QNAP QM2-4S-240 Quad SATA M.2 PCIe Card

[HarryMuscle]

Just wondering if there would be any red flags to getting a QNAP QM2-4S-240 quad SATA m.2 PCIe card (https://www.qnap.com/en-us/product/qm2-4s-240) to add to a TrueNAS Scale system. According to the specs (https://www.qnap.com/en-us/product/qm2-4s-240/specs/hardware) it uses a PCIe switch and then two SATA controllers that each control two m.2 slots. The smaller cousin (https://www.servethehome.com/qnap-qm2-2s-220a-adapter-general-purpose-mini-review/) of this card uses a Asmedia ASM1062 controller and I'm assuming that these cards do too.

Thanks,
Harry

 

[Samuel Tai]

I wouldn't chance it. This smells very like a SATA port multiplier to me.

Multiply your problems with SATA Port Multipliers and cheap SATA controllers

In the last year or two, we've had a resurgence of users asking about SATA Port Multipliers and cheap SATA controllers. Please, do NOT use port multipliers, and use cheap SATA controllers only after extensive research. SATA controllers and SATA...

www.truenas.com

 

[Samuel Tai]

I may have been a bit too harsh. It looks properly engineered, and very similar to the OWC Accelsior E2 I previously ran as an L2ARC, which striped over 2x M.2 SSDs. I wouldn't use it in any other capacity, as it's basically a small hardware RAID controller over the M.2 SSDs.

 

[nabsltd]

Just wondering if there would be any red flags to getting a QNAP QM2-4S-240 quad SATA m.2 PCIe card

Why go for an SATA M.2 instead of NVMe?

If your motherboard supports bifurcation, something like this will do the trick nicely. If your motherboard does not support bifurcation, then something you'll have to spend more money, but it can still be done.

 

[HarryMuscle]

Why go for an SATA M.2 instead of NVMe?

If your motherboard supports bifurcation, something like this will do the trick nicely. If your motherboard does not support bifurcation, then something you'll have to spend more money, but it can still be done.

The PCIe slot that's available in the machine is only a 4x slot which limits nvme options to pretty much zero if you're trying to fit 4 more drives.

Thanks,
Harry

 

[Samuel Tai]

That's the problem, it won't appear as 4 drives. The ASmedia chip will RAID it to a single volume.

 

[HoneyBadger]

That's the problem, it won't appear as 4 drives. The ASmedia chip will RAID it to a single volume.

There's no RAID logic on the ASM1062, and even if there were, it's two distinct controllers behind a PCIe switch; no way to RAID across that without involving software. The card will present two individual ASM1062 SATA controllers, with two drives each - it'll be up to @HarryMuscle to decide what to do with them.