HP SAS Expander Owner's Thread

That's something you'd use with a SAS SAN. There isn't anything consumer level that really does what you wanted. Why not just use bonded ethernet if you want more speed?
 
jonPlancey said:
In theory all 3 computers should be able to access the Raid volume on the computer with rocketRaid 2722 and LSI HBA via simple file sharing
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whose theory?

if this was possible we'd already be doing it.
 
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i am trying to find a solution
that would provide at least 600mb\s
bandwidth to 4 computers at the same time.
I am trying to find a very cost effective solution.
 
Can you even get those kinds of speeds out of that RAID card? What do you even need it for? If you want cheap, pick up a bunch of dual port Intel NICs. You could put two in each system. They're only $15 or so each on eBay last I checked for the PCI-X ones.
 
Blue Fox said:
Can you even get those kinds of speeds out of that RAID card? What do you even need it for? If you want cheap, pick up a bunch of dual port Intel NICs. You could put two in each system. They're only $15 or so each on eBay last I checked for the PCI-X ones.
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I was reading here a while back
that some one setup a system
capable of > 2,000mb\s using
software raid and 4 HBAs.

I am trying to replicate this:
http://www.dulcesystems.com/html/pro_rxd.html
 
Someone using 4 HBA's on the same motherboard and aggregating them with a software based RAID0 has nothing to do with what you're trying to do, at least as you've described it. It's the reverse of what you're trying to do.

You say you want to have 4 host systems direct-attach to one pool of harddisks. SATA disks aren't going to talk more than one host at a time period. Some SAS drives (dual port) will talk to two hosts if the host card and expander support it. The only way you're going to be able to accomplish what you're after is with 10-Gig ethernet, fiber channel, etc. There may be other methods but none of them will be inexpensive.

Anyway this is pretty off-topic so you may want to start a separate thread about it and get more feedback.
 
jonPlancey said:
I was reading here a while back
that some one setup a system
capable of > 2,000mb\s using
software raid and 4 HBAs.

I am trying to replicate this:
http://www.dulcesystems.com/html/pro_rxd.html
Click to expand...
That's not networked and is connected to one system only. It's not that difficult to get that kind of performance in a single system. You wanted networked and that solution doesn't offer it and a functional one would be quite expensive. It doesn't use SAS at all either. They have a PCIe expander and a bunch of Areca 1222X cards. Literally this: http://www.magma.com/expressbox7x8RASG2.asp and http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816151066
 
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Hello SAS Expander owners, I am selling a HP SAS Expander for 200+Shipping which I bought from synenergy a few months ago. It comes with the latest firmware. I never used the card and it is still packaged as it was delivered, can provide pics if needed.
Also have a LSI SAS3442E-R controller for sale for 80+shipping.

pm if interested.
I'm located in CA, thanks.

-edit: SOLD.
 
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By the way (anyone who knows), I am using an ASUS rampage Extreme (2 x16 electrical PCI-E slots) for the LSI 3442, and I have an old ASUS SLI board to power the expander.

Should the LSI controller work fine in the other GPU's spot? I've never used them for anything but graphics, so I'm treading new territory, but I see no reason why it wouldn't work.
 
I would like to get this for my Adaptec 52445. But all the Adaptec controllers that are listed in #0 has a NO so my controller properly doesn't work?
 
Is it possible to connect 10 HP sas expanders together? Can create a raid array with 240 harddrives? What equipment do I need for this?
 
Freak1 said:
I would like to get this for my Adaptec 52445. But all the Adaptec controllers that are listed in #0 has a NO so my controller properly doesn't work?
Click to expand...

Last time I tested a 5-series Adaptec card was 7 or 8 months ago, and cards like the 52445 weren't working with the HP expander. In the meantime I sold all my Adaptec cards because of the incompatibility. There have been a few firmware updates for the Adaptec cards since then, but I don't know if the latest firmware introduced expander compatibility or not. Someone with an Adaptec card would need to test this.
 
hmm I'm beginning to think I am cursed with these expanders. Second one I got is dropping a random drive just about everyday now. Nothing wrong with the actual drive though and once rebooted it comes up just fine. No problems direct to the 1880i though. Temps on everything are real low. I've tried to create a parity backup with flexraid for 3 days straight now and can't complete before a random drive drops out. Anyone had this happen before or have any ideas?
 
What make/model/firmware of drive? What raid level? Any power management settings on the Areca card (low power idle, spindown, etc)?
 
I'm not convinced your problems are expander related based on your power mgmt settings, even though you said the problems don't seem to appear if the drives are connected direct to the Areca. Would you mind moving the screenshots to the Areca thread, there we can have a longer dialog about the problem.
 
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@VERTIGGO: Is LED CR6 (the one just below the SFF8088 connector) on your HP SAS Expander blinking steadily?
 
No blink. Solid green for 1, 4, 5, and 6. I have five internal cables connected to the Norco 4220 backplanes, and the 5th one has no drives. Heatsink is quite warm.

I would guess it could be what you were talking about earlier... but I have no extra DDR to toss in this old board.
 
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@VERTIGGO: Your problem is that the MB you are using is not releasing the PWRGD signal which means your HP SAS Expander is kept in reset mode!

I had the same problem... I posted about it in my build log in post number 3...

You either need to use a different MB or you need to cover pin A11 with tape and see if you can get it working that way in this MB!

I'm not sure what you are referring to about the DDR memory, my previous post was my first post to you.
 
I am experiencing issues as well.

MB= SuperMicro MBD-X7DWN+O
Processor= Xeon E5405
RAM= 8GB DDR2 667 FB-DIMM
Raid Card= ARC1880i w/BBU both ports to the Expander
Expander=HP SAS Expander
Drives=
6x Samsung 1TB HD103UJ
3x Seagate 1TB STS31000333AS
10x Seagate 1TB ST31000340AS
2x Seagate 143.3GB ST3146855SSS512
3x Seagate 143.3GB ST3146855SSHPS2

Arrays=
RAID 5 560.0GB All SAS drives
RAID 6 17TB All SATA drives

The SAS array completes fine with no issues and performs as expected. When I add the SATA array things start getting hinky. The array builds after a few days and I begin to run HD Tune Pro on the array. When testing I have 1 or two drives at random drop out and the array becomes degraded. The only way to get these drives back are to reboot the server and add them as Hot-Spares which means a few more days of rebuilding. Rinse and repeat. Yesterday after the latest rebuild everything appeared to be working, even after running HD Tune Pro, so I started the upgrade to the newest firmware. That was successful and again everything looked fine until I started to populate the array with data. The entire HP SAS expander dropped from the Areca card. So I restarted the server and after the BIOS screen I got nothing. I unplug one of the ports to the expander and get to the Areca card and notice that the SATA array is completely gone. At this point I plugged both ports back into the expander and restart. I get the blank screen so I try and pull the battery and see what I can get. I get the Areca screen so I plug it back in and reboot. I finally have the Areca screen with everything plugged in but still I don't have the SATA array. At this point I went a head and left it because I need the SAS array for my VMs.

Is there anything I can try that would make this headache go away? I am at the point that I am thinking of trying the Areca card with the 846E2 I got from Blue Fox. I planned on using it as just a chassis to add more disks to the Areca card.
 
I'll try the pin cover up... I was referring to an earlier post by you or someone else I remember that said trying a cpu and/or ram in certain motherboards might have the same effect.

By the way, from your thread it looks like the tape is merely to confirm the issue...? Will I need a cpu/resistor mod for continuous use?
 
@Cyberrad: I think your issue is that you are mixing SAS and SATA drives on the same controller and expander. If memory serves me right, it is not recommended (or even possible) to run both on the same controller or expander. I do remember reading somewhere that you should only have one technology on the controller or expander. Try removing one array and running it only on SATA or on SAS for a while and see if that is stable...

@VERTIGGO: You should be fine just disconnecting the signal via the tape. Personally I wouldn't run with the signal left floating but that is entirely up to you. This trick should fix your issue though as I am pretty sure that's what is causing your problem.
 
treadstone said:
@Cyberrad: I think your issue is that you are mixing SAS and SATA drives on the same controller and expander. If memory serves me right, it is not recommended (or even possible) to run both on the same controller or expander. I do remember reading somewhere that you should only have one technology on the controller or expander. Try removing one array and running it only on SATA or on SAS for a while and see if that is stable...
Click to expand...
I've had both SAS and SATA drives on the same controller with no issues.
 
Is this a limitation with Areca or the HP SAS Expander? I have been running Adaptec controllers for awhile and I never ran into these issues.
 
Does anyone else besides HP (and the defunct Chenbro stuff referred to in post 1) make a comparable SAS expander, perhaps with the same chipset?
 
The Chenbro expander is defunct? I got mine from Provantage about 3 months ago, and it was actually less than I paid for my HP. There was about a 3 week wait, but they are still available.
 
treadstone said:
@VERTIGGO: You should be fine just disconnecting the signal via the tape. Personally I wouldn't run with the signal left floating but that is entirely up to you. This trick should fix your issue though as I am pretty sure that's what is causing your problem.
Click to expand...

I will not run any RAID on this controller so I'm technically OK with accidental resets if that's the only issue. I also ordered a cheap 939 cpu to toss in if that does the same thing.
 
@VERTIGGO: It really depends on how the MB manufacturer implemented the PWRGD signal. It's possible that throwing a CPU into your MB will help you, but I doubt it.
 
Thanks to Treadstone, I'm completely up and running at the moment. The drives populated as soon as I powered on with the electrical tape over the A11 pin (11th one from the end on the underside of the expander board).

I'm running Windows 7 64 pro, though, and it has no idea what speed the transfers are made at, so it just says "calculating..." when I try to estimate it. Does everyone running carp like Windows get the same?

Edit: I noticed it does calculate when I copy from two mounted drives (I have most of them folder mounted). I wish folder mounting wasn't so handicapping, it's also impossible to run chkdsk, and there are only 26 letters in an alphabet...
 
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@odditory:
Since you seem to got the HP expander working with a 9211-8i controller, did you check the signaling speed between drives and expander? I did try that a while ago and while the controller (tried two different 9211-8i) controllers negotiate 6Gbps with the expander (firmware 2.02), the expander always uses only 1.5Gbps towards the drives. The drives I used were Samsung F1, F3 and also a WD green drive. While one can blame the fan-out cables (I only tried cables from one manufacturer), the controller itself uses 3Gbps when the drives are directly attached. I could never solve this problem, maybe it is just a faulty expander.
 
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