SAS HBA under 200-150 dollars?

Notice: Page may contain affiliate links for which we may earn a small commission through services like Amazon Affiliates or Skimlinks.

ScarredPinguin

New Member
Mar 19, 2021
12
0
1
Hello everyone! Newbie here.
I'm looking for a cheap SAS HBA for my AMD Ryzen 5 server wtih SAS825TQ 6 Gb/s backplane for 8 disks. All disks would be SAS 6Gb/s due to the backplane limitation and in ZFS raid.
Could someone please recommend me some good SAS HBA? I have read that LSI 9211-8i/LSI2008 and LSI Broadcom SA 9300-8I are good. Is it better to buy SAS 12Gb/S HBA for the future?

Thanks in advance!:)
 

zack$

Well-Known Member
Aug 16, 2018
701
315
63
Cheapest I would recommend is the SAS2308 based cards for your immediate use case.

However, having a decent HBA you can re-use for a future system build is a worthwhile investment. In this latter case, SAS3008/SAS3408 based cards will guarantee SAS3 compatibility in the future (SAS3 is on the way out by the way).

Note that you will be paying roughly 2-3x more for the SAS3008/SAS3408 based cards than the SAS2308 (typically).
 
  • Like
Reactions: ScarredPinguin

pinkanese

New Member
Jun 19, 2014
27
10
3
33
The Adaptec card tends to run hot and will require direct cooling in most cases in a home server.

What drives are you connecting and what do you plan to use in the future? Spinning disks pretty much topped out at SAS1 speeds, so any card is going to be adequate for those. If you don't plan on running an array of 8 SAS3 SSD's in the future the SAS3 card is going to be overkill.

I would go with an LSI 2308 based card, 9207-8i or similar, in most cases.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ScarredPinguin

ScarredPinguin

New Member
Mar 19, 2021
12
0
1
Thank you all for help!:)
I have decided to buy sas3008 HBA for the future.
Is this the right HBA? I found it on Amazon for 129 euros and they claim it's new. However, it's for 300 euros on various e-shops. Should I be worried?
IMG_20210413_083736.jpg
 

zack$

Well-Known Member
Aug 16, 2018
701
315
63
I don't know Euro prices but I wouldn't pay more than US$100 for a SAS3008.

The Supermicro SAS3008 cards are the cheapest and are easily cross flashed to IR and IT mode with Supermicro scripts on their website (with updated firmware). Look for the AOC-S3008L-L8E.

FWIW, I picked up 2x AOC-S3008L-L8E for $45 each late last year.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ScarredPinguin