Experience using the 3WARE 9650SE-8LPML or HP Smart Array P410/512

[DrexLock]

I'm planning on converting over my Ubuntu Server to FreeNAS 10 when its released.

My current machine is:

• HP ProLiant ML310e Gen8 v2 (https://www.hpe.com/h20195/v2/GetPDF.aspx/c04123183.pdf)
• Intel® Xeon® E3-1230v3
• 32 Gbs of ECC ram
• four 3 TB drives
• two 256 Gb SSD Drives.

When I originally set this machine up I left my storage array on the SAS connection on the motherboard and ran my two SSD Drives off of the motherboard sata connections. But with a wipe and rebuild I'm wondering if there is a better way to setup my drives. I have a 3WARE 9650SE-8LPML and a HP Smart Array P410 that both have dual SAS connections and was considering using one of them instead of the existing headers on the motherboard. Does anyone have experience using either of these cards with FreeNAS?

I plan on using FreeNAS for primarily media storage and streaming using plex, while running one or two VMs (a minecraft and VPN Server) and a handful of docker containers (Plex, Nextcloud, Traefik) as well as general backups and file storage.

 

[Mlovelace]

I don't know about the 3Ware card, but the HPSA P410 is a raid card and not appropriate for freeNAS. You want to use a HBA card so freeNAS has bare-metal access to the drives. Raid cards even in "JBOD" mode have been know to cause major problems. You can find used HBAs on ebay quite cheap, look for the Dell PERC H200/H310 or the IBM M1015. I've found the PERC H200 as low as $15 on ebay.

If you buy either of the ones I mentioned you'll want to cross flash it to the LSI P20 firmware version. There are loads of walk-throughs on the web and forum on how to do that.

 

[DrexLock]

Dang, I was afraid of that. I hate having hardware that I cant use/reuse.