I think the hard drives are all good (they are brand new, so makes sense). For some reason the BIOS is only picking up 3 out of 4 HDD drives. Even when I disconnect the 240Gb SSD, it still only picked up 3 of the 4 HDD.

I do not have an HBA, just using the onboard controller on the board. It has 6 SATA ports.

If this is not the right place to ask, I'd appreciate some advice on where to find answers (some googling didn't result in anything useful).

Any advice on what I could try to diagnose the issue and hopefully fix it?

Motherboard: XFX MB-N780-ISH9 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 780i SLI
8 Gb RAM
4-core CPU
240 Gb Kingston SSD
4 x 4Tb WD Red drive
630 W power supply
EVGA e-GeForce 9800GTX PCI-E graphics card

Thanks!

 

[NugentS]

What happens if you move the disks onto different ports - does the fault move around. Can you tie the fault to a particular HDD or a particular port?
Your hardware is err on the old side - low memory, no ECC, DDR2 but I guess you know that.

 

[dubya]

What happens if you move the disks onto different ports - does the fault move around. Can you tie the fault to a particular HDD or a particular port?
Your hardware is err on the old side - low memory, no ECC, DDR2 but I guess you know that.

Sorry, I should have mentioned, I did try to chase the error. I tested each of the 4 WD drives individually, they are all picked up in the BIOS (I did not boot beyond that). I also tried all 6 SATA ports with my 240Gb SSD boot drive, every port does pick up the SSD in BIOS (again, did not boot every time).

It seems all the ports work, all the drives work, but when I put all 5 drives (4 HDD + SSD), it will not pick up the 4th HDD.

I realize the hardware is older, but I'm trying to get this done on a budget, I have no need for high performance (yet), just some shared network storage for me and my girlfriend, with several machines in the house. We inherited the hardware from my father in law (looks to be a self-built machine).

I assume since the motherboard has 6 SATA ports, it should be able to run up to 6 drives, right? (No other SATA drives connected).

 

[NugentS]

AwardBIOS - that takes me back.
I can't see any reason that you can't use all the SATA ports. I am assuming you have checked the BIOS but there doesn't seem to be anything obvious in there having flicked through the manual.
Are the drives recognized in the BIOS, but not TN - or not recognized at all?

 

[Alecmascot]

4 x 4Tb WD Red drive

Are these EFAX SMR Drives ? (No bearing on this issue, just one for later)
Are you running the latest BIOS for the MB ?

 

[dubya]

The drives are WD40EFAX SMR. (I'm cursing myself that I forgot about the SMR vs PMR/CMR thing, but like I said, on a budget)

I haven't checked the BIOS version, that would be a good next step.

The picking up issue is in the BIOS, not TN, I haven't gotten that far yet. I really wanted a 4 drive NAS (1 parity), so I've been trying to get them all recognized in BIOS first.

 

[NugentS]

Then you have a BIOS issue / mainboard issue / hardware issue. Not sure we can help you here (much)
As for the SMR bit - send them back and get CMR. SMR drives will cause you major issues. If you can't send them back then I suggest (after fixing the drive recognition issue) a different NAS Software (OMV, UnRaid etc). You do not want to use SMR with ZFS

That probably sounds harsh it is however realistic