I recently got a BPN-SAS3-846EL1-N8 NVME backplane with a Supermicro AOC-SLG3-8E2P 8-port Oculink HBA card. I’ve been trying to get it running in ESXi, but I’ve encountered a problem where my NVME drives aren’t detected. Here are my specs:
MB: Supermicro X11DPH-T BIOS v2.1
CPU: dual Xeon 8176 ES2 QL1F
RAM: 256GB 2666 DDR4 ECC
Chassis: Supermicro SC846TQ
HBA: Supermicro AOC-SLG3-8E2P 8-port Oculink
Backplane: BPN-SAS3-846EL1-N8
Oculink cables: all Supermicro
NVMe drive: Intel Optane 905P U.2 960GB
OS: ESXi 6.7u3 host
I’ve been running the setup stably for 3 years but added the HBA and back plane. The problem is that ESXi won’t detect the Optane attached to the BPN-SAS3-846EL1-N8 via the 8E2P HBA. I have another Optane 905P M.2 380GB running w/o problems that’s attached to the MB M.2 slot. My guess is that it may be something related to the jumper settings on the back plane. The AOC-SLG3-8E2P is plugged into a PCIe x16 slot tied to CPU2. In the jumper settings, it says by default the NVMe drives would be tied to CPU1. If I switch around the jumpers, I can have 7 slots tied to CPU2 and 1 tied to CPU1. Haven’t tried it yet, but does anyone have any suggestions or tips to get it working? Or perhaps it’s something in the BIOS I need to change?
Before getting the parts, I asked Supermicro about the MB, HBA and BP compatibility and they said it’s no problem. No bifurcation is needed on X11 MBs and the HBA acts as a switch for all 8 drives. I also tested the U.2 Optane by connecting a M.2 adapter it and it passes all checks.
Currently, Supermicro tech support isn’t helpful at all due to the unsupported chassis and won’t give me any solutions. Much appreciated!
MB: Supermicro X11DPH-T BIOS v2.1
CPU: dual Xeon 8176 ES2 QL1F
RAM: 256GB 2666 DDR4 ECC
Chassis: Supermicro SC846TQ
HBA: Supermicro AOC-SLG3-8E2P 8-port Oculink
Backplane: BPN-SAS3-846EL1-N8
Oculink cables: all Supermicro
NVMe drive: Intel Optane 905P U.2 960GB
OS: ESXi 6.7u3 host
I’ve been running the setup stably for 3 years but added the HBA and back plane. The problem is that ESXi won’t detect the Optane attached to the BPN-SAS3-846EL1-N8 via the 8E2P HBA. I have another Optane 905P M.2 380GB running w/o problems that’s attached to the MB M.2 slot. My guess is that it may be something related to the jumper settings on the back plane. The AOC-SLG3-8E2P is plugged into a PCIe x16 slot tied to CPU2. In the jumper settings, it says by default the NVMe drives would be tied to CPU1. If I switch around the jumpers, I can have 7 slots tied to CPU2 and 1 tied to CPU1. Haven’t tried it yet, but does anyone have any suggestions or tips to get it working? Or perhaps it’s something in the BIOS I need to change?
Before getting the parts, I asked Supermicro about the MB, HBA and BP compatibility and they said it’s no problem. No bifurcation is needed on X11 MBs and the HBA acts as a switch for all 8 drives. I also tested the U.2 Optane by connecting a M.2 adapter it and it passes all checks.
Currently, Supermicro tech support isn’t helpful at all due to the unsupported chassis and won’t give me any solutions. Much appreciated!
Last edited:
