UPS problems and USB PCI-e cards

[Wim Mistiaen]

Hello all,

I've built my freenas system 2-3 months ago, and it's working great. It wasn't a cheap investment, but I'm really pleased with the results and possibilities. Not a single minute of regret of the money spent. Furthermore, this forum has been a great help (and I'm sure it will continue to be so).

Up untill now, I was able to find all answers to my questions in old threads, so I never had to make a new post myself (and trust me, there were plenty) . Like I said, up untill now. Here's my problem:


The problem i got is with an Eaton 3s UPS. It keeps giving me disconnect messages

Code:

> ugen0.5: <EATON> at usbus0 (disconnected)
> ugen0.5: <EATON> at usbus0
> ugen0.5: <EATON> at usbus0 (disconnected)
> ugen0.5: <EATON> at usbus0
> ugen0.5: <EATON> at usbus0 (disconnected)
> ugen0.5: <EATON> at usbus0

and occasionally data stale messages

Code:

Jun  6 15:25:16 Stallone upsd[29122]: Data for UPS [Eaton3SUPS] is stale - check driver
Jun  6 15:25:17 Stallone upsd[29122]: UPS [Eaton3SUPS] data is no longer stale

This has apparently happend to quite some people, and seems to be a FreeBSD issue, rather than Freenas specific. (bug https://bugs.pcbsd.org/issues/4914)

https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/data-for-ups-is-stale.20898/
https://forums.freenas.org/index.ph...ected-message-yet-ups-is-communicating.18177/
https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/logs-show-almost-daily-ups-disconnection.25032/

In my attempts to solve it, I increased maxage to 30 in the /etc/local/nut/upsd.conf file, and restart nut with a script (hosted on my pool) on startup, and I put "pollinterval = 15" in the aux parameters field for the UPS service. Both to no avail. (The script executes, as the file is edited when I nano into it)

First question:

Is the data stale and the driver disconnect the same issue? I'm not very litterate concerning linux, but it seems to me the data stale is more a upsd-issue (related to NUT?), and the disconnect more a lower level driver issue. I might be chasing the wrong issue here.


Second question:

I attached the UPS to the mobo header USB, by means of a cheap chinese USB adapter plate (the one with just a cable and no electronics on it.) USB 3 is turned of in the mobo bios (ASRock c2750d4i), and i already tried 2 different USB cables. I've been thinking mybe this is the culprit. so i was looking into a PCI-e USB addon card.
I was wondering if freenas supports a USB3.0 PCIe card (i know about the support of USB 3 being disabled, and chipsetsnot supported etc etc.). i would ofcourse be fine if it ran at USB 2.0 speed. I just wondered if these things are plug and play/pray or a real pain to get working.

basically, i'd like to buy this http://www.amazon.de/dp/B003MVJG8Q/...de=df0&creative=22494&creativeASIN=B003MVJG8Q , and i'm asking if this is a good call.

PS: I also have the possiblity to buy an USB2.0 card at a local shop, don't have a model number though. Should I buy that instead maybe, to get the USB3.0 issue out of the picture completely?

I read this topic https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/pci-x-usb-3-0-card-and-freenas.20901/ (and a bunch of others), but I'm afraid I'm none the wiser.

sorry for the lengthy post.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Ericloewe]

If you're using USB 2.0 devices and there's a connection, USB 3.0 is completely out of the picture, in principle.