HP Gen8 Microserver Boot Issues

[WarnesJ]

Hi
Did you ever find a solution to this boot issue? I really want to use Scale on my Microserver as currently using OpenMediaVault which although easy to use, I feel that Scale would be better. I haven't yet tried the 22.02.1 release, was it fixed in that release does anyone know?

Thanks for your time.

I'm not sure if @AndyW solved the issue he had yet. I unfortunately wasn't able to replicate the problem he was experiencing. But I wanted to share that with my Microserver installation I did make a bit of a change. Instead of using the optical SATA port I pivoted to using a USB SATA M.2 2242 SSD enclosure paired with a 128GB M.2 2242 SSD. Essentially this allowed me to continue to use the internal USB port for the main TrueNAS SCALE OS. But instead of using a USB thumb drive which is more prone to failure, I now have the reliability and performance of an SSD. (Well as far as USB's performance will let me push it.) And the bonus is I could revert any AHCI mode changes and I don't need to maintain custom boot loaders.

So far it's working really well. I think this is what I'm going to stick with.

I wanted to share my experience and perhaps it might help?

 

[Smitch71]

Thanks @WarnesJ. My issues were with installing on the internal usb/sdcard. Whatever I try it fails. I think i tried standard Debian 11 and that failed too, although OMV 6 which I currently use (which is based on Debian) works?? I also tried a usb to sata adapter and installed on a 120GB SSD which failed also.

Did you mention that you turned of AHCI?

Thanks for yyour help.

 

[WarnesJ]

Thanks @WarnesJ. My issues were with installing on the internal usb/sdcard. Whatever I try it fails. I think i tried standard Debian 11 and that failed too, although OMV 6 which I currently use (which is based on Debian) works?? I also tried a usb to sata adapter and installed on a 120GB SSD which failed also.

Did you mention that you turned of AHCI?

Thanks for yyour help.

Ah. I never had any problems installing on a USB stick installed in the internal USB port. My initial install was to a generic USB stick, but I've since replaced that with a USB M.2 SATA SSD enclosure.

My mentioning of turning off AHCI was to allow me to install to an SSD connected to the internal SATA port that is usually used of the optical drive. If I hadn't disabled AHCI then I could never boot from the drive. But I abandoned that and re-enabled AHCI once I started using the USB M.2 SATA SSD enclosure connected to the internal USB port.

It's weird that you're able to boot OMV from the internal USB port but not TrueNAS SCALE. Strange. I'm sorry, I'm not sure what advice to give you to try next.

 

[Br000301]

You can get it to boot off the optical SATA port-it just requires disabling AHCI and using the "Legacy" mode in the BIOS configuration.

1. Go into the BIOS configuration utility (F9 at the graphical start up screen)
2. Go to "System Options" -> "SATA Controller Options" -> "Embedded SATA Configuration" and toggle it to "Enable SATA Legacy Support"
3. Go back to the main menu and then choose "Boot Controller Order", set Ctlr:1 to "PCI Embedded Intel(R) SATA Controller #2"
4. You can now go back to the main menu again and go to "Standard Boot Order (IPL)" and set IPL:1 to "Hard Drive C: (See Boot Controller Order)

When installing, as long as you're using a disk that is a different brand or model (it shows the manufacturer and the serial I believe?) from the data disks it should be simple to tell which disk(s) you want to boot off of.

Thank you so much I had this very problem. I can now boot to TrueNAS on the SSD attached to the Optical Drive port.

 

[jspenc]

You can get it to boot off the optical SATA port-it just requires disabling AHCI and using the "Legacy" mode in the BIOS configuration.

1. Go into the BIOS configuration utility (F9 at the graphical start up screen)
2. Go to "System Options" -> "SATA Controller Options" -> "Embedded SATA Configuration" and toggle it to "Enable SATA Legacy Support"
3. Go back to the main menu and then choose "Boot Controller Order", set Ctlr:1 to "PCI Embedded Intel(R) SATA Controller #2"
4. You can now go back to the main menu again and go to "Standard Boot Order (IPL)" and set IPL:1 to "Hard Drive C: (See Boot Controller Order)

When installing, as long as you're using a disk that is a different brand or model (it shows the manufacturer and the serial I believe?) from the data disks it should be simple to tell which disk(s) you want to boot off of.

Just to add in case this confuses anybody else in the future, I actually had to reboot and go back into bios after step two, as the second option wasn't appearing immediately in step 3.

 

[Kieeps]

as stated before, if you replace the optical drive with a ssd/hdd you need to switch from ahci to legacy OR move the cables from the first HDD bay to the sdd/hdd in the optical bay and use the optical bay sata to connect the HDD bay 1... it's not a nice workaround but it's been working for me :D

 

[claib]

Hi
Did you ever find a solution to this boot issue? I really want to use Scale on my Microserver as currently using OpenMediaVault which although easy to use, I feel that Scale would be better. I haven't yet tried the 22.02.1 release, was it fixed in that release does anyone know?

Thanks for your time.

Hi there
i'm in exactly the same situation :
Microserver gen 8
Boot from USB withinstallation Media
Got a USB > NVME Adapter in the internal USB port.
No chance to boot truenas scale
With truenas core it works ; happy boot..

Any advice ?

 

[WarnesJ]

So I was able to replicate the problem on another HP Microserver Gen8. And I have an open ticket on it right now - https://ixsystems.atlassian.net/browse/NAS-120382. The HP Microserver doesn't support the UEFI boot loader, so if we had an option to use the Legacy/BIOS boot loader (like in TrueNAS CORE) this might resolve the issue. We could also chainload a Legacy/BIOS bootloader from the SD card slot, but I thought I'd open the ticket with Xi Systems to see if there was a simpler solution.

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

Correct, the older HP Server BIOS does not support UEFI, and also doesn't work with some SSD drives. Depending on the version it also cannot boot USB drives over 8 GB.

Legacy SATA off the MB should work. (DO NOT USE SAS off the mainboard, that's incompatible RAID.)

I use an LSI SAS to 2.5" bay with triple-mirror SAS drives, though may try switching to the on-board SATA ports when my 2.5" drives die and are replaced with 3.5" spinners. I'll still have 2 or 3 SAS ports available and may run them to the SATA boot drives.

 

[luckyz0r]

Correct, the older HP Server BIOS does not support UEFI, and also doesn't work with some SSD drives. Depending on the version it also cannot boot USB drives over 8 GB.

Legacy SATA off the MB should work. (DO NOT USE SAS off the mainboard, that's incompatible RAID.)

I use an LSI SAS to 2.5" bay with triple-mirror SAS drives, though may try switching to the on-board SATA ports when my 2.5" drives die and are replaced with 3.5" spinners. I'll still have 2 or 3 SAS ports available and may run them to the SATA boot drives.

That was my question.

If I understand, the 4 bay are connected to the sas connector in the MB.
This will not work with Truenas scale?

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

Nah, nah, nah, USB is basically SAS with beer poured over it--it'll work, you just have to realize it's drunk and misbehaves regularly, though from the USB perspective it's totally rational and reliable.*

So yes, you can boot SCALE from USB on an HP server with no problem if you invest a little time to set up the USB thumb drive so the HP server BIOS can read the entire data partition if using Ventoy, if using Rufus use an 8GB or smaller thumb drive. Basically, HP BIOS can only read the first 8GB of the drive, so anything beyond 7.8GB should be slack space (or in my case a FAT-32 partition usable after booting the OS). This has nothing to do with TrueNAS and everything to do with the HP BIOS, although HP systems aren't the only ones that experience that issue (see the third link below).

Overview:

Eating boot drives

I've been using Free/Tru Nas for a few years now. I run it on an HP GEN 9 micro server with 16gb of ram, And use it as a basic file server and a Plex jail also. It sees very light use with maybe 1-2 evenings of plex viewing a week. Back in the day I had the Boot drive on USB sticks and they...

www.truenas.com

Details:

Drives spin up while doing reads/writes, Reach full speed and 100% usage, Spindown a little and repeat the process. (Drives set to always stay on)

I don't have any spindown settings applied. I set them to always be active. I did a few smart tests and the drives pass fine. But they will spin up slowly and make read/write clicks in between points of ramping up which is strange, then they will reach full speed and sound like they are at 100%...

www.truenas.com

Reasoning:

Solved: Rufus 'killed' my USB Drive · Issue #2105 · pbatard/rufus

Checklist I looked at https://github.com/pbatard/rufus/wiki/FAQ to see if my question has already been answered. I performed a search in the issue tracker for similar issues using keywords relevant...

github.com

---
*Possibly not totally accurate depending on your point of view.

 

[luckyz0r]

I was asking about the raid card in the gen8.
Does it work with truenas scale or should I buy a hba pcie card for the 4 bay hdd's?

Thanks for your help

 

[jgreco]

I doubt there's a RAID card in that little doorstop of a server. It is probably just four mainboard SATA ports wired up to an SFF-8087 connector, or perhaps a PCH SCU.

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

I was asking about the raid card in the gen8.
Does it work with truenas scale or should I buy a hba pcie card for the 4 bay hdd's?

Thanks for your help

The HP Dynamic Smart Array B120i Controller on the HP ProLiant MicroServer Generation 8 is a software-RAID controller, not hardware. It *might* work okay with TrueNAS, but I wouldn't count on it as it's given people fits for some time, which in my humble opinion is pretty standard for HP proprietary technology (at least I've had random issues with it when odd things happen like power is cut, but those are stories for another day).

The MicroServer has one PCIe 2.0 x16 low-profile slot which is enough to get an LSI 4-port internal HBA for testing (about $28 to your door used on eBay for a non-knockoff item) or a LSI 16e card with 16 external ports if your internal SATA works out. You will need a SAS to SATA cable, though it probably will only work for testing with a boot drive sitting on the worktop as that's a lot of bulk that's not going to fit well inside the case. (Don't overheat the drive, that's what fans are for.)

Personally, I'd get an LSI SAS card. In my case @jgreco (we live next to each other) sourced one for me that instantly solved all my HP HDD issues (after disabling the on-board controller in HP's BIOS), so the value of such a troubleshooting tool may (or may not) be worth it to you. In my case it saved me so much work I have a new-found appreciation for @jgreco and stopped throwing peanut shells in his pool at night (I drink a lot), but you have a different box and have to evaluate it as such.

https://h20427.www2.hpe.com/pdf/HP_ProLiant_MicroServer_Gen8_quicspec.pdf

 

[jgreco]

HP Dynamic Smart Array B120i Controller

I'm pretty sure the B series "controllers" are just software RAID done on standard ports of some sort (SATA, PCH SCU, etc). I'm not a Linux expert so I can't tell you the best way to identify this on SCALE. If it was on CORE, we'd just look at the dmesg log and pluck out information about the actual controller, wait, we've done this little dance in the past... dig dig dig

Useful info over in

GUI not showing all disks

I recently added some extra drives (via a USB3 attached 4 drive enclosure) to my TrueNAS-12.0-U6 server. From camcontrol, I can see the drives are visible to TrueNAS but the Storage > Disks GUI only shows ada0 thru ada3 and da1 and da5. But, when I created a new zpool and vdevs I was able to...

www.truenas.com

 

[luckyz0r]

The HP Dynamic Smart Array B120i Controller on the HP ProLiant MicroServer Generation 8 is a software-RAID controller, not hardware. It *might* work okay with TrueNAS, but I wouldn't count on it as it's given people fits for some time, which in my humble opinion is pretty standard for HP proprietary technology (at least I've had random issues with it when odd things happen like power is cut, but those are stories for another day).

The MicroServer has one PCIe 2.0 x16 low-profile slot which is enough to get an LSI 4-port internal HBA for testing (about $28 to your door used on eBay for a non-knockoff item) or a LSI 16e card with 16 external ports if your internal SATA works out. You will need a SAS to SATA cable, though it probably will only work for testing with a boot drive sitting on the worktop as that's a lot of bulk that's not going to fit well inside the case. (Don't overheat the drive, that's what fans are for.)

Personally, I'd get an LSI SAS card. In my case @jgreco (we live next to each other) sourced one for me that instantly solved all my HP HDD issues (after disabling the on-board controller in HP's BIOS), so the value of such a troubleshooting tool may (or may not) be worth it to you. In my case it saved me so much work I have a new-found appreciation for @jgreco and stopped throwing peanut shells in his pool at night (I drink a lot), but you have a different box and have to evaluate it as such.

https://h20427.www2.hpe.com/pdf/HP_ProLiant_MicroServer_Gen8_quicspec.pdf

This would work ok?
Not for testing purposes, my trunas scale will be my main NAS.

RAID SAS/SATA LSI SAS9240-4i 4 ports // PCIe x8 //

Thanks for your help

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

@luckyz0r : RAID (like the MegaRAID cards) is not suggested. You want the most simple, most reliable Host Bus Adapter available; with less firmware in the middle it will be both more reliable and more affordable, a win for you and the system.

The on-board SATA controller *might* work (it's not hardware RAID), how reliably I do not know, but in such a small system I would try to get that working and then test it via a good system burn-in routine (which is also documented on this site).

I would also use TrueNAS CORE for stability reasons. I do love SCALE, but if running a single MicroServer, CORE is probably the better choice.

See the Download button at the upper-right side of this page:

Hardware Recommendations Guide

This is the latest edition of the FreeNAS Community hardware recommendations guide. The current major version is R2, dated January 2021, with the last minor update on 2021-01-24. The format has moved away from the forum post form factor, to...

www.truenas.com

 

[WarnesJ]

Hi all. Sorry to revive an old email thread but I wanted to let you know that the booting issue on the HP Microserver Gen8 after installing TrueNAS SCALE appears to be resolved now. I submitted a ticket (see https://ixsystems.atlassian.net/browse/NAS-120382) and the issue was related to the HP Microserver Gen8 needing a legacy boot loader. The v22.12.3 release of TrueNAS SCALE has incorporated a fix into the installation process. During the installation a prompt will appear which will give you the opportunity to install the legacy boot loader. This is very similar to the TrueNAS CORE installer.

Anyway, I thought I'd let you know in case this forum post shows up in anyone's searches.

 

[Headless Horus]

Hi all. Sorry to revive an old email thread but I wanted to let you know that the booting issue on the HP Microserver Gen8 after installing TrueNAS SCALE appears to be resolved now. I submitted a ticket (see https://ixsystems.atlassian.net/browse/NAS-120382) and the issue was related to the HP Microserver Gen8 needing a legacy boot loader. The v22.12.3 release of TrueNAS SCALE has incorporated a fix into the installation process. During the installation a prompt will appear which will give you the opportunity to install the legacy boot loader. This is very similar to the TrueNAS CORE installer.

Anyway, I thought I'd let you know in case this forum post shows up in anyone's searches.

Hi all, I’m new here and pretty new to all this too, so I’ll do my best to not bumble about too much. I’ve an HP Micro Server Gen8, which has been working on Ubuntu for the last couple of weeks fine, though I’ve been persuaded to install TruNAS as a more streamlined way forward for my NAS. My first stumbling block is mentioned here, regarding Legacy mode. I’ve an SSD in the Optical drive bay on Sata5, TruNAS starts to install to it. I pick sda as the only drive. It asks if I want a swap drive (yes), then if I will use UFI or Legacy. Once I pick Legacy it creates new GPT entries in mem and I get 4 “has completed successfully” and then says “CANT_FIND_sda3_OR_sdap3: not a block device”. I’d a greatly appreciate any advice on where to start looking to fix this. Thanks in advance for any help

 

[WarnesJ]

Hi all, I’m new here and pretty new to all this too, so I’ll do my best to not bumble about too much. I’ve an HP Micro Server Gen8, which has been working on Ubuntu for the last couple of weeks fine, though I’ve been persuaded to install TruNAS as a more streamlined way forward for my NAS. My first stumbling block is mentioned here, regarding Legacy mode. I’ve an SSD in the Optical drive bay on Sata5, TruNAS starts to install to it. I pick sda as the only drive. It asks if I want a swap drive (yes), then if I will use UFI or Legacy. Once I pick Legacy it creates new GPT entries in mem and I get 4 “has completed successfully” and then says “CANT_FIND_sda3_OR_sdap3: not a block device”. I’d a greatly appreciate any advice on where to start looking to fix this. Thanks in advance for any help

So I have a silly question. Are you installing TrueNAS CORE or TrueNAS SCALE? When I did a quick search I ran across this post in the forums (https://www.truenas.com/community/t...roserver-gen8-cant_find_sda3_or_sdap3.110714/) that seemed to describe what you're seeing. In that case the person was installing TrueNAS CORE when they saw that error message, hence why I'm asking what version of TrueNAS you're attempting to install. :)

In that post, the person seemed to say that things started working for him when he installed TrueNAS SCALE and chose the UEFI boot loader. I never had any success with the UEFI boot loader on my HP Microserver Gen8, but I was not using the ODD SATA5 port (I was using an SSD in the USB port). So if you're error was during a TrueNAS CORE installation, perhaps give TrueNAS SCALE a try and select the UEFI boot loader option when prompted. Maybe that will do the trick.