Supermicro Chassis 846 & 216 - getting cheaper?

[Rand__]

There are actually 3 types of backplanes
-TQ = Individual connector per drive bay, direct pass through of whatever controller backs the slot (SATA onboard or up to SAS3 via HBA). No NVMe support
-A = Similar to -TQ excpet it aggregates 4 individual connectors in a min SAS connector (can use SFF-8087). Needs reverse cable for mainboard, straight for HBA. No NVMe support
-SAS[1-3]EL[1|2] - This is a SAS expander board with one or two connectors to the HBA. It comes with level specific support for SAS 1-3 (and different connectors, mini SAS for SAS1/2 and mini-SAS HD for SAS3.

SATA3 is similar to SAS2 so you can get either a SAS2ELx backplane if you want/need an expander or either of the TQ/A.

But I am sure the search would have told you the same

Edit: And this very thread had the details already mentioned before as well...

 

[BackupProphet]

My favorite is A backplanes. As they provide full speed.
SAS2E backplanes are good if youre just gonna use a lot of spinning drives and very few SSDs
TQ is a cable mess, and I would avoid it.

 

[cheezehead]

My favorite is A backplanes. As they provide full speed.
SAS2E backplanes are good if youre just gonna use a lot of spinning drives and very few SSDs
TQ is a cable mess, and I would avoid it.

Same here but they are not that common on the secondary market unless your looking at something like an SC216. TQ and SAS1 are everywhere cheap, with SAS2 starting to come down on price.

 

[rootgremlin]

You all forget one minor (for me it was a major) detail.....

Imagine, your array is fu.... and you want to replace the defective drive.

All but the expander backplanes lack the information about drive position. The expander Backplanes are the only ones that can signal status and position of the corresponding drive. All the other backplanes just have the datapath and no idea what physical slot corresponds to the physical sata connection/sas address on the expander

You know the Funktion where the drive-LED is green for activity, and turns RED when the drive has a problem (typically smart problem)
The controller has to tell the backplane to light the correct red-light position. but it has no idea what position that would be, because the backplanes only carry dataconnections.

 

[BlueFox]

You all forget one minor (for me it was a major) detail.....

Imagine, your array is fu.... and you want to replace the defective drive.

All but the expander backplanes lack the information about drive position. The expander Backplanes are the only ones that can signal status and position of the corresponding drive. All the other backplanes just have the datapath and no idea what physical slot corresponds to the physical sata connection/sas address on the expander

You know the Funktion where the drive-LED is green for activity, and turns RED when the drive has a problem (typically smart problem)
The controller has to tell the backplane to light the correct red-light position. but it has no idea what position that would be, because the backplanes only carry dataconnections.

That's not exactly correct. The TQ and A backplanes support sideband and can display drive failure/position.

 

[Terry Kennedy]

All but the expander backplanes lack the information about drive position. The expander Backplanes are the only ones that can signal status and position of the corresponding drive. All the other backplanes just have the datapath and no idea what physical slot corresponds to the physical sata connection/sas address on the expander

Not so. on (for example) an 836A backplane, plug only one drive into a random slot. Now look at the LSI controller's BIOS menus and in the list of connected devices, you'll see your drive next to a label that says "Phy XX", where XX is the chassis slot the drive is in. You can mess up the numbering if you install the 4 backplane SFF-8087 cables in the wrong order on the controller, but that's an assembly error, not a controller / backplane flaw.

The TQ backplane will be the same, also assuming you have the cables installed in the correct order.

You know the Funktion where the drive-LED is green for activity, and turns RED when the drive has a problem (typically smart problem)

On all of my Supermicro chassis, there is a blue LED which is on for "drive installed but idle" and blinks off for activity. A separate red LED indicates a drive fault. Operating the red LED requires a sideband cable between the backplane and the controller (normally part of a SFF-8087 / SFF-8087 or similar cable).

If you have your drives spread across more than one controller, then the Phy numbering is only within the single controller (so if you had a 16-slot backplane and 2 8-port controllers, you'd have Phys 00-07 on each controller).

 

[rootgremlin]

that is exactly my point.
"you'd have Phys 00-07 on each controller"
and what drive is the correct one to pull? Remember, your array is already critical
The drivepositioning feature is moot when you use more than one Controller. The Same with an aftermarket expander.
Sure, i certainly did not try all kinds of conrollers or expanders, but with those i had, either the sideband did nothing at all (maybe not compatible?!) The controller had no sideband or the positions the controller told me simply made no sense or were wrong. (You know those Supermicro SAS-Fanout cables 1SAS to 4sata that are not the same lenght, so you can not arrange them accordingly)

The thing is.... i certainly did my research beforehand and never did i read of this "problem". So it would have been nice if someone had mentioned it.
We do not have many affordable / compatible controllers or expanders to choose from. Moreso when we want to use some "exotic" software.
And the few that remain, in my experience, do not play nicely together when it comes to those "
additional information".

 

[BlueFox]

With sideband, the failed drive will be flashing, so it's pretty obvious which one to pull. Most HBAs will let you flash the LEDs on a specific drive at will too. Anything LSI or Areca will do it at least. Did you actually plug in the sideband cable into the backplane?

 

[Terry Kennedy]

that is exactly my point.
"you'd have Phys 00-07 on each controller"
and what drive is the correct one to pull? Remember, your array is already critical
The drivepositioning feature is moot when you use more than one Controller. The Same with an aftermarket expander.

Have you read the documentation for your controller? For example, on LSI SAS2 controllers:

sas2ircu <controller #> LOCATE <Encl:Bay> <Action> [Wait [Time]]
    where <controller #> is:
      A controller number between 0 and 255.
    where <Encl:Bay> is:
      A valid Enclosure and Bay pair to identify
      the drive
    where <Action> is:
      ON   -  turn ON the drives LED
      OFF  -  turn OFF the drives LED
    where [Wait [Time]] is:
      Minimum time location indicator blink for a particular drive
           optional option, valid only for ON action
      Time -  Waiting time between 1 to 60 seconds
Examples: sas3ircu 1 locate 1:3 ON
                   sas3ircu 1 locate 1:3 ON WAIT 10
          sas3ircu 1 locate 1:3 OFF

Sure, i certainly did not try all kinds of conrollers or expanders, but with those i had, either the sideband did nothing at all (maybe not compatible?!) The controller had no sideband or the positions the controller told me simply made no sense or were wrong. (You know those Supermicro SAS-Fanout cables 1SAS to 4sata that are not the same lenght, so you can not arrange them accordingly)

Supermicro's cables were designed based on their complete servers. I wouldn't be surprised if the Supermicro RAID AOC-xxxx cards had the ports in a different order on the connector, since the bracket is "backwards" from a normal PCIe slot.

Fortunately, there are a large number of manufacturers of pre-made cables in a near-infinite number of configurations, so you can select an appropriate cable that meets your needs.

The thing is.... i certainly did my research beforehand and never did i read of this "problem". So it would have been nice if someone had mentioned it.

Perhaps because you are the only person having this issue?