I'm looking to put together a home media server. I have had significant success with the C2100 chassis and the H200 board, flashed into IT mode for a linux backup server at work. For my home case, I'm looking at running ESXi as the hyper visor and running Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials in a VM. I found that the H700 can be had for not much money, and it's fully supported in VMWare / ESXi.
Secondly, I have a lot of 3 TB WD Red drives in the office, some of which have been used previously. That makes for pretty inexpensive storage for a home media server.
I installed 12 WD Red drives in a RAID 10 on the H700 card and did a fast initialize. This simply removes the beginning and end of the RAID array data, and from what I can tell, relies on a background initialization? These drives had previously been used on a ZFS pool for mass storage. I started watching the drive activity lights, and the pattern was very odd. Every now a then a drive (any one of the 12 - random in pattern) would illuminate with solid activity. It would stay solid for maybe 3 seconds? Maybe a little longer, then the carrier would illuminate RED for 1 - 2 seconds, then it would go back to flashing happily.
I opened MegaRAID Storage Manager and connected to the ESXi box. I found a LOT of messages related to CRC error found. I'm thinking this has something to do with not doing a full initialization out of the gate. From what I've read, given these drives have been used previously, I really should have done a full initialization on them... Does this make sense? Am I on the right track? I know WD Red have consumer level URE, but I'm running RAID 10, this is for a home server, and most importantly, the WD Reds support TLER.
My second question relates to the expansion backplane. At the bottom of the backplane, there are 4 jumpers. J15, J16, J17, and J18. J15 is clearly identified - the jumper is to be put in place when a PERC card is used and removed if an LSI branded card is used. Easy enough. Every photo I've seen of this backplane has J16, J17, and J18 closed (jumpered). My backplane had J18 removed / open.
I received an odd message at boot up regarding direct access mode and discovered my backpland did NOT have a jumper on J15 in spite of using a PERC card. I installed a jumper, but also jumpered J18 (as that's what was in every photo I could find).
Does ANYONE know what J16, J17, and J18 do? I'd really love to know what setting this changes.
Secondly, I have a lot of 3 TB WD Red drives in the office, some of which have been used previously. That makes for pretty inexpensive storage for a home media server.
I installed 12 WD Red drives in a RAID 10 on the H700 card and did a fast initialize. This simply removes the beginning and end of the RAID array data, and from what I can tell, relies on a background initialization? These drives had previously been used on a ZFS pool for mass storage. I started watching the drive activity lights, and the pattern was very odd. Every now a then a drive (any one of the 12 - random in pattern) would illuminate with solid activity. It would stay solid for maybe 3 seconds? Maybe a little longer, then the carrier would illuminate RED for 1 - 2 seconds, then it would go back to flashing happily.
I opened MegaRAID Storage Manager and connected to the ESXi box. I found a LOT of messages related to CRC error found. I'm thinking this has something to do with not doing a full initialization out of the gate. From what I've read, given these drives have been used previously, I really should have done a full initialization on them... Does this make sense? Am I on the right track? I know WD Red have consumer level URE, but I'm running RAID 10, this is for a home server, and most importantly, the WD Reds support TLER.
My second question relates to the expansion backplane. At the bottom of the backplane, there are 4 jumpers. J15, J16, J17, and J18. J15 is clearly identified - the jumper is to be put in place when a PERC card is used and removed if an LSI branded card is used. Easy enough. Every photo I've seen of this backplane has J16, J17, and J18 closed (jumpered). My backplane had J18 removed / open.
I received an odd message at boot up regarding direct access mode and discovered my backpland did NOT have a jumper on J15 in spite of using a PERC card. I installed a jumper, but also jumpered J18 (as that's what was in every photo I could find).
Does ANYONE know what J16, J17, and J18 do? I'd really love to know what setting this changes.