Well hopefully they designed the H200 to work well within the R710. I'm a noob at this so I have no clue how all this stuff is designed. If it burns up then I'll follow your advice and go get a H310.
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Dell PowerEdge R710 used as a NAS?
- Thread starter pwnerman
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Well hopefully they designed the H200 to work well within the R710. I'm a noob at this so I have no clue how all this stuff is designed. If it burns up then I'll follow your advice and go get a H310.
I recently set up an R710 (6-3.5" hdd config) with freenas and have tried both the H200 and H310 cards that have been flashed. The H200 works fine, but the H310 will not show any drives in freenas. Does anyone have a H310 working in ZFS in the R710?
Do you have an H310 working in the R710? I cannot seem to find anyone that has this configuration. I have an H200 working my my R710, but cannot get the H310 to see any drives...it works in another box, though, so the card is functional and properly flashed. Thanks in advance for any insights.
wblock
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No, I don't have an R710. I've read reports of it sometimes being necessary to insulate a couple of the PCIe pins on an H310 to get it to work in certain systems, but have not encountered that with the motherboards I've tried (Supermicro and Gigabyte). And the symptom was that the machine would not boot, not that the drives were not seen.
It's worth checking the firmware revision on the H310, also swapping cables if more than one set is in use.
Go to this link and read step 4. it will help you
https://techmattr.wordpress.com/201...-flashing-to-it-mode-dell-perc-h200-and-h310/
Edit the other guy gave you the same link lol
Hello rbendorf,
I am new to the FreeNAS forum. I have 3 R710 Dell PowerEdge servers. 2 of them with 64GB of RAM installed and Perc 6i controller, 3rd one with 96GB of RAM with an integrated H700 Raid controller. I also have an actual LSI 9211-8i HBA card. I'm very interested in using one of the R710s as a NAS server. For drives I have 4 x 4T WD Red Pro HDDs. I'm familiar with regular PCs, but not with Dell Servers and to attach the HDDs from LSI 9211-8i HBA to the backplane using Mini SAS to 4-SATA SFF-8087 breakout wire.
I know that I have to physically install the card into of the PCIe slots of the R710 server, but beyond that I'm not clear about connecting the mini sas to sata cable to the other end. . Any feedback on that point would be appreciated. Thanks.
Regards,
Neostorm
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I'll save you the time and effort of figuring this out. It took me a good long while. Your best bet is to use the LSI 9211-8i HBA the PERC is ancient and doesn't have a IT Mode and the H700 really isn't necessary.
First you get your HBA flashed into IT Mode on the P20 Firmware. (I cannot tell you how to do this with the LSI card) I personally used a H200 which is just a Dell rebranded 8i. Uses the same firmware and everything.
Once it's flashed into IT mode you are going to need to install it on any of the PCIE slots besides the Dell specific one. Once you do that you are going to need some SAS cables to connect to the backplane. The stock dell cables for the H200 are not long enough to make it to any of the PCIE slots besides the Dell Dedicated one. You are going to need to go buy two of these. http://www.monoprice.com/product?c_id=102&cp_id=10254&cs_id=1025410&p_id=8189&seq=1&format=2
They are very nice quality and you will have a good deal of length to spare. I just put the extra near the back of the server. It didn't hurt airflow or anything so it was all good. You are going to then need to connect each one of those cables to one end of the HBA and the other end you are going to need to connect one to each of the backplane connectors. I have attached a photo for you but you prob know what they are. (The pic is not of an actual R710 backplane. It's just to show the connectors.)
After this you are really good to go and start your OS install and hard drive validation tests. Everything worked perfectly for me following these steps and should for you as well with Freenas.
Also you have no need for breakout cables. SAS and SATA use the same connector. Each one of those SAS cables I just had you run to the backplane can handle about as many drives as the entire system since it only have 6 slots for drives. I forget how many drives exactly the 8i cards can handle but it's over ten. Once you have those SAS cables run from the flashed HBA card to the two connectors shown in the photo on the backplane it should be as simple as just installing the drives in caddies and sliding them into the system.
If you have any questions please let me know. It was a struggle finding info on how to do this with an R710 and I would like to help others. Also if you need help flashing go to that link above from techmatter. He does it for the h200 but the process should be almost the same for the LSI version.
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Hello Pwnernam,
Thank you for the detailed notes and explanation and steps to follow to properly set up an HBA card (i.e LSI-9211-8i, H200, etc) in the R710 Dell server. This will save me lots of wasted time and effort to figure it all out. I did initially buy a breakout cable thinking this is what I needed based on some of the posts I had read. Now I see that they were discussing what is needed for regular PCs or Computers (not a Dell R710). Clearly I was wrong on that count as it relates to the R710 Dell server. Indeed a struggle it is to get the correct info as you rightly stated.
I will purchase two 1m 30AWG Internal Mini SAS 36pin (SFF-8087) Male to Mini SAS 36pin (SFF-8087) Male Cable as shown on the link you provided me. As for the LSI-9211-8i HBA card, I believe that mine is already flashed to IT Mode, but on P19 Firmware. I will double check it by installing the card in a regular PC and follow whatever steps to 1) check current mode/Firmware and 2) Flash it to IT mode P20 Firmware if necessary.
Since the H700 is not necessary, I will use one of the R710 servers with the Perc/6i controller card instead and install the LSI card in one of them and then take it from there. I want to use the 4 x 4TB WD Red Pro HDDs only for storage. Currently there are 2 x 1TB HDDs (RAID-1) attached to those Perc/6i controllers in those other two Dell servers. That is the boot drive. Seems like I have two options, 1) leave this current setup be and use the RAID-1 1TB disk as the boot drive and just attach my storage 4 x 4TB drives to the LSI card once that is installed, or 2) disconnect the RAID-1 1TB boot Disk from the Perc/6i controller and attach to the newly installed LSI HBA card as well along with my 4 x 4TB HDDs? I hope that makes sense. If not then I'll need to get more clarification and provide you more info about about my servers.
I'll keep you posted. Thanks.
Regards,
Neormorph
Thank you for the detailed notes and explanation and steps to follow to properly set up an HBA card (i.e LSI-9211-8i, H200, etc) in the R710 Dell server. This will save me lots of wasted time and effort to figure it all out. I did initially buy a breakout cable thinking this is what I needed based on some of the posts I had read. Now I see that they were discussing what is needed for regular PCs or Computers (not a Dell R710). Clearly I was wrong on that count as it relates to the R710 Dell server. Indeed a struggle it is to get the correct info as you rightly stated.
I will purchase two 1m 30AWG Internal Mini SAS 36pin (SFF-8087) Male to Mini SAS 36pin (SFF-8087) Male Cable as shown on the link you provided me. As for the LSI-9211-8i HBA card, I believe that mine is already flashed to IT Mode, but on P19 Firmware. I will double check it by installing the card in a regular PC and follow whatever steps to 1) check current mode/Firmware and 2) Flash it to IT mode P20 Firmware if necessary.
Since the H700 is not necessary, I will use one of the R710 servers with the Perc/6i controller card instead and install the LSI card in one of them and then take it from there. I want to use the 4 x 4TB WD Red Pro HDDs only for storage. Currently there are 2 x 1TB HDDs (RAID-1) attached to those Perc/6i controllers in those other two Dell servers. That is the boot drive. Seems like I have two options, 1) leave this current setup be and use the RAID-1 1TB disk as the boot drive and just attach my storage 4 x 4TB drives to the LSI card once that is installed, or 2) disconnect the RAID-1 1TB boot Disk from the Perc/6i controller and attach to the newly installed LSI HBA card as well along with my 4 x 4TB HDDs? I hope that makes sense. If not then I'll need to get more clarification and provide you more info about about my servers.
I'll keep you posted. Thanks.
Regards,
Neormorph
First, you will need the P20 firmware.
Second. I don't know how many of the servers you are going to be using for freenas but in the ones that will have freenas wasting a HDD slot for a boot drive is a total waste.
I think just about anyone on this forum would tell you that. All you need for a freenas boot drive is a good name brand flash drive 16 gigs or higher. The Dell D710 has an easily accessible internal usb port for safe internal installation of your boot drive. This is all you need for freenas. These systems are ment to be on constantly for weeks at a time if not longer and once the system is booted the flash drive doesn't do much.
Don't make this complicated. In your freenas boxes get rid of the PERC 6i card. just toss it. All you need to do is follow my above instructions with the H200 or the LSI equivalent connect the SAS cables to the back plane and install the drives. You will then create a bootable flash drive with the install media on it. Your other clean flash drive will go inside the system in the internal usb port. Then you will plug in the install media usb in the back of the R710. Then just boot up the system and go through the install steps.
Also once you get the boot drive up and working and you finally get into Freenas you are going to have to make a decision. If I were you I would buy another two hard drives and populate the entire system with 6 hard drives for storage in a Raid Z2 config. If you only use four disks and then want to add on later you are only going to be able to do a mirrored config between those two drives and then if you add that to your pool it would essentially cancel out any kind of redundancy you had.
Hope this helps.
Also take a look at this guide. It will help. https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/unclefesters-freenas-beginners-guide.43889/
@ rbendorf Thanks for the Tip about Walmart/Newegg and their sale of the mini SAS 36 male connectors. I just got two of those from Monoprice.com as pwnerman had suggested. I got them for about $10 each so I'm happy on that count. Really a good price considering the quality of those wires.
@ pwnerman Again thanks for all the additional information and suggestions you provided in your last post. Very Much appreciated. I got mini the SAS 36 male cables in the mail yesterday as I stated above. I also installed the LSI-9211-8i HBA card in a regular desktop PC and it is in IT mode with P19 firmware. So I'll have to follow instructions to flash it to P20 firmware since that is the required version.
I do very much like the idea of not wasting/using the additional two drive bays for booting up the system. So then I can have the 6 hard drive RAID Z2 setup for storage as you have mentioned. I wasn't planning on buying additional HDDs, but for sure 6 is better than 4 in terms of redundant RAID setups.
I'll get two flash drives (one as the boot drive for FreeNAS) and the other as a bootable drive with FreeNAS Install media on it. Any specific suggestions on brand/make for the flash drives? (Flash drives aren't all created equal :)). I figure a 32GB one for the FreeNAS boot drive makes sense as that would leave room for future FreeNAS upgrades.
In the mean time, I need to find/follow the instructions on how to flash the LSI-9211-8i HBA card to P20 firmware from the PC it's currently installed in. ;)
Thanks again!!
Neomorph
@ pwnerman Again thanks for all the additional information and suggestions you provided in your last post. Very Much appreciated. I got mini the SAS 36 male cables in the mail yesterday as I stated above. I also installed the LSI-9211-8i HBA card in a regular desktop PC and it is in IT mode with P19 firmware. So I'll have to follow instructions to flash it to P20 firmware since that is the required version.
I do very much like the idea of not wasting/using the additional two drive bays for booting up the system. So then I can have the 6 hard drive RAID Z2 setup for storage as you have mentioned. I wasn't planning on buying additional HDDs, but for sure 6 is better than 4 in terms of redundant RAID setups.
I'll get two flash drives (one as the boot drive for FreeNAS) and the other as a bootable drive with FreeNAS Install media on it. Any specific suggestions on brand/make for the flash drives? (Flash drives aren't all created equal :)). I figure a 32GB one for the FreeNAS boot drive makes sense as that would leave room for future FreeNAS upgrades.
In the mean time, I need to find/follow the instructions on how to flash the LSI-9211-8i HBA card to P20 firmware from the PC it's currently installed in. ;)
Thanks again!!
Neomorph
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search this thread for the link to the wordpress blog. That guy has instructions and a completely ready to go zip file with the p20 firmware on it. Simple
As for flash drives I would just do with any name brand one. USB 3.0 is a waste of money on the R710 because it doesn't have USB 3.0 so don't forget about that.
Also if you have any usb drive around your home that's around 4 gigs that's all you need for an install drive. That's if you have a flash drive laying around and I don't know of anyone who doesn't own a flash drive.
Hey guys, I've made some good progress since I last posted. 1) Successfully flashed the LSI 9211-8i card to P20 and IT mode. 2) Took out the old Perc 6i Embedded Controller Card from one of the Dell R710s and tossed it. 3) Installed the newly flashed LSI 9211-8i card in PCIe 2 Slot 1 of the server and attached it to the backplane with the two mini SAS wires I bought from monoprice.com (Really nice quality!!!). The wires fit nicely in the side grooves of the server where the old SAS wires were placed. I had to twist and tie up the extra bit of wire (since they are 1M in length), but otherwise it's all nice and tidy.
4) Put the 4TB x 4 WD Red Pro HDDs in tray caddys and inserted them in drive bays 0 - 3.
5) Fired up the server and the LSI 9211-8i card came up and initialized itself. Ctrl-C to enter the Bios of the LSI card and it all looks good. A few keystrokes and I confirmed that the 4TB HDDs were scanned and detected as Direct Attached devices (Super!!!!).
Next Steps to be done, Install FreeNAS on one of the two Sandisk Cruzer Fit 32GB flash drives I bought today. The second one will be used as a mirror drive for the FreeNAS boot drive. I need to read up the "Installing FreeNAS on Flash drives" doc and get it the install done.
Note - I'm getting two additional 4TB HDDs since I'll have two empty drive bays in the server.
I cannot thank you enough @pwnerman for the wonderful how-to and knowledge on how to use a Dell PowerEdge R710 server as a FreeNAS server. No doubt that it would have taken me much longer to gather up the needed information on how to get this done. I'll let you all know how the Install of FreeNAS on Flash drive goes. :)
Regards,
Neostorm
4) Put the 4TB x 4 WD Red Pro HDDs in tray caddys and inserted them in drive bays 0 - 3.
5) Fired up the server and the LSI 9211-8i card came up and initialized itself. Ctrl-C to enter the Bios of the LSI card and it all looks good. A few keystrokes and I confirmed that the 4TB HDDs were scanned and detected as Direct Attached devices (Super!!!!).
Next Steps to be done, Install FreeNAS on one of the two Sandisk Cruzer Fit 32GB flash drives I bought today. The second one will be used as a mirror drive for the FreeNAS boot drive. I need to read up the "Installing FreeNAS on Flash drives" doc and get it the install done.
Note - I'm getting two additional 4TB HDDs since I'll have two empty drive bays in the server.
I cannot thank you enough @pwnerman for the wonderful how-to and knowledge on how to use a Dell PowerEdge R710 server as a FreeNAS server. No doubt that it would have taken me much longer to gather up the needed information on how to get this done. I'll let you all know how the Install of FreeNAS on Flash drive goes. :)
Regards,
Neostorm
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uncle festers FreeNAS guide has a walkthrough of installing the OS. Has pics and everything. Just google it and you will find it.
Also just a note but if you only have two drives it's easy to add a mirror to your boot drive after installing. You can do it you will just need to wipe the one with the install media on it and then plug it in and attach it via the GUI. Just google "attaching mirror to boot drive FreeNAS" and you will find it.
Also you are welcome and just remember to wait till you have all the drives before you start setting up a volume.
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Sure thing man, I'll check out uncle festers FreeNAS guide and walkthrough on installing the OS. Though the mirror boot drive can be done during the install of FreeNAS, but just for kicks, I'll add the mirror to the boot drive post installation via the GUI as you've suggested. I think also that approach has the advantage of removing any doubt/confusion about which disk device is to the mirror boot drive (I want the internally plugged flash drive to be the primary boot device) . I'm saying that because it would not be clear (at least to me) how the R710 Server would show/label in the F11 boot bios menu the second flash drive which will be plugged into of one the front USB port of the R710.
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Yes you can do it while installing FreeNAS for the first time. Also recognizing which drives are the USB sticks is easy. The capacities of the drives will remove any uncertainty.
This brings me to another tip I have for you that your post made me think of. Something that will be handy for you in the future in case any drive issues occur.
Take all the drives out of your system. Make a chart with 0-5 running down the side of the paper. These numbers will correspond with the labeled caddies on the R710 look at the front on the left and they are there.
What you then want to do is record the serial number off each hard drive and mark it next to the corresponding caddy you put each drive into. This will help you in the future because FreeNAS won't mark your drives the same as the labels and having the serial numbers of the drives corresponding to the physical slot numbers will make it easier to know which one needs removed and replaced.
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thanks
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