IBM Lenovo 46C9111 Serveraid M5210 $65 OBO

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Indecided

Active Member
Sep 5, 2015
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Nice find, but given how vague the listing is 1) lack of a clear picture of the actual product 2) instead you get to see their gold rhino with just a reflection of the card packaging in a generic u-line static bag I would be very wary of it being a Chinese knockoff.

Granted, they tend to just knockoff the original LSI cards most, but you never know. Having said that, I'm tempted. Out of SAS3 backplanes though. Anybody going to TOFTT?
 

nthu9280

Well-Known Member
Feb 3, 2016
1,628
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San Antonio, TX
Nice find, but given how vague the listing is 1) lack of a clear picture of the actual product 2) instead you get to see their gold rhino with just a reflection of the card packaging in a generic u-line static bag I would be very wary of it being a Chinese knockoff.

Granted, they tend to just knockoff the original LSI cards most, but you never know. Having said that, I'm tempted. Out of SAS3 backplanes though. Anybody going to TOFTT?
Agree about the lack of details in the listing. That's is a pain in dealing with some of these e-cyclers like Kalleyomalley etc unless you know exactly what you are looking for. It takes a lot effort to figure out what the item is.

That said, the price on this specific card has been falling steadily. There are other listings in the $80 range. Just need confirmation that this can be configured for JBOD. I don't have a use for HW RAID card.

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Rand__

Well-Known Member
Mar 6, 2014
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Wouldn't deem that impossible.
Happy to see they didn't jack the price up (yet) ;)
 

Son of Homer

Member
May 9, 2016
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I believe these can be configured as JBOD/Pass through mode in the BIOS. Don't own one so can't say for sure. Can someone confirm? If so this is a great price for a New 12gbps card.

These are based on SAS3108 chip and can't be cross flashed to IT mode FW, AFAIK.

New Bulk Lenovo 46C9111 Servertaid M5210 SAS/SATA Controller | eBay

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Here is a Lenovo version of a spec sheet: ServeRAID M5210 and M5210e SAS/SATA Controllers Product Guide > Lenovo Press

If I am reading this correctly, JBOD is available, under iMR mode (no memory upgrade), but not MR mode.

Support for Integrated MegaRAID (iMR) mode (no cache memory upgrades installed) or MegaRAID (MR) mode (requires 1 GB, 2 GB, or 4 GB cache memory upgrade).
  • iMR mode supports (no cache memory upgrades installed) the following features:
    • RAID 0, 1, and 10, and, optionally, 5 and 50
    • Fixed stripe unit size of 64 KB
    • Self-encrypting drives with optional Zero Cache/RAID 5 upgrade
    • Both RAID and JBOD (pass-thru mode with system drives) configurations
      • Up to 16 drives are supported in a RAID configuration.
      • Up to 63 drives are supported in a JBOD configuration. (JBOD drives can be used as bootable drives.)
  • MR mode supports (1 GB, 2 GB, or 4 GB cache memory upgrade required):
    • RAID 0, 1, 10, 5, and 50 and, optionally, 6 and 60 (Non-RAID is not supported.)
    • Configurable stripe unit size from 64 KB up to 1 MB
    • Self-encrypting drives
    • Optional SSD performance features (FastPath and CacheCade)
 

Son of Homer

Member
May 9, 2016
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The new listing shows used, seller refurbished. There are a couple of sold listings from another vendor @ $65 for "new bulk",
 

nthu9280

Well-Known Member
Feb 3, 2016
1,628
498
83
San Antonio, TX
Nice find, but given how vague the listing is 1) lack of a clear picture of the actual product 2) instead you get to see their gold rhino with just a reflection of the card packaging in a generic u-line static bag I would be very wary of it being a Chinese knockoff.

Granted, they tend to just knockoff the original LSI cards most, but you never know. Having said that, I'm tempted. Out of SAS3 backplanes though. Anybody going to TOFTT?
Rolled the dice for $55 and decided to be the guenea pig.

LSI Megacli said flash was successful but Fw stayed the same even after a 2nd attempt. Put it in a Centos machine and used IBM/Lenovo FW tool and update was successful. Couldn't get into BIOS and it does not list an option Control+C/R etc.

Two different HP machines (Z600, and elite 8300 desktop) disable some of the RAM slots. Haven't taped the B5-B6 to see if that resolves the issue. Dell T3400 (my flashing testbed) didn't have that issue.

Hot plugged a drive containing backup data and windows 10 could see it fine.
SMART data appear to be working also. Will need to do more testing before calling it a success.


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Javik50k

Member
Oct 11, 2018
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Hello!
I have one question. Just installed M5210 with supercapacitor BBU for my new NAS, but i want to use CacheCade.
Wich key do i need? IBM pdfs says "feature on demand", but card do have hardware key connector (wide, 2 pin with empty space between).
Caching SSDs are two Intel DC3700s, i think, these must be compatible. So how do i activate CacheCade? In MSM option is grayed out.
Thank you in advance