Did I brick my IBM M1015?

[pete_c]

Great forum guys!

Started initially using an Asus E-350 to update the firmware. I saw the "pal" error so I went to another motherboard (Intel). I did the step by step processs as documented here. Everything looked great until I rebooted.

I noticed on reboot that non of the LEDs are illuminating on the controller. The computer posts and the card isn't seen.

If I take the card to the Asus E-350 motherboard; one LED is on but the computer doesn't post.

Megarec and sas2flsh do not recognize any card. Any suggestions?

 

[mobilenvidia]

How far through the process did you get before you rebooted ?

There must be hope, avoid using the ASUS E-350 as this will give issue if it does the 'PAL' thing

What is Intel Mobo you used ?
PCIe 2.0 16x/8x slot ? not sure how you'd get on in a 4x slot

 

[pete_c]

I finished the write of the "serial number". I was at a DOS prompt and waited a bit after. Powered down the computer.

Its a Foxconn Intel with a 16x PCIe 2.0 slot.

I gave up on the Asus E-350 when I saw the Pal thing. The card though was recognized just fine with the old firmware on it.

So now though when the card is plugged into the Foxcon Intel motherboard PCIe 2.0 slot; no LEDs light up. This box has W2003 on it and when I let it boot once it did see "something" in the PCIe slot even with the LEDs all off.

 

[mobilenvidia]

The card should live, as you have flashed the FW succcessfully and got the changing the SAS Address.
Will get back later when I'm home with some things to try

 

[pete_c]

Thank you mobilenvidia. I typed all the SAS Address letters in capitals as was on the sticker on the card.

Its a Foxconn G31MXP Intel chipset motherboard.

Booting the box into windows to see what happens. Its destined though to be a FreeNAS box. (hence the FW change).

 

[mobilenvidia]

Best to have the card in the Intel board to test this.

If you were able to change the SAS address then the card should still be alive.
The board should even boot with the SAS address not set (will give an error message)

Megarec should see the card, if it doesn't then there might be trouble.

In DOS:

MegaRec -adpList
Your card should show here, even with no Frmware and BIOS on the card it should still show.

Megarec -cleanflash 0
should remove the firmware and BIOS from the card then start again.

Fingers crossed this can be solved

 

[pete_c]

Thank you mobilenvidia.

This is what I see running in DOS with the card plugged into the Foxconn intel motherboard.

MegaRec -adpList

MegaRAID HWR Contoller Recovery tool. Version 01.01-004 February 05, 2010
Copyright (c) 2006-2008 LSI Corp.
Supports 1078 controller and its Successors.

No MR controller(s) found.
If controller(s) physically present but not found,
Please shutdown the system and set the jumper in default position and power up

I see the same for:

Megarec -cleanflash 0

BTW - when I plug the card into the Asus E-350 one LED blinks and the E-350 doesn't post. The card / E-350 did post before the FW update.

What Jumper? I have a feeling that IBM made the board indestructable; no matter what I do to it.

Found the beginning of a thread; but the link is dead (cached on google).

Hi guys, I have just bought two of these controllers which are the IBM M1015, but on ... 2. its a very tiny pcb/jumper thing - it gets placed over 2 pins on the .... ( DFCT) FW 10M09 cause system (sles11sp1/rhel6) reset while lspci

 

[mobilenvidia]

The jumper refers to the LSI9260/80 cards that have a Factory reset jumper and a SBR bypass jumper.
The M1015 has no jumper to play with.

It's beginning to look serious.
You need to find another motherboard to have a go at this.

Ideally a Supermicro or a serverboard where you can disable the PCIe OptionROM loading.

 

[pete_c]

Thank-you mobilenvidia.

I was reading and mostly saw that its better to utilize the card in a server style motherboard. The only PCIe function present in the Foxconn bios is that to force PCIe at the 1X speed.

I am headed towards building a new NAS box; documenting the whole build on one of the forums that I hang at.

My goal was kind of a low powered NAS using the ASUS E350 mITX board (already populated with 8Gb of memory) and this new not for sale here in the US 8 drive NAS box. Its a very small footprint hot swap case which the vendor in China agreed to provide with the point of me documenting the build (pictures et al). The MB does have 6 SATA ports; but I was going to utilize the IBM M1015 for this endeavor. None the less they are inexpensive; so getting another isn't a big deal.

I'm going to start the build probably in the next few weeks.

 

[mobilenvidia]

Hmmm, it beginning to look like not all Motherboards are build equal, I know Gigabyte Mobo's have issues with LSI cards.
I think due to timing issues, OEM's trying to squeeze to much performance out of a Mobo to lead the Benchmark race.

I've been toying with a Mini-ITX build my self and putting in the M5015 and RAID 5 in it to house all my Wive's videos safely
Looking at your E350 issuse with the M1015, I'm possibly heading away from desktop boards and heading for a SuperMicro mini-ITX setup
But the SuperMicro's build in video means 15pin dsub output, which today is soooo naff, if they only came with DVI video out

Zotac make some very nice featured Mini-ITX baords, but it will be a risk in whether the RAID cards will work.
They also have nice video out

Just had a thought with your M1015 try this.
In the E350 Mobo BIOS, disable the onboard HDD controller and/or set an other controllers to IDE mode (not AHCI)

 

[pete_c]

Thanks Mobilevidia.

Just had a thought with your M1015 try this.
In the E350 Mobo BIOS, disable the onboard HDD controller and/or set an other controllers to IDE mode (not AHCI)

Yup tried that yesterday. I'm still getting used to this Asus very graphical / with many pictures Bios. Never seen anything like it before.

Here's an Amazon link to it.

http://www.amazon.com/Asus-Dual-Core-Fusion-Motherboard-E35M1-I/dp/B004ZMGVUM

Here's a link to the 8 drive case that I will be putting the above motherboards in. Can't find the link; but here's a picture.
It took about 1.5 months to get. Very well packaged. I haven't opened it yet and do not know if I could even utilize a short PCIe card in it anyways.

I split up the NAS boxes a bit. One is just for video, another is for music, data, etc. Two are propietary Linux / Raid 5 boxes and have done well. One is an embedded MS 1U 4 drive hot swap case and it also does well (old now). Another is just a DIY with a 3Ware hotswap drive cage running FreeNAS.

I over do it a bit; but utilize these little Patriot Memory NMTs around the house chrooted and tweaked a bit each with 1 TB drives in them. These are so small that they can be placed with velcro on the back of the LCD.

Lately been "trying" to root the Logitech Revue I purchased to also use it kind of as an NMT of sorts. Its got ICS on it; but very customized. It streams video from the NAS boxes well though. They kind of released the newest ICS though as "unrootable".

 

[pete_c]

Mobilevidia,

As I am writing an article on building this NAS box with mentioned Asus motherboard decided a few minutes ago to update the BIOS on the motherboad. It worked! I can now see the updated (?) IBM M1015 PCie card.

Here is the motherboard link:

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/AMD_CPU_on_Board/E35M1I/

Just have 8Gb of memory in it.

After all that was written above I'm now looking to make sure that I updated the firmware to the one that I wanted to utilize.

I think its OK now as I see the following on boot.

LSI Corporation MPT SAS2 BIOS
MPT2BIOS-7.17.00.00 (2011.02.18)

I hit the control c key to get to the configuration and see:

Adapter - SAS9210-8i
FW Revision - 9.00.00.00-IT

I think I am OK with earlier done FW upgrade.

I have no SATA drives as of yet connected.

I'm looking now to validate its functionality in the 8 Drive NAS box pictured above.

 

[mobilenvidia]

Thats great it's all going well now.
Good thing about ASUS they have a very good support dept and BIOS does get regular updates.

Once you see the LSI splash screen you know all is good.
Whit IT mode there is little to see or do.
But CTRL+C should let you see what is attached to the card.

Happy building and writing

 

[pete_c]

Thank-you Mobilevidia for your support and help and a great forum!

 

[Patrick]

Hey pete: where did you get that chassis? Do you have a model number for the 8 slot version?

 

[pete_c]

http://board.homeseer.com/showthread.php?t=152350

Its very generic from a company in China. Here is a link to my documenting the build. I'm still working on it and am documenting the build on an online magazine as well.

I think it was referred to by the CS as an M800. He told me that it was still a not "finished" test box and to ignore the logos on the box that said "mini-server".

 

[Patrick]

Can you PM me with details on where to get it? I would want to review that if it is $55.

 

[pete_c]

Will PM Patrick.