2x 14TB SAS + LSI 9361-8i and 2x cables 149 USD

[BackupProphet]

2x 14TB SAS Toshiba 3.5" 12Gbps wi/ LSI 9361-8i and 2x SAS3 - SAS3 Cable | eBay

Capacity: 14TB. Bundle Option: -1x 14TB SAS with LSI 9361-8i FastPath and SAS 3 to SAS 3 Cable. -2x 14TB SAS with LSI 9361-8i FastPath and SAS 3 to SAS 3 Cable. Raid Card Model: LSI 9361-8i. PlusDrives is a division of UNIXSurplus, a large Server dealer in Silicon Valley, California.

www.ebay.com

 

[ano]

decent dealio

 

[unwind-protect]

Got a pair. Thanks.

 

[EasyRhino]

weirdly interesting combo.

Decent price on just the drives by themselves.

the 9361 seems to be a megaraid card, which means hardware raid only and no IT mode (I may be wrong)

the cables look like SAS3 to SAS3, in other words to hook up to an internal backplane or something, not breakout cables.

PS the seller is also selling the drives by themselves for about $81, or in lots of 20.

 

[ano]

it has a JBOD mode you can toggle

 

[Fritz]

I ordered a 2 drive combo yesterday and they are already on the way.

 

[myrison]

Got in for a pair of drives yesterday as well. The price was hard to pass up. Thanks for posting the deal.

 

[pedrom]

Thanks for posting.

Can someone please report on the # of hours each drive has and health. Thanks.

 

[Koop]

I really didn't need anything here so I didn't buy anything to allow others to get in on this deal.

Will say this is a great deal though. Individually this would be, what, double the price? Pretty good.

If they got these still in a few days though I may be tempted. Keep me from temptation my friends please buy it all lol

 

[nabsltd]

the 9361 seems to be a megaraid card, which means hardware raid only and no IT mode (I may be wrong)

The pictured 9361 does not have a cache module, so the only real way to use it is in JBOD mode, as RAID without cache is really slow.

Will say this is a great deal though. Individually this would be, what, double the price? Pretty good.

You can get a pair of 14TB SAS drives shipped for about $170. The RAID card is essentially worthless, as you're better off with an HBA for non-RAID. You'd need to add cache and battery for RAID, which sell separately for about $40, while you can get a 9361-8i with cache and battery for $25. The cables are also pretty worthless, as they don't help you connect the two drives to the card.

It's a good deal for a pair of 14TB drives ($150 instead of $170), with some extra junk in the package. If it had the cache and battery instead of the cables, it would be a steal at $150.

 

[Koop]

You can't just put it in IT mode as just a straight HBA? I was assuming you'd do that and connect to a expander backplane with the two provided cables. If you can put it in IT mode figured it was the same as a $30-$40 HBA.

Am I mixing this card up with a different one? I'm mobile I can't double check

 

[Koop]

@nabsltd equivalent to LSI SAS 9300-8i if in IT mode? That's the HBA I was thinking of I think. I use the Supermicro version in that SM chassis I have.

Def not double though if you can get the drives at that price though.

Well if anyone gets this deal and doesn't need the cables let me know because I need a pair to connect to a backplane in a second chassis I got. Want to use as a JBOD

 

[Fritz]

Are cache batteries pretty much universal or are they different for every card/mfg?

 

[Thomas H]

it has a JBOD mode you can toggle

I tried this but it would crash my proxmox host when I tried to PCIe passthrough the 9361-8i in jbod mode for TrueNAS vm. I picked up a Inspur LSI 9300-8i, hba in IT mode, for $15.98 and no issues. Also, no RAID BIOS baggage with faster boot during bios.

 

[nabsltd]

You can't just put it in IT mode as just a straight HBA? I was assuming you'd do that and connect to a expander backplane with the two provided cables. If you can put it in IT mode figured it was the same as a $30-$40 HBA.

The card can't be cross-flashed into IT mode...it's MR mode only. As long as the OS driver is good, it would be fine even for something like ZFS, as JBOD presents the disks to the OS just like an HBA...there are no RAID features available on disks in JBOD mode, so no use of cache, no hiding true geometry, etc. Appliances like TrueNAS have spent much more time tuning the HBA drivers (i.e., IT mode), so they recommend HBA instead.

Since I'm not sure what I'm going to need cards for, I buy the 9361-8i with cache and battery so I can use it for anything. The eBay seller "plusdrives" has them for $39, and they also have every feature unlocked (e.g., RAID6, CacheCade, etc.).

Are cache batteries pretty much universal or are they different for every card/mfg?

The "battery" for the cache on the 9361 is really a capacitor pack. I think LSI went to capacitors for everything with the 93xx and beyond. They seem to be universal, as every pack has the same connector, and each cache module has a cable that converts from that connector to whatever the cache module uses.

 

[Koop]

I see thanks for the clarification. I've not looked much into raid cards due to all the software raid options out there.

 

[Fritz]

Thanks. I have a SAS2 RAID controller that uses the same "battery". Don't remember the model # but the battery plugs into a daughter board mounted to the controller. It's a cache board I assume. I'm not using it at present so I can use it with the 9361 that's coming with the drives if it's worthwhile.

 

[nabsltd]

I have a SAS2 RAID controller that uses the same "battery". Don't remember the model # but the battery plugs into a daughter board mounted to the controller. It's a cache board I assume. I'm not using it at present so I can use it with the 9361 that's coming with the drives if it's worthwhile.

The cache cards are different for every model of LSI card. There are even OEM versions of the same LSI card that use a different cache card from the LSI version because the design is different.

So, you can use the supercap, but you'd have to buy a cache module. The module for the 9361-8i runs about $25-30 shipped, which is why I always just buy the card with the module.

 

[Dev_Mgr]

I picked one up too. Going to use it in my server to hold backups (Raid 1 for now, but may look for more 14TB SAS drives to change to 4-drive raid 5, or when I picked up another drive bay for this system, I may go up to 8-drive raid 6).

 

[GhettoSuperstar]

I picked up two of these sets. 14tb for $80 and four of them. It was "VERY" hard to walk away from this deal. Finally get to replace 3x WD120EMAZ drives that are slow writing (SMR) but were used only for a mirror copy.