Drives missing in Disk Management... but they are not...

[BestGear]

Hi Guys

Weird one when setting up a new JBOD chassis for backup duties.

Got 16 drives hanging off an HP expander (the older cheap one), connected to a Windows 10 PC with a 2008 controller in it.

In MegaRaid Manager - all 16 drives are visible, yet in Disk Manager, only 12 are there.

Megaraid identifies them all ok. individually...

I have tried each MiniSAS cables on their own and all 4 drives show in Disk Manager.

I dont want to move this onto my main server until its proved 100% ok - any ideas?

Many thanks in advance.

David

 

[kapone]

Running out of drive letters by any chance?

 

[nthu9280]

I've read similar issue with Intel 36 port SAS expander here on the forums.

Is your HP expander on the latest FW? You may be are aware of that HP RAID controller is not required to update the FW. Any regular HBA can be used but do need Linux which can be handled by using a Live USB.

Here are my rough notes on this. I think latest was 2.10.

****
Use HBA not a RAID controller

Install sg3_utils

./CPxyzzy.scexe --unpack=tmp

lsscsi -g | grep HP

[x:y:z:w] enclosu HP HP SAS EXP Card 2.08 - /dev/sgXX

# sg_write_buffer --mode=dmc_offs_defer --bpw=4096 --in=<FW-File>.bin /dev/sgXX
# sg_write_buffer --mode=activate_mc /dev/sgXX

Reboot
*****

 

[BestGear]

Running out of drive letters by any chance?

Not got that far... even in Disk Manager the partitions/disks are not visible....

 

[BestGear]

I've read similar issue with Intel 36 port SAS expander here on the forums.

Its running the 2.08 that it came with... I will check to see if a later version is around.

I have another up in the attic - might just get it down and swap it to see if it makes any difference.

Thanks for the process to flash it - thats appreciated!

David

 

[kapone]

If MSM is showing all disks...your HBA is working fine...the expander is working fine...

Disks not showing up in Windows Disk Management is a Windows issue.

 

[ecosse]

Might be worth updating the driver in Windows? What does the MegaRAID utility say from Windows?