FreeNAS 9.3 GRUB Boot Error

[Jonathan Wilson]

I've just started using FreeNAS after having driver problems with windows. Everything is smooth right up until I goto boot from the new install.

I downloaded the ISO as well as Win32Diskimager and created the boot disk on a 16 GB Sandisk flash drive. I do not want to install to another flash drive, I want to put FreeNAS onto a hard drive, I understand that means FreeNAS will absorb the whole drive, thats fine its a 160GB Seagate that I have no reason to use as storage space. Booting from the USB is smooth, I can pick the hard drive which is listed as ada1 and the installation completes without error. Once I go to reboot I remove the flash drive and the system loads the GRUB boot loader but after a few minutes of loading goes into recovery mode. Using the ls command brinds up several hard drives and one floppy drive, however the only thing plugged into the machine is the single 160GB hard drive. I've tried reinstalling multiple times each with the same result, I've swapped 160GB hard drives and they are known to be good (they were pulled from functioning machines and disk scans reported no errors) I re imaged the flashdrive, tried enabling AHCI in the bios, setting the SATA controller to compatibility mode instead of enhanced, nothing.

I'm away from the server right now but its an older intel board (cant remember model but its paired to the CPU's) running dual quad core Intel Xenon processors clocked at 1.6Ghz (got a feel for the age yet?) With 16GB EEC ram. 800W corsair PSU, with all required hookups to the motherboard. As well as a 3ware 8006-2lp RAID storage controller acting as a JBOD and one Adaptec 2405 RAID controller acting as JBOD.

If there are any simple solutions to try, i'm up for it. I couldnt find anything with my particular problem searching the forums.

 

[BigDave]

Jonathan, your first step is to find out if the hardware you have, is supported. Freenas is based on FreeBSD and their website
has a link to the lists of supported hardware. RAID cards (hardware RAID) will in most cases not play well with FreeNAS
even in JBOD mode. In order for FreeNAS to work without issues, it needs *direct access* to the hard disks, most hardware
RAID cards do not really allow this. The use of older hardware is no longer recommended for FreeNAS as the software has
evolved way beyond what it was, just a short time ago. In the forum, there are stickies you should read regarding recommended
hardware for the most up to date versions of the FreeNAS software OS.

 

[Jonathan Wilson]

I appreciate the response, I will look into whether the cards will play nice or not, for part of the troubleshooting I did bypass them all together and just plugged the hard drive into the motherboards sata plugs. I do remember reading something about AHCI, how important is it that FreeBSD have that enabled. The only experience i've had with FreeBSD is a routing and firewall platform PFsense, and after the install thats all an in browser gui. I'll check out the freebsd webpages.

EDIT: After reading the compatibility section, it appears that all my hardware is technically compatible, whether that is true or not is up to experimentation. Any other simple fixes I should try?

 

[BigDave]

The only experience i've had with FreeBSD is a routing and firewall platform PFsense, and after the install thats all an in browser gui.

FreeNAS is much the same. You might try taking your bios back to a default condition (Intel boards often have a jumper for this).
Keep your newly created boot drive and remove all the raid cards. Consult your mobo manual on how to clear your bios cache and
start from square one. Place your boot drive at SATA1 port and you should be able to boot to the FreeNAS GUI (if your install was good).
The FreeNAS manal has all the steps needed.

 

[Jonathan Wilson]

Getting into my office I decided to restart fresh, removed all the RAID cards, reset the BIOS (it had not been cleared since PFsense 2.1 had been running on it) and switched from using Win32Diskimager to PowerISO, retried the install with only one error (CAM Status: Command Timeout, Retrying Command) then rebooted and loaded into FreeNAS no problem. Shut down and reinstalled the RAID cards and booted again with no problem.

Guess i'll never know what fixed it. Thanks for the help.

 

[BigDave]

reset the BIOS (it had not been cleared since PFsense 2.1 had been running on it)

That is probably what made the difference, glad to hear you got it going