SOLVED Problem getting the LSI 9300-8i to run

[neverfinder]

Hi there,

I started installing my FreeNAS system a week ago and everything was working fine. Network setup, general configuration.

Today came my LSI / Broadcom HBA LSI SAS 9300-8i. I put the card in and the first problem is that FreeNAS is not booting anymore. I can access the NAS via IPMI and after "booting" I see a black screen with a _. In addition, I can't get into the Bios anymore. (delet does not work neither does F11 for boot options) I can press them as much as I want and still land in the black screen with the _.

I don't see any information about the LSI card when booting... Once I remove the card I can get back to bios or boot FreeNAS.

Could it be a Bios setting I have to change? Is there a way to force booting to the Bios with the card? (Without having to press anything?)

I installed FreeNAS using EFI/EFI not legacy. Could there be a problem? Any other ideas? Is the "lag" on the IPMI to large to get into the bios?

System is:
Motherboard: Supermicro X11SDV-4C-TLN2F retail (MBD-X11SDV-4C-TLN2F-O)
CPU: Intel Xeon D-2123IT
RAM: 4x Samsung DIMM 16GB, DDR4-2400, CL17-17-17, reg ECC (M393A2K43CB1-CRC)
Power Supply: Seasonic Focus Plus Platinum 550W ATX 2.4 (SSR-550PX)
Storage: 8x10TB RAIDZ2 (3x10000GB Hitachi Ultrastar He10 0F27452 256MB 3.5" (8.9cm) SATA 6Gb/s 5x Seagate Enterprise Capacity 3,5" 10TB)
Storage Card: Broadcom SAS 9300-8i, PCIe 3.0 x8 (LSI00344)
Boot Device: Corsair Force LS - Rev. B - 60GB, SATA (CSSD-F60GBLSB)

 

[Chris Moore]

Is the "lag" on the IPMI to large to get into the bios?

That shouldn't be a problem.

Today came my LSI / Broadcom HBA LSI SAS 9300-8i. I put the card in and the first problem is that FreeNAS is not booting any more.

and

I don't see any information about the LSI card when booting... Once I remove the card I can get back to bios or boot FreeNAS.

Makes me think there is a problem with that card. I have not used that specific model number but it should work.

Could it be a Bios setting I have to change?

You might try resetting the BIOS settings to defaults

I installed FreeNAS using EFI/EFI not legacy. Could there be a problem?

I don't think that would cause a problem, but you might try setting the BIOS to legacy mode and then installing using legacy mode. I have been using that and it is working reliably.

Any other ideas?

My first thought is that the SAS controller is defective but we should probably try some of this before going there.

 

[neverfinder]

OK, I reinstalled FreeNAS as legacy. No change. Next step is to put the card into my workstation and take a look whats happening. I can't imagine it beeing the card, as I have two identical cards, which behave the same way. (don't ask me why, but currently I'm happy there are two)

Everything boots fine when no card is installed. When imput them in I get the boot screen, where I can't press anything, I don't see any LSI information and the next thing I see is a black screen with a _. After around 1-2 minutes the system reboots.

I can only imagine it is a bios setting, however, I checked most settings without the card and can't see any obvious problems. I could get a USB keyboard and try getting into the bios with the LSI card installed.

Very very strange. I'm glad for any tipps and hints I can get.

 

[Chris Moore]

I can only imagine it is a bios setting, however, I checked most settings without the card and can't see any obvious problems.

Did you restore defaults in the system board firmware?

I have some UEFI systems at work that have the default set to disable legacy firmware, or something like that, and that could be blocking your system board from loading the firmware from the SAS controller. I ran into that with a system where upgrading the system firmware to the most recent version caused the SAS controller to block the boot process.

 

[neverfinder]

Update and I really run out of ideas... Both controler show the "LSI Bios" fine with my other PC. I tried flashing one of the two controller to the newest Bios and Firmware. Great idea.... It's not working. Don't know if I made one card to a brick, but I dowloaded the latest release and tried it in many ways. This is what I get...

 

[neverfinder]

Trying over EFI ...

 

[neverfinder]

Just as an update my RAID card LSI 9260 8i boots fine or I can get into the MegaRIAD Bios.... Not that that card helps me in anyway. Is there another LSI HBA card I could try? I would need 8 internal SATA/SAS connections for 10TB drives.

 

[neverfinder]

Thanks a lot! I tried it again with 93008iit.bin and it didn't work. I then tried 9300it.bin and it actually worked! I really don't get why the official name when downloading the file is so long if it's such a problem...

I have, however, another small problem. I attached all 8 drives and only 5 are showing up. I rechecked the cabling and realised that the three drives that are missing are all WD drives. (Bought from three different dealers)

I tried attaching them to the Mainboard, but they still don't show up. What could it be? Do they have to be initialized or formatted before use? Next I will take them home and try them in my USB enclosure or directly in my computer.

They are Western Digital 10TB DC HC510 SATA 6Gb/s (Ultrastar Data Center Hard Drive) - HUH721010ALE600 / US7SAL100

 

[Johnnie Black]

I have, however, another small problem. I attached all 8 drives and only 5 are showing up. I rechecked the cabling and realised that the three drives that are missing are all WD drives. (Bought from three different dealers)

I tried attaching them to the Mainboard, but they still don't show up. What could it be? Do they have to be initialized or formatted before use? Next I will take them home and try them in my USB enclosure or directly in my computer.

They are Western Digital 10TB DC HC510 SATA 6Gb/s (Ultrastar Data Center Hard Drive) - HUH721010ALE600 / US7SAL100

Google "wd 3.3v sata"

 

[neverfinder]

Thx that did the trick!

 

[Spearfoot]

Thx that did the trick!

Glad to hear it!
Would you mind marking the thread as 'SOLVED', and telling us what you did to handle the problem? Curious minds want to know! And it might help someone else with the same problem.

 

[Chris Moore]

Google "wd 3.3v sata"

Here is the video:
https://youtu.be/9W3-uOl4ruc

 

[neverfinder]

Thx to all! It looked like the Power supply was sending 3v to the HDDs. AS Chris posted the video brought the solution.

 

[Ericloewe]

These things are spreading like wildfire. I predict pain in the coming years for anyone with fully-compliant backplanes or power cables.

 

[Chris Moore]

I guess I am lucky, my backplane only uses Molex four-pin connections, so this should not be a problem with my system. Still, it is a thing to be mindful of.

 

[Ericloewe]

There are some out there with local regulation that do supply +3.3 V to the disks, despite only receiving +12 V and +5 V.

 

[Chris Moore]

Thx to all! It looked like the Power supply was sending 3v to the HDDs. AS Chris posted the video brought the solution.

I am happy that it works now.
If you are interested in a bit more background, here is another video about it that is a bit more informative:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnISM_LMuss&t

Also, I hope it will be a resource for others that may find the same problem with the 3.3 volt line.

 

[Akindia]

I had similar symptoms as the main post for my LSI 9300 card on my Supermicro X11SRA-F motherboard, so I'll just document here what ended up working for me: I had to go into the BIOS and find the PCI-e setting for the particular PCI Express slot I was using, and change it from the default of "Legacy" mode to UEFI mode, and presto! all working again, finally.

 

[plsuh]

Just tagging on here that setting the PCIe to "EFI" worked for me as well with a Supermicro X11-SDV4C-TLN2F and a LSI 9207-8i SAS card. I had to remove the card to do it as the board would not enter Setup with the board installed. Then, I could enter Setup, go into Advanced --> PCIe/PCI/PnP Configuration. Change the setting for CPU SLOT7 PCI-E 3.0 X8 OPROM from "Legacy" to "EFI". Power down, re-install the card, and it came up properly.

 

[mrmorg]

where did you get the firmware from? i cant find it