Setting up a Dell r710 to work with a PERC H200 JBOD

[ViciousXUSMC]

So finally made the leap of faith to build my NAS after lurking here for over a year.

The recent $160 external deal for the 8TB WD RED's and finding out about Dell r710's on ebay for under $200 I was able to justify the cost and make it happen.

However despite thinking I did enough research, I think I missed a few key things and I need to find solutions to them without breaking the bank.

The included PERC6i does not have a JBOD mode (was going to try the Raid 0 virtual disk setup) but I totally overlooked the fact it cant handle over 2TB drives.

On the hunt for something like a LSI 9211-8i recommended for FreeNAS I found them to be about $60 kinda pricey. Then later found the Dell PERC H200 for $30 that can be flashed over.

So have that on the way...

Then I think I found another issue, since I have to move the card to one of the PCI slots as it wont be recognized as a Dell card anymore. It now wont reach with the default cable inside the server.

I have not had much luck yet finding what cable I need and it seems like it might be expensive. So hoping somebody can help with that here.

Else thinking outside the box, I was thinking that a PCI Express ribbon cable/extender might actually be the smart way to go.

Has anybody here done the Dell r710 FreeNAS build that I am trying to do and what kind of modifications did it take for you to get the end result?

Sidebar: Was going to use a Dell T30 for low power/noise but only having 4 drives was a bit limiting. My biggest worry about a server (Why I held off on getting a Super Micro off ebay) was the noise, but apparently the r710's are really quiet when kept cool, and they have manual fan speed override via IPMITools.

I hope that coupled with a L series low voltage Xeon gets me a server that is both quiet, low power, and exactly what I was looking for.

Edit: Ok found a solution.
It uses standard cables so ordered some 1 meter cables from monoprice that will let me get this attached.

 

[Navigator systems]

Hi
· Dell PowerEdge R710 is an old device. But you can get them so cheap .You would get more performance out of an R710 o with an 6 core Xeon and like 48 gigs of RAM for like 250 bucks instead a newer system . The Dell Power Edge R710 has a variety of stock RAID controllers, each with their own caveats and uses.

· SAS 6/iR, this is an HBA (Host Bus Adapter) it can run SAS & SATA drives in RAID 0, 1 or JBOD (more on JBOD later).

· PERC6/i this can run RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 10, 50, 60 with SAS or SATA drives. It can not run in JBOD. It has a replaceable battery and has 256MB of cache.

These first two can only run SATA drives at SATA II speeds (3Gb/s) and can only use drives up to 2TB. So if you need lots of storage or you want to see the full speed benefit from an SSD, these would not be a good option. If storage and speed are not an issue, these controllers will work fine.

· H200, this is also an HBA that is capable of RAID 0, 1, 10, or JBOD. It can use SAS & SATA drives.

· H700, this can run RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 10, 50, 60 with SAS or SATA drives. It can not run in JBOD. It has a replaceable battery and has either 512MB or 1GB of cache.

These two cards support SATA III (6Gb/s) and can use drive with ore than 2TB's. They are the more popular RAID controllers that homelabbers use on their R710.

Now, which to choose...

If you are planning or running a software RAID (ZFS, FreeNAS, etc..) then you'll want an HBA so that the OS can handle the disk. If you want a simple RAID, then the controllers with cache and battery backups will work better in that use case.

Another caveat, for the H200, if you want to run it in JBOD/IT mode, you will have to flash the firmware on the card. There are plenty of instructions out there on how to do this, but just make a note if that is your intention.
For more details visit us at: Annual Maintenance Contract, Rental, IT Infrastructure Management

 

[raylangivens]

Another caveat, for the H200, if you want to run it in JBOD/IT mode, you will have to flash the firmware on the card.

And be prepared for abysmally slow write speeds. AFAIK all Dell HBAs without cache/bbu suffer from that, at last on Windows. I can confirm that for H200 and H310 on Windows 10/Server 2012R2/Server 2016.

 

[Terry Kennedy]

The Dell Power Edge R710 has a variety of stock RAID controllers, each with their own caveats and uses.

There are a few additional caveats here:

• Many of these cards come in integrated (goes in the dedicated HBA slot), internal (goes in a regular PCIe slot, connectors for internal drives), and external (goes in a regular PCIe slot, connectors on bracket for external cables). If you put an internal card in the integrated slot, you'll get an "unrecognized board in integrated slot" (or similar) error. The integrated and internal cards are the same except for the bracket and the configuration data, and you can flash between them if you're adventurous.
• The controller end of the integrated slot cables are not the same between the various permutations of controller model / backplane type. There are generally 1 short and 1 long cable, but the part number varies. You can't just pull out one integrated controller and swap it with a different module without also changing the cables.
• The BBU battery for all of the models listed in the prior post is no longer available as a new part from Dell. Almost all of the ones being sold on eBay (even if listed as "new") are years old and won't hold much of a charge. Even batteries sitting on a shelf, not connected, need to be charged at least annually in order to retain capacity. A bad or missing battery will seriously degrade write performance.
• The H700 is available with a non-volatile cache. It still wants a battery. See previous item.

Note: All links in this post are auto-inserted advertising links, not mine.

 

[raylangivens]

• The BBU battery for all of the models listed in the prior post is no longer available as a new part from Dell. Almost all of the ones being sold on eBay (even if listed as "new") are years old and won't hold much of a charge. Even batteries sitting on a shelf, not connected, need to be charged at least annually in order to retain capacity.

I've bought several "new"/used/refurbished Perc6 batteries last year and all of them work just fine. LiIon batteries can survive quite long shelf times, if stored properly (xx % charged, constant temps).