first time user of HBA [9217-8i], need guidance

[thunderrd]

Hi, I have 9217-8i that I want to press into service because I have used all the available SATA ports on my mainboard.

The device appears in Device manager as SAS2 2308 Mustang, and seems to be installed correctly.

When booting, the initialization appears, and I am given the option to ctrl-c into the setup; however, with brand-new SATA drives attached, they are not displayed in the setup, nor are they shown in the initialization screen. These are 4TB WD Black SATA drives.

I have toggled the option 'display both controllers and devices' to on.

Because this is the first time I am using a card like this, I am not sure what I'm doing wrong. Can anyone give me a bit of advice? Thanks for anything that you can tell me.

 

[thunderrd]

I have some further information.

As a test, I took a used drive with data on it and plugged it in, and the HBA shows the drive normally. Its a much smaller and older drive, but it behaves as I expected it to, showing up in Disk Management normally.

Is it possible that 9217-8i is not capable of handling 4TB drives? I would not think this is the case. The firmware and/or BIOS possibly too old, and needing to be flashed, perhaps?

Is it possible that I have to format the new drives before the HBA can see them properly? I wouldn't think so either, but this is my first experience with using one.

Maybe this gives someone a clue that might help me. Thanks!

 

[BLinux]

that card uses SAS2308 chipset, so it can manage up to 8-ZebiBytes of SAS HDDs or 128-PebiBytes of SATA.. that's not the problem, and even if it was, usually you'll just get a drive that shows the wrong capacity.

how new are these 4TB WD Black drives? are they SATA 3.3 or newer? if so, you might want to check if the new "power disable" feature is your problem.

 

[thunderrd]

BLinux, thanks for the response. That is an interesting little video.

I've just now figured out what the problem is; apparently the drives have to have a partition table in order to be seen by the controller. These are brand-new OEM 6 Gb/s drives and I guess they didn't have a partition table out of the box. I've created a GPT PT on all of them and they are now recognized by the controller properly, and the 1E Raid array is done.

I guess I won't make that mistake again

 

[kapone]

Nope, you're wrong. Lots of learning...

 

[thunderrd]

Nope, you're wrong. Lots of learning...

While I appreciate your input, could you be a little less cryptic? I'd like to know what you are referring to.

 

[kapone]

While I appreciate your input, could you be a little less cryptic? I'd like to know what you are referring to.

I'll try...

I've just now figured out what the problem is; apparently the drives have to have a partition table in order to be seen by the controller. These are brand-new OEM 6 Gb/s drives and I guess they didn't have a partition table out of the box. I've created a GPT PT on all of them and they are now recognized by the controller properly, and the 1E Raid array is done.

That is most certainly not true. If that were the case...storage guys would go crazy creating partitions on each drive...

The controller "seeing" a drive absolutely zero to do with what's actually on the drive, partition wise.

 

[thunderrd]

OK, I'll bite. I did not create partitions, per se, I created the partition tables. Afterwards, the space was unallocated.

I'm an absolute know-nothing regarding HBAs, but the drives did not appear in the LSI initialization when I tried them at first; then, after I created the GPT tables on each drive, they appeared just as I wanted them to. I'm not being argumentative, I'd just like to know what happened between the time I first tried to boot, and after I created the GPT. All 3 of them were bought together, and tried individually at first.

If you know, enlighten me, so I can learn. I just know that before I did it, they dod not appear. Afterwards, they appeared as expected.

I'm just happy I got them to work, and I didn't have any help. We all started to learn sometime.

If what you say is true, why were the drives not 'seen' at first? There were no actual partitions on the drives at any time in this scenario.

Thanks for the time, I really do want to understand!

 

[thunderrd]

OK, I'm an idiot. Nothing like an expert bitchslapping a novice.

Thanks for elucidating, it's been very beneficial.