New Install Not booting after adding PCI with LSI

[magifeda]

I am brand new to Proxmox and TrueNas Scale 22.12.3.1. Trying to get brand new install on a Dell Precision T3620. I have it on a proxmox setup. Created VM with simple settings as far as I know. 4 cores, 15gb, memory, SeaBios, Default Display, Machine: q35, VirtIO SCSI Single, hard disk 42GB and network device is net0. I am able to boot up to truenas without PCI added fine. But when I boot up with PCI added with LSI SAS2008 it doesn't come up. I have attached screenshots

 

[jgreco]

I am brand new to Proxmox and TrueNas Scale 22.12.3.1. Trying to get brand new install on a Dell Precision T3620. I have it on a proxmox setup. Created VM with simple settings as far as I know. 4 cores, 15gb, memory, SeaBios, Default Display, Machine: q35, VirtIO SCSI Single, hard disk 42GB and network device is net0. I am able to boot up to truenas without PCI added fine. But when I boot up with PCI added with LSI SAS2008 it doesn't come up. I have attached screenshots

Presumably you've seen the virtualization guide.

Resource - "Absolutely must virtualize TrueNAS!" ... a guide to not completely losing your data.

[---- 2024/01/16: Still relevant. Virtualization really doesn't change much. Updates made as appropriate. ----] [---- 2018/02/27: This is still as relevant as ever. As PCIe-Passthru has matured, fewer problems are reported. I've updated some...

www.truenas.com

PCIe passthru on Proxmox is still listed as experimental, and it could be that the device isn't being set up appropriately in the BIOS. Your typical desktop PC or workstation is intended to run Windows or maybe Linux, and does not get the exhaustive testing of a server grade board.

You have three general options here.

1) Debug, starting by going through all the BIOS configuration pages and making sure virtualization is fully enabled and no weird PCIe options are configured. There's about a 50/50 chance it can be tracked back to some misconfigured option.

2) Why are you even trying to do this? Just run SCALE on your machine directly. It has KVM hypervisor support, just line Proxmox, not as sophisticated in some ways, but generally sufficient for modest to moderate needs.

3) Switch to ESXi, which is known to work very well under most situations. I wouldn't expect it to have issues on a Skylake workstation/desktop. ESXi is free for personal use and is about ten years more mature than Proxmox in terms of arcane features like PCIe passthru.

 

[magifeda]

I found a solution online. I have to do passthrough steps with proxmox to allow for truenas scale to see the drives.

 

[jgreco]

Don't pass through the individual drives like some idiot YouTuber recommended. We just finished recovering a very damaged pool that resulted from improper virtualization. This can lead to loss of your data.

 

[magifeda]

What is the suggested method to get truenas to see the drives?

 

[jgreco]

Follow the virtualization guide. I gave you your three options above.

 

[newb69]

I found a solution to this, implying you BIOS options are good:
Select the PCIe device on the hardware tab of your TrueNAS VM > Advanced > untick "ROM-Bar" > save and restart the VM.
After that my VM was able to boot correctly.

Although the above answer is most likely the better one. I just finished setting up with Proxmox but I'm considering restarting with SCALE on baremetal instead to save myself some troubles in the future.

 

[SebbaG]

I found a solution to this, implying you BIOS options are good:
Select the PCIe device on the hardware tab of your TrueNAS VM > Advanced > untick "ROM-Bar" > save and restart the VM.
After that my VM was able to boot correctly.

Although the above answer is most likely the better one. I just finished setting up with Proxmox but I'm considering restarting with SCALE on baremetal instead to save myself some troubles in the future.

You are a genius!!! Thank you soo much it solved it for me too. Was messing around for days with options UEFI etc. and couldn't get it to work. Finally it runs smoothly.

PS: I just switched from ESXi 6.7 to Proxmox 8.1 because I was fed up of vmware not supporting old hardware anymore. My server is still running fine and I don't wanna replace up, but want to stay secure and up to date. So I'll give proxmox a try.

Thx again!!!