ck13601 firmware bug and solution

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kharan5876

Limp Gawd
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Oct 3, 2007
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This is the chenbro ck13601 SAS expander
13601.png


So I just got a bunch of drives from newegg and I'm putting them into a Norco 4020. I'm using an LSI 8801E Host bus adapter connected to the external port of a chenbro ck13601 sas expander to connect all the drives. I noticed a problem with some of the ports of the expander not working and found of solution.

This problem is a firmware bug. I purchased my ck13601 from provantage around early June. You may or may not see this issue if you get one now I don't know if they have fixed it with newer releases of these cards. If any of you purchased this expander then hopefully this will help you if you run into this problem.

The problem is that ports CD5 and CD6 on the diagram above do not work, drives connected to them will not show up in the lsi card bios. I used the windows version of the LSI MegaRaid Storage Manager software to see what was going on. First, all of the ports CD1 through CD4 would put the disks on controller 2, and targets 8 through 23. This worked just fine.
Now when I tried to use CD5, the first disk would come out to be controller 2 target 24. All the remaining disks would become controller 0 and target 0. Likewise all of the disks on CD6 would be controller and target 0 as well.
Sometimes swapping the disks in and out of these ports would cause the megaraid software to crash (go hardware raid lol).

Looking at the manual for the ck13601, it mentions jumper CN9. This comes by default on pins 1 and 2 (upward position) and the manual claims this is for the "upgraded firmware version." I tried switching this jumper to pins 2 and 3 (downward position) to the "original firmware version" and voila, everything worked after that! All the ports CD1 through CD6 would give controller 2 and targets 12 through 35.

So anyway long story short, if you come across ports not working try switching the firmware jumper. I emailed this issue to chenbro tech support so we will see what they say.
 
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That's.. really odd. I think they've confused firmware with SAS versions maybe?
 
I just received my CK13601 from CDW about 2 weeks ago and all of the ports on mine are working. I'll check the CN9 jumper status when I get a chance.
 
be sure to use the hba bios to check or the lsi megaraid software (if you have an lsi card). The disks still seem to show up in the OS regardless of this issue. However I don't know if the disks will have problems operating due to the messed up SAS topology underneath.
 
How much did the lsi controller cost? Is this the cheapest option in order to connect 24 sata drives?
 
I got mine from provantage. It cost me about $260 when I bought it, then it went up to $300 and then it became unavailable.

Google it and find out for yourself.

Also I may have some terminology wrong. It appears that these lsi cards use an enclosure:bay numbering format for labeling these drives. So I think the correct terms to use for the above issue is enclosure number and bay number instead of controller and target?

And indeed, according to LSI's Fusion MPT Device Management document, an enclosure number of 0 is invalid.
 
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so it is about $520 for 24 ports + cables? i think that is a sweet price, why havent people like okie that have filled-up 4020's chosen this solution?
 
That jumper basically switches between "original" firmware and "enhanced" firmware. Original firmware, it acts more like a simple SAS expander, whereas extended firmware it provides all this extra enclosure data support that seems to muck things up and cause compatibility issues. I find the card is much more stable in the "original" firmware mode, which is not the default jumper setting.

I've been using my chenbro with a Highpoint 4320 (with an internal-external miniSAS converter + 1M external miniSAS cable to a norco 4020) very successfully, I have the following drives:

1 TB seagate 7200.11 x7 in RAID5
1 TB samsung F1 x4 in RAID5
1.5TB samsung F2G x3 in RAID5

I find that the SAS expander does not like refurbished seagate drives at all - if you try to add them they cause drive detection / dropout issues. I think the reason why a lot of people aren't using SAS expanders is that they're kind of hard to get at all. I had to special order from provantage to get mine, and from what I hear you can't even order them anymore now. However if you can set it up correctly, it makes a very nice high-speed way of adding direct connect external storage chassis. I can get speed of 600MB/sec.
 
Yes, we do have new firmware come out.

We need to send it back to factory update firmware.

It will take around 2~3 Weeks.

The attached file is our RMA request form.

Please fill out this form then e-mail back to [email protected]

We will issue RMA number to you as soon as we can.



Thanks,
Click to expand...

Ugh... 2-3 weeks staring at the new drives and powerless to do anything with them. I guess I should do it.
 
kharan5876 said:
Yes, we do have new firmware come out.

We need to send it back to factory update firmware.

It will take around 2~3 Weeks..
Click to expand...

I'm not too sure what I would think of that...

From what I understand of these kind of devices:
1. The chip manufacturer (LSI, PMC, Marvell, etc) usually creates a base firmware, and makes periodic updates to it.
2. The chip manufacturer provides tools or an api to their authorized oems, which lets them enable, disable, or modify a subset of features in the official firmware. Then that oem releases their own "custom" firmware for their product.

For example: The p411 sas-2 raid controller and the atto sas-2 hba's both use the latest sas-2 chips from pmc. Both hp and atto recently released firmware updates for those cards, where the firmware for both was dated July 27.

I would think that in the worst case, they would tell you "here's your firmware, but you need 'X' sas card to apply it".

If they can't supply you with a firmware, and it's working, I'm not sure I would send it in. I would be worried that I might never get it back.

kharan5876 said:
Also I may have some terminology wrong. It appears that these lsi cards use an enclosure:bay numbering format for labeling these drives. So I think the correct terms to use for the above issue is enclosure number and bay number instead of controller and target?
Click to expand...

The lsi expander chip has built-in enclosure management features. See the product page.

The HP/pmc sas expander does this too. If a drive is connected to an expander, the driver assumes that the drive is in an enclosure. port:expander/enclosure:slot (0:1:5). I think it's just a naming convention.

I would guess that if I were to chain several expanders, they would be seen as "enclosure" 1, 2, 3, etc.
 
If they can't supply you with a firmware, and it's working, I'm not sure I would send it in. I would be worried that I might never get it back.
Click to expand...

Yeah I'm worried about that too. However I don't think chenbro makes this card for OEM's. They have their own line of arrays and jbod's that use these expanders. I have not seen these expanders in any other device, but I could be wrong, haven't looked too hard at current jbod offerings.
 
cartman123 said:
so it is about $520 for 24 ports + cables? i think that is a sweet price, why havent people like okie that have filled-up 4020's chosen this solution?
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Because 3 supermicro controllers for 24 ports is still $200 less :)


These expanders shine when you don't have slot space or you are planning on doing dual 36 port arrays.
 
I like the daisy chain concept. If I need more storage all I gotta do is buy another norco and chenbro.
 
Ockie said:
Because 3 supermicro controllers for 24 ports is still $200 less :)


These expanders shine when you don't have slot space or you are planning on doing dual 36 port arrays.
Click to expand...

... or don't have PCI-X slots and want more than 100 MB/s from your array.

Yes, gigabit ethernet only does 100 MB/s anyways, but local operations like "zpool scrub" can take advantage of as much bandwidth as you have.
 
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