EU Intel EMC Avamar ADS M1200; Gen4S; DRBGP;Xeon E5-2620 (x2) 32GB // 279 GBP + 35 GPB
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Did the server come with trays? His listings are a bit... confusing.E5-2603, but i am gonna replace it with 2x e5 2650l. And remember that i ordered this server week before this deal (same seller) with 2x e5 2603 and 64GB RAM so it should come with this cpus. Well at last one came of two ... And according to seller sas cables are optional with additional sas card.
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After chating with seller he is sending missing cpu and hdds. But yeah, i wasnt planing this level of troubleshooting today
Finally received mine. The delivery company lost the package for a day or two. One drive cage was heavily dented.
What RAID module did you get? I got RMS25CB080 with one battery.
SAS cabling missing is quite irritating.
Edit: Haha, just noticed one of the heatsinks is pointing the wrong way. No wonder CPU1 was hot.
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Same here, but i got 3x H310 that i am gonna use. One for internal SSD's for proxmox, 2 for nas - connected to backplane (those will be added to nas vm with vt-d).
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Guys, can You check Your ram speed on this machine. My machine seems to have problems with it: Intel S2600GL - Low memory performence
Hi guys, today I got my "Intel EMC Avamar ADS S2400;Gen4S; DRBGP;" from that same seller. There were a few caveats before turning the server on for the first time:
* the heatsink on CPU1 was not screwed in it's correct position at all. I had to correct that (but that was kind of OK since I was upgrading the 2603 to 2660 anyway).
* none of the miniSAS cables from the backplane were connected, they were just thrown inside
* it had one of the earlies BIOS versions (like 1.3.002). I went through the upgrades to the most recent one
* I also got a Brocade network adapter, which was next to the server, not installed at all. But I don't mind ATM
* I got it with Intel RMS25CB080, but it won't work. When booting the server, there is a message:
As is obvious, at that moment it waits till I press a key.
When I start booting to Linux (Ubuntu in several variants, but all of them 16.04LTS; Debian, SysRescCD 5.0.1), it always gets stuck halfway through the boot sequence at:
That is the last line I get.
Now my questions - what to do with the RMS25CB080? I tried flashing the firmware downloaded from the Intel site (using UEFI), but it got stuck. Should I take the card out? Would it be better to connect the miniSAS cables from the backplate to the miniSAS connectors on the mainboard? After I test the system out, I want to either use it with FreeNAS or ProxMox, but ZFS in any case (I need at least 6 disks to connect, probably 9).
Thank you for your suggestions.
(Also, in one of the previous posts, there was info that it's "whisper quiet" or "library quiet". I have set it to Balanced Power mode and Fans to acoustic, and have to say that I have a different experience - it's very loud, my wife does not to be in the same room as the server, and I'm not talking about the noise it makes when it's starting all the fans at power on)
* the heatsink on CPU1 was not screwed in it's correct position at all. I had to correct that (but that was kind of OK since I was upgrading the 2603 to 2660 anyway).
* none of the miniSAS cables from the backplane were connected, they were just thrown inside
* it had one of the earlies BIOS versions (like 1.3.002). I went through the upgrades to the most recent one
* I also got a Brocade network adapter, which was next to the server, not installed at all. But I don't mind ATM
* I got it with Intel RMS25CB080, but it won't work. When booting the server, there is a message:
Code:
RAID Adapter
Firmware Failed Validation!!!
Adapter needs to be reflashed.
Press Any Key to Continue...When I start booting to Linux (Ubuntu in several variants, but all of them 16.04LTS; Debian, SysRescCD 5.0.1), it always gets stuck halfway through the boot sequence at:
Code:
ata2: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)
...
ata6: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)Now my questions - what to do with the RMS25CB080? I tried flashing the firmware downloaded from the Intel site (using UEFI), but it got stuck. Should I take the card out? Would it be better to connect the miniSAS cables from the backplate to the miniSAS connectors on the mainboard? After I test the system out, I want to either use it with FreeNAS or ProxMox, but ZFS in any case (I need at least 6 disks to connect, probably 9).
Thank you for your suggestions.
(Also, in one of the previous posts, there was info that it's "whisper quiet" or "library quiet". I have set it to Balanced Power mode and Fans to acoustic, and have to say that I have a different experience - it's very loud, my wife does not to be in the same room as the server, and I'm not talking about the noise it makes when it's starting all the fans at power on)
You need to reflash a card, look on intel website for tips how to do it. As comes ZFS, you need for it card that work in JBOD mode. I am not sure if you can flash this intel card to it mode. I solve this by puting 2x Dell H310 that are flashed to it mode, and those cards are passthrough to NAS VM (front panel is connected to them, for os i use 2x SATA SSD that you can put inside case + you got 2 sata ports on motherboard).
It is, well it was. Let me explain this. Intel had to change something in fan tables in last update (or before). So if You have old intel bios, You have wishper quiet system on accoustic mode. But if you flashed it to newsest you dont have it anymore (but you gor better performence).
@Ponury Typ thanks for the answers. Which BIOS version do you recommend (use) for whisper quiet system? I have used v 1.3.002 (the server came with that one), then downloaded (from this Intel Website ) and installed 1.08.003, then 2.02.002 and finished at 2.05.004.
If I understand the terminology correctly, SDR is responsible for describing the chassis attributes to the BIOS, and thus providing ways to tailor the airflow and fan speed. So maybe it's enough to find the best (quietest) SDR and keep that one...
Also, is it possible to just use the on-board miniSAS connectors to connect the front panel drives if I don't want to passthrough? (I know, 12 drives but only 8 connected with the 2 miniSAS...)
Edit:
And as per the RMS25CB080, I tried flashing the firmware (again downloaded from Intel website, through UEFI), but the flashing process only wrote the command and was stuck at that point for ~10minutes? Or how long should I expect the flashing to take? In the past when I was flashing my old M1015 for IT mode, it took less than 5minutes if I remember well...
If I understand the terminology correctly, SDR is responsible for describing the chassis attributes to the BIOS, and thus providing ways to tailor the airflow and fan speed. So maybe it's enough to find the best (quietest) SDR and keep that one...
Also, is it possible to just use the on-board miniSAS connectors to connect the front panel drives if I don't want to passthrough? (I know, 12 drives but only 8 connected with the 2 miniSAS...)
Edit:
And as per the RMS25CB080, I tried flashing the firmware (again downloaded from Intel website, through UEFI), but the flashing process only wrote the command and was stuck at that point for ~10minutes? Or how long should I expect the flashing to take? In the past when I was flashing my old M1015 for IT mode, it took less than 5minutes if I remember well...
As a follow up. The culprit in my server freezing at boot was the RMS25CB080 card. When any OS tried to evaluate the disks installed in the machine, it would lock up. So far I have not been able to flash anything to the RMS card, it always gets stuck - so I think it's a bad/wrongly flashed/damaged item.
Since I have taken the card out, the machine boots OK.
Now, to make the machine quiet - like "whisper quiet" as @Ponury Typ has writen, I have downgraded only the SDR and FRU parts of the BIOS to 1 or 2 versions older than the newest one (don't remember which one). Also, not only is it necessary to choose "Balanced Power" and "Accoustic" settings in the BIOS, it's also important to enable the "Quiet fan mode" (or something similar, I'm at work ATM and can not look at the correct name). Then the machine is trully whisper quiet for normal workloads.
It obviously blows the fans more when I start some mining, but that is not so important for me now - first the machine will live in the garage until it pays for itself, then I'm going to move it inside my house to use it as main NAS/VM server under lighter loads...
Since I have taken the card out, the machine boots OK.
Now, to make the machine quiet - like "whisper quiet" as @Ponury Typ has writen, I have downgraded only the SDR and FRU parts of the BIOS to 1 or 2 versions older than the newest one (don't remember which one). Also, not only is it necessary to choose "Balanced Power" and "Accoustic" settings in the BIOS, it's also important to enable the "Quiet fan mode" (or something similar, I'm at work ATM and can not look at the correct name). Then the machine is trully whisper quiet for normal workloads.
It obviously blows the fans more when I start some mining, but that is not so important for me now - first the machine will live in the garage until it pays for itself, then I'm going to move it inside my house to use it as main NAS/VM server under lighter loads...
I got my one with two RAID controllers, one is kind of mezzanine card and the second one is regular PCIe card. My server wouldn't boot with PCIe so i took it out. Will troubleshoot it over the weekend.
Can you please explain how you downgraded SDR and FRU as from what i can see they are separate files but somehow they are called in the script. Did you just replace them and flashed everything?
In terms of server being "whisper quiet", i wouldn't say so or there's something wrong with the fans. I hear rattling coming from my server so maybe some fans are worn by i wouldn't call it whisper quiet, unless you live next to a busy road. I don't complain, it's still more quit than my R710 but far from whisper quiet
RMM reads Airflow as 20CFM, as explained in BIOS sensors can't read RPMs when in accoustic mode. My config is:
2x E5-2660
12x8GB - 96GB 1333Mhz
Integrated RAID Controller II
1x 760W PSU
2xSDD and 2xHDD in the server
Maybe your config is different and server does not have to spin fans so fast? Or maybe you have different fans?
It's quite late after a socially intensive day, so @stn excuse just a quick answer. As for downgrading only the SDR/FRU - I went through some of the complete BIOS updates (don't remember all the version, but basically the last in 1.x line, the first in 2.x line, then maybe of the 2.x lines with IPMI/management updates and then the last one). The server was not quiet, so I then run the update, selected that I want to update (downgrade) only the SDR/FRU...
My config is basically very similar to yours, having a little bit less memory (64GB).
My config is basically very similar to yours, having a little bit less memory (64GB).
So i started flashing and went away from screen when it was doing "HBSP and PSU firmware upgrade".
When i came back server was restarted and no signal coming out of VGA port. I left it running for a while then restarted server.
Didn't come back. After checking Post code errors it stops on
06h Early CPU initialization during Sec Phase.
Anybody knows what it means?
I already replaced the CPUs, booted with only one CPU (tried both) with no success. I have no spare 2011 CPU to check but it looks like i bricked the motherboard?
When i came back server was restarted and no signal coming out of VGA port. I left it running for a while then restarted server.
Didn't come back. After checking Post code errors it stops on
06h Early CPU initialization during Sec Phase.
Anybody knows what it means?
I already replaced the CPUs, booted with only one CPU (tried both) with no success. I have no spare 2011 CPU to check but it looks like i bricked the motherboard?
maybe there is an BIOS recovery Jumper.
Bios Recovery Jumper - Intel S1200BTS Specification [Page 120]
Bios Recovery Jumper - Intel S1200BTS Specification [Page 120]