Hardware RAID or FreeNas RAID

[Garish]

Hello Everyone,

I am having kind of an Issue. I can't decide between a Hardware Raid or the Raid System that FreeNas provides.

Here is my Setup:

1) MotherBoard : X7DB8/X7DBE SuperMicro
2) Ram: 16GB DDR2
3) CPU: Dual Intel® 64-bit Xeon LGA 771 quad-core
4) ARC-1200 RAID Controller ( 2 Disks have been installed on a Hardware Raid 1) (FreeNas has been Installed on this)

5) I have TWO ARC-1680 PCIEx8 RAID Controller – DRAM: 512 MB / Channels : 8
6) 16 SATA 2TB Hitachi Disks

So now since I have twa raid controllers, I am thinking of going for a RAID 6 with a Hot Spare.

But I can't decide between FreeNas Raid system or the hardware Raid.

Any Advice or Help will be appreciated. THANK YOU IN ADVANCE...

Kind Regards,
Garish

 

[hugovsky]

You should never use hardware raid with freenas. ZFS needs direct access to drives. It's widely discussed in the forums.

 

[hugovsky]

Your hardware isn't very good to use with freenas. First you should never use hardware raid with freenas and ZFS. Second, hardware with FSB will always have perfomance issues.

EDIT: sorry, double post.

 

[zambanini]

what data do you want to serve

 

[enemy85]

Don't use HW raid.

 

[ZiggyGT]

Is ARECA 1220 RAID compatible with FREENAS
I recently purchased a server box that holds 8 SAS/SATA drives. It included a ARECA 1220 Raid controller. I updated the firmware to 1.49 and it now supports the 4TB drives I attached. I had planned to replace the controller with an HBA card, but the array cabling is not compatible with a newer card. It has a passthrough option for each drive.
1) Is the "passthrough" equivalent to the HBA mode? The drives appear in FREENAS as if that is the case and I can create a pool.
2) Does anyone have experience with this card using FREENAS?
I have a different backplane but that will take a lot of customization so I would like to use as is if possible.

 

[ZiggyGT]

The ARECA 1220 card is working OK with the drives in "passthrough mode" Set up some pools and I am access them. So I using the card with all drive populated Pool 1 with 5x3TB drives RAIDZ2 and 3x2TB drives RAIDZ1. I also plan to add 5x700GB drives to the Motherboard SATA ports in my HP Z400 MB. With the smaller drives which is the best config?

 

[sretalla]

The ARECA 1220 card is working OK with the drives in "passthrough mode" Set up some pools and I am access them.

How is your SMART data looking?

 

[ZiggyGT]

How is your SMART data looking?

The ARECA does not seem to pass that through. Drives in the MB SATA do report properly. The 3TB are new drives, but the 700GB are old and need to be monitored. that will be for non critical stuff

 

[sretalla]

The ARECA does not seem to pass that through.

And there's the problem. Your drives will not be running your scheduled SMART tests and drives will die without warning.

That's exactly the reason why we don't recommend using hardware RAID cards.

 

[ZiggyGT]

It claims to have a "pass through mode" I assumed this was similar to the HBA modes on the newer cards. Could not find any description. I am not creating any partitions with the RAID card to then work with FREENAS.

I was able to see the life history and info on failures but the temps were always reported as exactly 30degrees for all drives. Either the controller or the Hitachi drives are not reporting the temps. So I think this is close to the bare metal needed by FREENAS. I bought a HBA card but the backplane in my 8 drive case is not compatible with the cables. It is too big a hassle change it. I did not set out to use the ARECA card. But is seems capable

 

[Fredda]

Take a look here, especially point 5.

What's all the noise about HBA's, and why can't I use a RAID controller?

This is relevant to FreeNAS and TrueNAS CORE. Some parts of it might also be relevant to Scale, but I don't really know how reliable the Linux drivers are. 1) An HBA is a Host Bus Adapter. This is a controller that allows SAS and SATA devices to be attached to, and communicate directly with...

www.ixsystems.com

 

[ZiggyGT]

Fredda,
#5 is a very thought provoking statement. I had assumed/hoped that the "pass through mode (JBOD)" was the same as the HBA. These comment are very insightful. Overloading the RAID logic on the board was something I had not considered. I am double checking on the SMART status read out. Losing drives without warning is not a good plan. The Cache is small on this card and it is as old as Methuselah. Looks like I will be creating a big headache later if I don't change this now.

I will try to see if the SATA backplane (looks passive) I have will work with the LSI HBA card that I purchased. I have a Mini SAS - 4 SATA female breakout cable I can use to plug the red sata cables into. The backplane connector is a proprietary AEON connector. (bought on eBay, was supposed to be a Super Micro server, MB was chassis NOT) I should have listened to my dad when years ago, he said "You cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear". So far I have about $25 in this chassis , SATA backplane and drive carriers and $75 in the 6 core Z400 Motherboard and memory. Was hoping to use it. There are 4-5 unused SATA ports on the MB. I plan to add those drives on the top front of the chassis. Power supply used to push a MB with 2X the power draw so it should be good.

 

[ZiggyGT]

FREENAS is amazing! I replumed the HBA in with an adapter cable. Now the pool with 4 drives is connected to the LSI HBA controller. The other drive temporarily disconnected All the data is there and the pool is functioning properly. Lot's of error messages during startup due to disconnected drives but in the end everything works. Files that were on the pool are still there and function.

Does this mean that the ARECA RAID card in "passthrough mode" is equivalent to HBA mode? Still a mystery how much hardware is between the drive and the motherboard. That does make me nervous. Using the Metrics in FREENAS the performance in moving a big ISO to a 1Gb client is more 30% more disk operations but takes the same to transfer with ARECA (2nd) card than the LSI HBA(1st plot). Not sure what I will do. Cabling change is tough in the half height case. I am trying top get a Mini-SAS breakout that is a little longer so it can fit and support all 8 drives. That may make the determination. I could take out the backplane and wire direct to the HBA with a standard cable but all the dive power sequencing will be lost and the hot swap.

 

[Newfoundland.Republic]

@ZiggyGT - A cable like this? You have two SAS ports on the card. Each cable breaks out to four SATA ports.

 

[ZiggyGT]

@Newfoundland.Republic - That is a pretty standard cable. Unfortunately the SATA backplane in my server has a proprietary connector. I have to use the 8 separate SATA cables that connect to that. I need a mini-SAS cable that has the opposite SATA connectors like a MB would have. Then I can plug the mini-SAS into the LSI-HBA and then into the existing cables. I have one from an HPZ800 and it works fine, so I know it exists but no one has that style cable. I will keep looking

 

[sretalla]

Does this mean that the ARECA RAID card in "passthrough mode" is equivalent to HBA mode?

It means that this "encapsulation of JBOD within a partition" isn't happening... I don't think the full statement can be verified though as you mentioned SMART isn't passed through. You also can't be guaranteed that read/write caching isn't in the loop.

 

[Newfoundland.Republic]

I need a mini-SAS cable that has the opposite SATA connectors like a MB would have.

Do you have the part number for the drive backplane?

Can you post picture of the cable that connects into the backplane?

 

[ZiggyGT]

Do you have the part number for the drive backplane?

Can you post picture of the cable that connects into the backplane?

I have been on vacation for a couple weeks so sorry for the slow response. Here is a photo of the connector on the RAID card (red cables). Left photo shows the connector to the backplane. each backplane (AEON 94V0-FR4 Rev 3.1) handles 4 drives. There are two backplanes. The cable splits the proprietary backplane connector to four standard SATA connectors. There are two proprietary cables. AEON server with 775 Xeon CPUs. I would like to replace the RAID Controller with an HBA card. The Areca 1220 has a passthrough mode. I am using that.