Supermicro 6028U-TRTP X10DRU-i Barebone $349

[dbergrk]

In my TRTP+ the backplane goes to the motherboard via a MiniSAS HD to right angle MiniSAS. This uses the onboard controllers and limits the backplane to 10 SATA drives. In order to get all 12 drives and/or SAS support an optional card is required. I would guess that your chassis was purchased with that optional card but when it was sold to you the card was removed.

SM lists compatible cards as the AOC-S3008L-L8e, AOC-S3008L-L8i , or AOC-S3108L-H8iR.
Others may work but I am hesitant to say so because I noticed there is additional wire along with the data cables. I am not sure of its purpose but maybe someone else can chime in.

Thank you for the information. I think you are right on since I have two of the MiniSAS HD to MiniSAS HD cables you linked in my unit. So sounds like I'd need to either purchase the right angle cables, or consider buying cards with the benefits that brings.

One further question, I'm guessing one of these MiniSAS HD cables supports 4 drives? There are four MiniSAS HD ports on the backplane so maybe that's not correct? Each one of these ports controls 3 bays?

 

[dbergrk]

That additional cable is for SGPIO/Backplane/LED control. Don't buy a cable without it.

Awesome. Thank you.

 

[stewie0056]

Thank you for the information. I think you are right on since I have two of the MiniSAS HD to MiniSAS HD cables you linked in my unit. So sounds like I'd need to either purchase the right angle cables, or consider buying cards with the benefits that brings.

One further question, I'm guessing one of these MiniSAS HD cables supports 4 drives? There are four MiniSAS HD ports on the backplane so maybe that's not correct? Each one of these ports controls 3 bays?

You are thinking of those cables that split each SAS port out to a drive. That is not needed if your backplane has SAS expanders built-in. You would only use that type of cable if you were connecting to a drive directly or had a backplane that was just for passthrough (without expanders).

To put it simply, the controller determines how many drives you COULD connect and the expanders on the backplane determine how many drives you CAN connect. The SAS cables just provide the link bandwidth. No matter how many connections are broken out the with expanders, the max limit is set by the controller. Without using expanders you can still breakout each of the 8 ports (4 per connector) from the controller to a single drive using a splitter cable.

The onboard controllers support max of 10 SATA drives. The last two drives are ignored if inserted.
The optional cards AOC-S3008L-L8e, AOC-S3008L-L8i , and AOC-S3108L-H8iR support 122, 63, and 240 SAS drives respectively.

Both of our backplanes should be the same BPN-SAS3-826A with three SAS MiniSAS HD connectors. I am not seeing a fourth connection on the backplane? Can you confirm your backplane model number? Do you by chance have the BPN-SAS3-826A-N4 NVME variant?

 

[dbergrk]

You are thinking of those cables that split each SAS port out to a drive. That is not needed here since this backplane has SAS expanders built-in. You would only use that type of cable if you were connecting to a drive directly or had a backplane that was just for passthrough. This backplane supports 12 drives but Supermicro also has a crossover cable that can plug into the third MiniSAS HD port and break out an additional four SATA connectors.
- I realize I just contradicted myself but I am trying to keep this simple. This backplane uses expanders and supports breaking out SAS ports which I don't believe is common.

To put it simply, the controller determines how many drives you COULD connect and the expanders on the backplane determine how many drives you CAN connect. The SAS cables just provide the link bandwidth. No matter how many connections are broken out the with expanders, the max limit is set by the controller. Without using expanders you can still breakout each of the 8 ports (4 per connector) from the controller to a single drive using a splitter cable but like I said, that is not needed here.

The onboard controllers support max of 10 SATA drives. The last two drives are ignored if inserted.
The optional cards AOC-S3008L-L8e, AOC-S3008L-L8i , and AOC-S3108L-H8iR support 122, 63, and 240 SAS drives respectively.

Both of our backplanes should be the same BPN-SAS3-826A with three SAS MiniSAS HD connectors. I am not seeing a fourth connection on the backplane? Can you confirm your backplane model number? Do you by chance have the BPN-SAS3-826A-N4 NVME variant?

Wow. Thank you so much for that explanation. That makes a whole lot more sense, and there was a lot I wasn't understanding about this kind of hardware. Seems like picking up a AOC-S3008L-L8e or AOC-S3008L-L8i make a lot of sense to get the full utilization given the prices I am seeing for second-hand hardware. And given that I'd need to buy new cables otherwise to connect anything.

So to my surprise, my backplane is a BPN-SAS3-826EL1. Not sure what the EL variant provides versus the A, but it does explain the differences in the number of MiniSAS HD connectors. Do you happen to know?

 

[itronin]

So to my surprise, my backplane is a BPN-SAS3-826EL1. Not sure what the EL variant provides versus the A, but it does explain the differences in the number of MiniSAS HD connectors. Do you happen to know?

I might be describing things poorly and not particularly thorughly but in essence for SM backplanes:

an EL backplane is an active backplane (SAS expander). Drive connections are managed by the SAS expander. The SAS expander is essentially a switch (multiplex) between your HBA and the drives and your HBA is connecting to the expander which manages connections to the drives.

an A backplane is a passive backplane. Drive connections are managed by the HBA. You need a HBA connection for each drive.

this gets a bit more involved and complex when you look at dual ported drives and multiple HBA's connected to the expander.

SAS expanders can be daisy chained.

SM expander backplane nomenclature:

BPN = Backplane, SAS(n) is SAS(SATA too) where (n) = the SAS version, NNN = Chassis mount type, 826, 836,846 216 etc. etc. , EL(n) is an expander backplane, where (n) = the number of expanders installed. So there is one SAS3 expander on the backplane.
Instead of EL(N) you may also see A or TQ, additionally are the -N(n) at the end where N is NVME and (n) = the number of slots.

You can get a minimal configuration using one 8643 to 8643 cable between your HBA and the backplane to access all 12 drive slots. 4x12Gbps = 48Gbps of bandwidth from that one cable. If you are using spinners probably more than enough. SSD's not so much if they are SAS3 SSD's. Installing a second cable will give you 96Gbps to the backplane, you can also daisy chain backplanes together.

 

[stewie0056]

I might be describing things poorly but in essence:

an EL backplane is an active backplane (SAS expander). Drive connections are managed by the SAS expander. The SAS expander is essentially a switch (multiplex) between your HBA and the drives and your HBA is connecting to the expander which manages connections to the drives.

an A backplane is a passive backplane. Drive connections are managed by the HBA. You need a HBA connection for each drive.

this gets a bit more involved and complex when you look at dual ported drives and multiple HBA's connected to more than 1 HBA.

SAS expanders can be daisy chained.

SM expander backplane nomenclature:

BPN = Backplane, SAS(n) is SAS(SATA too) where (n) = the SAS version, NNN = Chassis mount type, 826, 836,846 216 etc. etc. , EL(n) is an expander backplane, where (n) = the number of expanders installed. So there is one SAS3 expander on the backplane.

You can get a minimal configuration using one 8643 to 8643 cable between your HBA and the backplane to access all 12 drive slots. 4x12Gbps = 48Gbps of bandwidth from that one cable. If you are using spinners probably more than enough. SSD's not so much if they are SAS3 SSD's. Installing a second cable will give you 96Gbps to the backplane, you can also daisy chain backplanes together.

Maybe I am missing something but this does not match what I am seeing.

Going by your description since I have a BPN-SAS3-826A backplane, it should be passive.
Regardless of HBA, in order to use all 12 ports I would need to use all three MiniSAS HD (3 ports x 4 lanes)

If that is true then how can I have 10 drives attached with two cables right now. If it was passive I could only have 8.
I am going to double check my backplane tonight. Maybe I do have an EL and didn't realize it.
I really doubt mine is an EL because I know for a fact there are only three MiniSAS HD ports which match the description and locations in the A manual, but not the EL.
I find it odd that @dbergrk has an EL in their server considering SM doesn't list it as an option for this model anywhere. To me that suggest it was done after purchase and is not stock.

 

[BlueFox]

The 6028U chassis with the EL1 backplane is custom SKU for Softlayer. They have a few other changes too (risers, external fan options, etc). I have one myself. The EL1 backplane is easy to spot as it has a heatsink.

 

[itronin]

Maybe I am missing something but this does not match what I am seeing.

Going by your description since I have a BPN-SAS3-826A backplane, so it should be passive.
Regardless of HBA, in order to use all 12 ports I would need to use all three SAS MiniSAS HD (3 ports x 4 lanes)

If that is true then how can I have 10 drives attached with two cables right now. If it was passive I could only have 8.
I am going to double check my backplane tonight. Maybe I do have an EL and didn't realize it.

So in my post I was talking about an BPN-SAS3-826-EL1 which is an active backplane for SAS HBA's that installs in an 826 (and I think

without an add-in card, your motherboard supports 10 SATA drives (NO SAS). Looks like 2x4 are coming out by SFF-8087 (right angle cable is handy there) and 2 more are coming out from sata ports to the backplane.


I looked at the ebay listing you posted and I believe actually see 3 cables headed to the backplane through the memory slots in the picture (but I don't know if that is what you ultimately ordered or received), in another picture I see what appear to be 2xSFF-8087 to the motherboard and then I also see 2 SATA cables coming out of a wrapped cable and plugged into the two satadom capable SATA ports on the motherboard. If those are in the bundle of three then it looks like a reverse SATA breakout from SFF-8643 (what your backplane has) and as a result you have only 10 drives available to your system form the backplane right now.

Is the server in operation right now? Easiest way is to shut it down, pop the cover and take a look at what's printed on the backplane and look very carefully at the cable bundles at the backplane, mid transpoint and where they connect to the motherboard.

If both of your orange SATA ports are connected to a cable and both your SFF-8087 are connected and all those cables head out to your backplane then that;s how you get 10 drives (and you can only have 10 drives in this configuration) active on your backplane.

that means there's actually 3 three cables headed from your motherboard compartment to the backplane they may just be bundled such that you can't easily distinguish all three.

 

[stewie0056]

So in my post I was talking about an BPN-SAS3-826-EL1 which is an active backplane for SAS HBA's that installs in an 826 (and I think

without an add-in card, your motherboard supports 10 SATA drives (NO SAS). Looks like 2x4 are coming out by SFF-8087 (right angle cable is handy there) and 2 more are coming out from sata ports to the backplane.


I looked at the ebay listing you posted and I believe actually see 3 cables headed to the backplane through the memory slots in the picture (but I don't know if that is what you ultimately ordered or received), in another picture I see what appear to be 2xSFF-8087 to the motherboard and then I also see 2 SATA cables coming out of a wrapped cable and plugged into the two satadom capable SATA ports on the motherboard. If those are in the bundle of three then it looks like a reverse SATA breakout from SFF-8643 (what your backplane has) and as a result you have only 10 drives available to your system form the backplane right now.

Is the server in operation right now? Easiest way is to shut it down, pop the cover and take a look at what's printed on the backplane and look very carefully at the cable bundles at the backplane, mid transpoint and where they connect to the motherboard.

If both of your orange SATA ports are connected to a cable and both your SFF-8087 are connected and all those cables head out to your backplane then that;s how you get 10 drives (and you can only have 10 drives in this configuration) active on your backplane.

that means there's actually 3 three cables headed from your motherboard compartment to the backplane they may just be bundled such that you can't easily distinguish all three.

That's what I was missing! I could have sworn the two orange plugs were unplugged but I just found a photo on my phone that says otherwise.
Thank you guys! I learned something tonight about SM backplane nomenclature.

 

[stewie0056]

The 6028U chassis with the EL1 backplane is custom SKU for Softlayer. They have a few other changes too (risers, external fan options, etc). I have one myself. The EL1 backplane is easy to spot as it has a heatsink.

Good to know! I'm sure mine is stock SM but it did come with some proprietary PCIe card with "Baidu USA 2015" written on it. You can see it in some of the pictures on the eBay listing.

 

[BlueFox]

Yours likely is a custom SKU as well then. Supermicro OEMs for many companies.

 

[dbergrk]

Thanks everyone! I guess it is nice getting the EL version despite having to buy either some cables or card. Ended up purchasing a AOC-S3008L-L8e. Hopefully that works out for me.

 

[cooldude919]

Thanks everyone! I guess it is nice getting the EL version despite having to buy either some cables or card. Ended up purchasing a AOC-S3008L-L8e. Hopefully that works out for me.

I bought the AOC-S3008L-L8E and its working great with unraid. I did update the firmware, but it was obviously already HBA since that model is hba only.

 

[cooldude919]

Glad to see this here! I wasn't a member of this forum earlier but I was the one who prompted the seller to put this on his eBay store.
View attachment 16654

Now I didn't just make this post to be smug but I wanted to tell you that I did NOT buy this server because I found a still better deal (for me at least).

I originally wanted the bare server so I could buy and add my own CPU and RAM. I also already had several PCIe NICs so I was planning to just throw a 10G in a slot. But then came across the following listing that actually included roughly what I was looking for and at a cheaper price than I could piece together.

$600 - 6028U-TRTP+ 128GB 2133 (8x16GB), E5-2620 v3, and 2xSFP+

Supermicro 2u X10dru-i 2xxeon E5-2620 V3 12 Cores 128gb RAM No HDD for sale online | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Supermicro 2u X10dru-i 2xxeon E5-2620 V3 12 Cores 128gb RAM No HDD at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

If I was to build this it would cost more or less $709 depending on deals at the time.
Server - $349
CPU - $40 (2*$20)
RAM - $320 (8*$40)

I'm not stoked about the CPU included but at $40 it still is cheaper just for the chassis/mobo and RAM. If you were planning on adding a 10G NIC then it might be a wash for the CPU cost since this chassis has two SFP+ onboard.

Now to anyone still interested in this listing, I will say this seller it terrible at shipping. First one arrived smashed and motherboard damaged. The second one arrived with the left ear (power button/LED cable) ripped off. The seller let me keep both for the price of one and I was able to swap parts make one complete server. I hope that after two shipping disasters they have learned to package it better, but YMMV.

Secondly the CPU included was not what was listed. I received a 2650 v3. I don't know if the person miswrote the 5 for a 2 in the listing but this is a $60 10 core compared to the $20 6 core I was expecting.
It actually preforms quite well for my workload so I am holding off on replacing them at the moment. Again YMMV on what CPU you receive.

FYI have you seen the price drop from ESISO? their barebones is down to $240 now, that may change your math a bit.

SUPERMICRO CSE-829U-X10DRU-I+ BAREBONE CHASSIS 12LFF 2x HS 2x PSU | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for SUPERMICRO CSE-829U-X10DRU-I+ BAREBONE CHASSIS 12LFF 2x HS 2x PSU at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

 

[cooldude919]

Glad to see this here! I wasn't a member of this forum earlier but I was the one who prompted the seller to put this on his eBay store.
View attachment 16654

Now I didn't just make this post to be smug but I wanted to tell you that I did NOT buy this server because I found a still better deal (for me at least).

I originally wanted the bare server so I could buy and add my own CPU and RAM. I also already had several PCIe NICs so I was planning to just throw a 10G in a slot. But then came across the following listing that actually included roughly what I was looking for and at a cheaper price than I could piece together.

$600 - 6028U-TRTP+ 128GB 2133 (8x16GB), E5-2620 v3, and 2xSFP+

Supermicro 2u X10dru-i 2xxeon E5-2620 V3 12 Cores 128gb RAM No HDD for sale online | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Supermicro 2u X10dru-i 2xxeon E5-2620 V3 12 Cores 128gb RAM No HDD at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

If I was to build this it would cost more or less $709 depending on deals at the time.
Server - $349
CPU - $40 (2*$20)
RAM - $320 (8*$40)

I'm not stoked about the CPU included but at $40 it still is cheaper just for the chassis/mobo and RAM. If you were planning on adding a 10G NIC then it might be a wash for the CPU cost since this chassis has two SFP+ onboard.

Now to anyone still interested in this listing, I will say this seller it terrible at shipping. First one arrived smashed and motherboard damaged. The second one arrived with the left ear (power button/LED cable) ripped off. The seller let me keep both for the price of one and I was able to swap parts make one complete server. I hope that after two shipping disasters they have learned to package it better, but YMMV.

Secondly the CPU included was not what was listed. I received a 2650 v3. I don't know if the person miswrote the 5 for a 2 in the listing but this is a $60 10 core compared to the $20 6 core I was expecting.
It actually preforms quite well for my workload so I am holding off on replacing them at the moment. Again YMMV on what CPU you receive.

also FWIW theserverstore is excellent with shipping, the custom foam fill/pack thing is hard to beat. From other posts ESISO can be hit or mess with including everything in the descriptions, but considering the price difference now, they seem hard to beat.

 

[BuellMule]

I've been having some issues getting Unraid to work with this server. I transferred 10 drives over to it. I have the softlayer labeled server. The backplane has 4x SFF-8643 connections on it.

Curiously, my server came with just a cable assembly that had 2x CBL-SAST-0593.

I didn't put 2 and 2 together until this morning....

I initially connected 2x SFF-8087 to the SFF 8643 on the back plane from the motherboard.
Then connected up the other two ports to an LSI 9211-8i flashed to IT mode that previously worked well in my previous server.

I pulled the usb stick from my working server, but, with this configuration, My unraid would not boot, and would get stuck on "starting rsyslogd daemon" And never finish booting. So I thought, let's try a brand new installation, just to see if it boots. It did boot with a brand new USB key written from the unraid USB creator . But, it would not boot a 2nd time, and get stuck at the "starting rsyslogd daemon". It would ONLY boot with a fresh usb stick.

So, I thought, maybe the motherboard SFF8087 ports were bad. SO I put a 2nd LSI 9211-8i card in.

Voila... It boots, and it boots repeatedly.

However, I keep getting some errors from unraid.

"emhttpd: device /dev/sdd problem getting id"

It does this for sdb through sdi

Did this for nearly every drive. And it came up with some CRC errors that previously I did not have. Most of these drives are 8tb HGST drives that were from shucked easystores within the past 18-24 months.

So I pull the 2nd LSI card, and don't connect the last 2 ports on the backplane. I have just 2 ports from my LSI 9211-8i card to the backplane. It boots, and shows 10 drives. But still shows some of the drives as "not healthy".



But no longer do I get the "problem getting id" errors that were continually repeating.SO now to experiment a bit more, and JUST connected the 2 SFF8087 ports on the motherboard to the backplane, and see what it recognizes.

 

[BlueFox]

You cannot connect the backplane directly to the motherboard. The backplane has a SAS expander and the motherboard is SATA only (having SFF8087 or SFF8643 ports does not mean the device is SAS). They are incompatible. You have to rely on a SAS HBA like your 9211-8i.

 

[Bradford]

this is a good price, i recall when JUST THE 12 bay 2u SAS3 expander backplane (BPN-SAS3-826EL1) would cost this much (or more). it actually still does.

About 1 to 1.5 yr ago i bought the 4x NVMe variant of this exact 2u system (paid ~6-700$ for it, barebones). it did also have the 2x 10gb copper add-on card (and the x10-dri board, not the x10-dru like this one). I will say that this:
- It pulls more power than i expected (see below)

- the board that came with the system had weird power issues (ie would not power up unless i cycled removing and inserting one of PSUs / and or ran it with just 1x psu) , i ended up going through 2x more x10-dri boards in total that had similar issues like this (from different sources), but the final board that did not have this issue, has been rock solid 24/7 since then (~ 1.5yrs now), and under pretty heavy vmware VMs load, since then.

- Its fan ran way louder than needed (common w supermicro), even on optimal fan setting. The 10g NIC addon card is consistently the hottest part according to ipmi. I ended up putting all the fans on a 20$ noctua fan controller (with knob) that still allows the MB to adjust the fan speeds, but at a much reduced RPM (so is quieter). And i can adjust this with the knob if needed.

overall, outside of the power issues i had with some of the boards, ive been very happy with this ssytem, and its 4x nvme u.2 bays!

some of my power draw notes for this system (CPU= 2620-v3):
View attachment 16373View attachment 16374View attachment 16376

Do you have a part number for that noctua fan controller?

You cannot connect the backplane directly to the motherboard. The backplane has a SAS expander and the motherboard is SATA only (having SFF8087 or SFF8643 ports does not mean the device is SAS). They are incompatible. You have to rely on a SAS HBA like your 9211-8i.

Did you get caddies with your server from ESISO? I discovered this chassis and am considering it.

I read earlier in the thread that high watt GPUS might be a bad idea here - I need a 1 or 2U chassis that i can put a deshrouded 2070 in. Anyone running a RTX or high-wattage GPU in one of these? My 2070 currently pulls about 200W when it's hard at work.

 

[BlueFox]

Did you get caddies with your server from ESISO? I discovered this chassis and am considering it.

I read earlier in the thread that high watt GPUS might be a bad idea here - I need a 1 or 2U chassis that i can put a deshrouded 2070 in. Anyone running a RTX or high-wattage GPU in one of these? My 2070 currently pulls about 200W when it's hard at work.

I did receive caddies. These servers do specifically support GPUs. You can easily fit 3 double slot GPUs in it. The risers included with the SKU that eSISO sells are actually set up for GPUs. You get 3 x PCIe x16 with spaces for double slot cards, single PCIe x8, and a lone PCIe x8 that's internal only and meant for HBAs (needs a bracket that isn't included). You will just need to buy the internal power cables, which are fairly cheap and readily available. Just be aware that it won't be quiet with a bunch of GPUs.

One other important thing to note is that the backplane is a SAS3 expander one, so you have to buy an HBA to use it (which isn't included). They also include the TPM module, which is nice.

You can also email them for better pricing. They don't charge sales tax outside of eBay either (so long as you're not in CA).

 

[Bradford]

I did receive caddies. These servers do specifically support GPUs. You can easily fit 3 double slot GPUs in it. The risers included with the SKU that eSISO sells are actually set up for GPUs. You get 3 x PCIe x16 with spaces for double slot cards, single PCIe x8, and a lone PCIe x8 that's internal only and meant for HBAs (needs a bracket that isn't included). You will just need to buy the internal power cables, which are fairly cheap and readily available. Just be aware that it won't be quiet with a bunch of GPUs.

One other important thing to note is that the backplane is a SAS3 expander one, so you have to buy an HBA to use it (which isn't included). They also include the TPM module, which is nice.

You can also email them for better pricing. They don't charge sales tax outside of eBay either (so long as you're not in CA).

Great info, thank you. I went to their website, it was down. I emailed them, it bounced back. I sent them a facebook message, we'll see if anyone's alive there.