Comparing HBA IT mode SAS controllers | 2020 Edition

This video is a follow up to my previous video "Comparing HBA IT mode SAS controllers" from 2018. Since then, my store has greatly expanded the selection of HBA IT mode SAS controllers. So, in this new 2020 Edition, I'll be covering a much larger variety of IT mode HBA SAS controllers, spanning 5 different generations. Additionally, I'll go more in-depth regarding each card.
For convenience, if you want to skip to certain sections, here's the index:
0:00 - Opening introduction
2:48 - LSI SAS1068E (SAS-1, Dell SAS6i/R for R410)
11:11 - LSI SAS2008, SAS2004, SAS2116 (1st generation SAS-2)
35:26 - LSI SAS2308 (2nd generation SAS-2)
46:55 - LSI SAS3008 (SAS-3)
1:00:46 - LSI SAS3408 (SAS-3 Tri-Mode with NVMe support)
1:03:36 - Final wrap-up
If you'd like to support this channel, please consider shopping at my eBay store: ebay.to/2ZKBFDM
eBay Partner Affiliate disclosure:
The eBay links in this video description are eBay partner affiliate links. By using these links to shop on eBay, you support my channel, at no additional cost to you. Even if you do not buy from the ART OF SERVER eBay store, any purchases you make on eBay via these links, will help support my channel. Please consider using them for your eBay shopping. Thank you for all your support! :-)

[@ClearlyCero]

This is a criminally undersubscribed channel, I literally couldn't have started building my storage array without your help.

[@ArtofServer]

Wow! Those are some strong words! Lol Thanks for watching! Please share. :-)

[@cgarzs]

What? You could *NOT* have started *WITH* his help? That's harsh 😆

[@ClearlyCero]

@@cgarzs nice catch, corrected without

[@ytkamty]

I could... but I made a lot of mistake ^_^" It just makes it clear about HBA and what to choose/purchase ! So know, I can start thinking if I need one and which one for further improvements of my home server :-D I've just discovered your channel, and Iwanted to bookmark your ebay store... it appears I already did it before... ;-) I know why now. I agree with the above comment : you SHOULD ABSOLUTLY WATCH THIS before diving into it and buy crap or overkill/expansive stuff you don't need or won't work. Thanks a lot for this.

[@XSTAYUPX]

Thats not true..

[@oso2k]

Would be great to see a 2022 edition of this video. Thanks for all the hardwork!

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you! I don't have too much new information in 2022 that I think would be worthy of an update. The information in this video is still relevant for today.

[@machineheadminot]

@@ArtofServer I love the video! Still revelant in 2024? :D lol

[@ThomasTomchak]

This is like a master class on HBA’s. Thanks for doing this video and all your attention to detail. It helped me understand so much more about SAS cards and see where the I picked a few years ago fit into the lineup. You’re my hero 🦸‍♂️

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks! And thank you for your orders and support!

[@l5386]

This was a really helpful video. Your ebay store was about $20 or so more expensive, but it's worth it imo to support your work and these great videos!

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you so much! I'm glad this vid was helpful! And I appreciate everyone who shows their support by shopping at my store!

[@theophilusbassaw580]

A year later, I still refer back to this video and recommend it to others. Nicely, done video

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you! So happy to hear it has been useful! :-)

[@gmeyolo2809]

Anytime anyone asks about HBAs i direct them to this channel and ebay store.

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you for your support 🙏

[@steviebro0538]

I don't like eBay.

[@Doesntcompute2k]

I love this video! I realized I apparently didn't comment on it earlier, so better late than never. I've have gone back several times and watched this video--as I do almost all of yours. This one has helped me a lot when looking into SAS3 controllers for SSDs. I have told/given this video to a LOT of friends looking to get into home servers/ws with SATA or SAS RAID or JBOD for TrueNAS/Scale. They have commented how great your presentation style is, so I wanted to 2nd that. Since a lot of them watch on Roku (etc.) devices, they cannot comment. Keep up the great work! This form of video is great for me to catch up on my knowledge or refresh.

[@ArtofServer]

really happy to hear this one was helpful to you! thank you for sharing it and watching it! :-)

[@babajaga9345]

You clearly put a lot of work in this. I like every second of it. Thanks for this video!

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you! Glad you got something out of it!

[@Lierofox]

Just found this channel after I bought an LSI 9207-4i4e from your store! Got it to replace my 9207-8i in my Unraid server running on an HPE Proliant DL185 G5. I've had plans to expand its capacity with possibly a Powervault or another DAS/JBOD enclosure, but didn't have enough free PCIe slots to do it, very few HBAs seem to support that internal + external configuration, but in this case, that 9207-4i4e is a lifesaver! Thanks for being a great resource for us home lab guys!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks for supporting me through my store!

[@milivojesikira]

I have been snooping around your channel for some time. Thank you for all the information on HBAs, cables, flashing, centOS, etc... Also, saw you on forums... Just wanted you to know you are very kind and your youtube channel is awesome. Audio is quite good and your presenting skills are good enough if you ask me. I am far from USA, so your ebay store is not a solution for me, but I will recommend you to the good folks in the North America on forums/ social networks. Keep up the good work!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks for your kind words! What's your handle on the forums?

[@HorizonDesu]

I watched this and other video explaining about cable. I had so many questions until I found this channel. I instantly brought a bstock hba sas card on his eBay. Thank you, I love you.

[@ArtofServer]

Glad my videos helped! And thank you for showing your support by shopping at my store! :-)

[@2amNerd]

Just bought my first ever HBA card from you after watching this video. THANK YOU for being so awesome with this video and how you explain it on ebay as well.

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you! Your support of the Art of Server is very much appreciated!

[@KrumpetKruncher]

Awesome video!!! Learned a ton and HBAs are finally starting to make sense!

[@ArtofServer]

Glad this helped! :-)

[@arshamskrenes]

Thank you so much for this incredibly thorough video! This should be all over the forums! Thanks again!

[@ArtofServer]

Glad it was helpful!

[@TmanaokLine]

This is awesome! Thank you so much, I've bought a ton from you and didn't realize you had a YT channel! So cool!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks for supporting my store! Glad this video was helpful! :-)

[@drkskwlkr]

Thank you for yet another very helpful video!! Even if one knows most or all of this, it is great to have everything of importance in one place for reference.

[@ArtofServer]

Glad it was helpful!

[@CaptainLoveBoob]

Never knew of this fellow but found his name on reddit. Reached out on ebay and dude took the time to help and expand my knowledge. 10/10, will be buying from him today

[@ArtofServer]

I'm not sure who you are from the couple dozen people I've responded to today, but it was my pleasure to help! Thank you for your kind comment! :-)

[@CaptainLoveBoob]

@@ArtofServer you sold me the mustang with 2 sas to sata then remembered the card had low profile but I needed regular for my case.

[@HotloadsTTV]

WOW you have so much server knowledge it's insanity!! Anytime anyone asks me about HBAs especially with the CHIA mining craze I send them to this channel!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks!

[@SeanLynchXY]

Hooray, Hooray, we all love the art of HBA!!! Thanks for your videos AOS! :)

[@ArtofServer]

My pleasure!

[@andymok7945]

Thanks so much for doing these videos. Great info for those like me starting to work with these controllers.

[@ArtofServer]

Glad this helped! Thanks for watching!

[@raga3457]

I liked it even before completely viewing the video. Thanks for the awesome video...👍😊

[@ArtofServer]

you humble me! :-) thanks for watching... (if you watched it)

[@MR-vj8dn]

I really enjoyed watching this. I love listening to videos like these as I work in my home lab. Thumbs up!

[@ArtofServer]

Glad you enjoyed it. Thanks for watching!

[@MR-vj8dn]

@@ArtofServer I’m only about recently found out about the movement towards SDS, with using preferably HBAs instead of RAID controllers. Very interested in the topic and want to lab / try it out myself ASAP.

[@ArtofServer]

@@MR-vj8dn that's awesome! If you want to start playing around with ZFS, don't watch my "Forbidden Arts of ZFS" series of videos until you get more experience with it. :-)

[@MR-vj8dn]

@@ArtofServer I’m curious but not too sure about ZFS. I’ve seen many ppl make videos about it but as I’m picky about my file systems, in such ways to serve my client machines as good / natively as possible. I usually go the route of block storage with iSCSI and format the drive to OS native. .. but with even better hardware than I have I could perhaps have ZFS below iSCSI ..?

[@ArtofServer]

@@MR-vj8dn yes, you can use ZFS zvol over iscsi and format it with native filesystem.

[@hitmandahl]

Your videos inspired my to buy my first Dell PowerEdge R410 w 2x Xeon E5640s and a PERC6/i RAID cars, looking for a the SAS 6/ir to flash into IT mode! And thanks for another great video!

[@ArtofServer]

Glad to hear that! If you need SAS6i/R card already flashed to IT mode, I have them listed here: ebay.to/2JcLpOZ

[@hitmandahl]

@@ArtofServer I actually got the dell SAS6/iR (The one that uses Dell proprietary port on the riser so I can get a 10Gb NIC in the freed place and use one of my virtual machines run as a router/firewall),and the correct cable, both new, thanks to your videos! This is so EXCITING! You are a great teacher

[@kdibaba]

Wow. An amazing video. Keep up the good work.

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you very much!

[@rkeantube]

very nice, i picked the LSI SAS2308-8I 9217-8I and added a fan to keep it cool because of this video

[@ArtofServer]

Glad this was helpful! :-)

[@rkeantube]

@@ArtofServer there a 3d print for fan bracket www.shapeways.com/product/NET3LH5QP/fan-bracket-for-lsi-9207-8i no physical modifcation of the card to use in a non server case

[@leonardopinheiro6693]

Excelent video! Keep doing it!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks, will do!

[@michaelgarcia8271]

Thanks for the useful video. Ended up going to your site and ordering an HBA for my Unraid server.

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you so much for your support!

[@DogeGFSolo]

That's what i said lol great minds innit :)

[@MagikMan69181]

Great video, glad to see all this info in the one place! Just curious, will you be covering motherboard integrated SAS as well at some point?

[@RollerCoasterLineProductions]

Great video. Information to store away in case I need to add more spinning rust on my new unraid server.

[@ArtofServer]

Glad it was helpful!

[@JoaoSilva-gs5jb]

you are a beast, thanks so much for all this amazing content!

[@ArtofServer]

Glad you like them!

[@JoaoSilva-gs5jb]

@@ArtofServer oh man oh man, your content is true masterpiece, do you have a video about what's hba, software raid, it mode, in a deep explanation, I already got sort it, but wanna learn more

[@robertchoate359]

Thank you so much for doing this video

[@ArtofServer]

You are so welcome! I hope it was helpful! :-)

[@peterdee1900]

Great video!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks!

[@tonymerrett]

hey ya such a great channel!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks! Glad you are enjoying it!

[@augurseer]

This. Is. Awesome. I will also say to everyone that watches. I have purchased an HBA from his eBay store. Worked perfect!!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks man!

[@jart122]

Love your videos

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks for watching!

[@martinjungmusic]

That's still a great overview, just ordered a LSI 9211-4i to virtualize TrueNAS Scale as I only had a PCIe x4 slot left. It would be great to see newer cards with just 4 PCIe lanes, especially at PCIe 4.0 or 5.0 speeds I see a lot of potential.

[@ArtofServer]

Totally agree! Would be nice to see newer gen cards with less PCIe lanes.

[@chromerims]

Another superb video 👍. Thank you, Art of Server. 12:42 It feels like folks (in the home and small businesses) increasingly are keen to deploy two on-prem use cases dually: ► (1) Colder/cooler storage with stability/longevity of data and possibly lower rates of bit-rot, thus favoring HDD devices over SSDs, and ► (2) Hotter/warmer storage with bias towards speed of SSDs. The above being distinct from and in addition to cloud-based storage / mirroring services. Kindest regards, neighbors.

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks! yes, I think just like the trend in the enterprise, the need for tiered storage architecture is finding use cases in home labs and small businesses.

[@chromerims]

@@ArtofServer 👍

[@awesomearizona-dino]

Subd....i have a lot to learn, this channel is a good start.

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks!

[@sogndal94]

i am using the HP one in a dl380e gen 8, and works great. the best thing is that it does not make the server go into full fan speed mode. =) Great video!

[@ArtofServer]

Cool... you are talking about the H220 or H240? btw, do you know the mechanism by which HP decides to freak out and full blast the fans? Is it on the SMBus on PCIe? Or something else? I don't know recent HP stuff well....

[@sogndal94]

@@ArtofServer The h240. i also have the H220, and that also works. it seems to be the SMbus(but i am not sure), i tried blocking that but does not work.

[@Ducati1198desmo]

@@sogndal94 in what os are you using the h240?

[@sogndal94]

@@Ducati1198desmo Sorry for really late answer. vmware, for vSAN.

[@azenkwed]

Tremendously helpful

[@ArtofServer]

Glad it helped! :-)

[@DogeGFSolo]

Oh baby look at all them controllers :)

[@ArtofServer]

meow!

[@eyaldror7522]

great video. thank you!!

[@ArtofServer]

Glad you liked it!

[@heldersilva7554]

Great content and well explained for novice and experienced users. I bought a 9207 because of the bandwidth since I connect 4 SSDs and 4HDD to it but and I wanted to make sure it wasn't a bandwidth bottleneck, but I totally forgot about the IOPS and the higher clocked 2308 certainly helps with it. Just a small point for some people considering 9206-16e, although it will probably have better IOPS performance than the 9202-16e, they have the same bandwidth. One has a PCI-E 3.0 8x and the other has PCI-E 2.0 16x. So probably just go for the 9202-16e (less heat problems) if you need the 16 ports, since even if you use SSDs they will be bottlenecked by the pci-e bandwidth. I don't think you mentioned it in the video, so just pointing it out :)

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge! :-) Yes, I didn't mention 9202-16e card since at the time I made this video, I was completely sold out. It is a good card, but handles lower IOPS than 9206-16e. You are right in that bandwidth on PCIe bus is almost the same (not exactly, due to encoding overhead differences 2.0 vs 3.0, but close enough).

[@heldersilva7554]

Art of Server on another note. Have you ever been able to change the scan order, address or cage number (I think it’s called manufacture data) in a card? Because if I flash the LSI generic firmware with a -e 7 erase before it the card presents some very strange port numbers

[@ArtofServer]

@@heldersilva7554 changing address, serial number is easy. But I haven't looked at changing other parameters. What do you mean by cage number?

[@heldersilva7554]

Art of Server for each sas/sata port you have information like cage number/port/port address. These determine the order in which the os sees the drivers. It’s not really important. But it would be nice to match the bay number of my microserver gen 8 with the daN numbers of FreeNas.

[@djvincon]

Aa the Art of a very good video's and research... I like.

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you very much!

[@attackandsnack]

time to do another update! :) just ordered a card in the meantime, just went with my gut.

[@ArtofServer]

Another update of this video? I think for now, the information in this video is still current. Hope your "gut" did you right! :-)

[@chromerims]

@@ArtofServer Thank you, Art of Server 👍

[@Jorge2222]

Great video and info! One super minor point I am not sure you've made is how an internal port card can be used for external ports with that internal to external PCIe slot converter, again minor point. Thanks

[@ArtofServer]

Good point! Thanks for watching!

[@wildmanjeff42]

have used the leds on an IBM1015 card to identify bad drive in zfs array. lot easier to trace the wire number down than to pull drives to check serial numbers

[@ArtofServer]

yes, indeed! that can be useful if the drive is dead.... just wait until you need to troubleshoot the drives that are not quite dead, but flaking out and giving I/O errors instead of I/O timeouts... LOL

[@stamasd8500]

Very interesting. I only wish you had included cards with the 2108 chipset, like the IBM M5014/5015 in the comparison.

[@ArtofServer]

Sorry, this was focused on HBA cards... the 2108 is a RAID card and I don't really deal with those these days.

[@BennyTygohome]

Excellent, thank you

[@ArtofServer]

You're welcome! Thanks for watching!

[@pinkdispatcher]

Very helpful, thanks. I'll be getting a Dell T320 soon with an H310 controller, and I will be using ZFS (on NetBSD) on it, and rather risking a mess with trying to flash it to IT mode, I found I could get an LSI SAS2008-based controller for less than €40, which should work great. I think.

[@ArtofServer]

Cool. Glad it was helpful! Thanks for watching!

[@Varengard]

What could be interesting would be a first and second generation benchmark side-by-side comparaison of iops when running the same SSDs on both. In my use-case, I'll be using a SAS2008 based HBA just for a pair of 1TB SSDs in btrfs software raid1 that are just a cache-pool for my array. I doubt it would be any worse than my crappy sata3 cards anyway, but I'ld be interrested to know how much there would be a notable enough gap between SAS2008 and SAS2308 HBAs when it comes to IOps in a configuration of just 2 or 4 sata SSDs. I'm due to receive a SAS2008-based LBA in a week or two, and was planning to hook up a pair of SSDs to it. Yes, a full 8 port LBA for 2 sata3 SSDs. Explanation: I have a R720. Front filled with spinning rust on a JBOD configured H310 mini mono. I managed to sip 5V from the motherboard, which is the only power the Crucial MX500 ask for. Issue: my SATA3 cards that actually won't let the server boot. (every >12< of them are "offbrand" ones with some ASMedia controllers, was just fine in my hp Z620, but Dell R720 is having non of it)

[@agataerminiapennisi5504]

Cat logo is cool!!! 🐈

[@ArtofServer]

Cats are awesome! Lol

[@roberto-mu525]

Thank you, admirable contents and the unboxing sessions are specially instructive! I have a Poweredge T110 II. I want to undust it) and would appreciate your advice before: could it be expanded more than tec.specs indicated (4 x 1Tb)? If it is possible, please, let me know your suggestion about the PCI. KInd regards, Roberto

[@ArtofServer]

I'm not that familiar with T110 server. I'm a little bit more familiar with the rackmount stuff.

[@insidejob8309]

On SSDs I tested some on a Dell Perc H700. Samsung EVOs which are normally fast on SATA are dogs on the H700. I talked to dell about it and they said a mismatch in the timings causes it. So I tested some Enterprise HGST SSDs and yes they work great and are super fast and robust. If you still with enterprise grade and approved they are fine on SSD but if you go consumer non approved well you get issues.

[@JKGarageBMW]

Great vid - with vSphere 7 deprecating my RAID controllers, I have a number of SM863 and PM863 SSDs I am thinking of making a FreeNAS/ZFS array out of. What HBA would you recommend for high performance/SSD pools?

[@ArtofServer]

with SATA SSDs (or SAS2 SSDs), i would normally just recommend a HBA based on SAS2308 chipset. just keep in mind, the performance of ZFS doesn't scale linearly with SSDs... so don't expect a 24xSSD disk pool to perform 24x a single SSD. some tuning may be required.

[@patrickweggler]

Great video, agein! In terms of power consumption is it better to run an 8 lane card plus port expander or go with the 16 lane without expander? Especially for the sas2008 vs sas2016 ...

[@ArtofServer]

great question... that might be an idea for a future video! my guess is that SAS2008+expander is more energy efficient than SAS2008x2, but SAS2116 might be most efficient... but I don't know.. just a guess.. and a great question. i'm writing this down for future video... thanks!

[@enzofx8954]

@@ArtofServer +1 in finding a recommended solution for 16 lanes. Going to read up on those expanders...

[@javiscancino]

So, what kind type of adapter would i need to connect a single 8tb Exos 7e8 sas drive under win10?

[@Jetta4TDIR]

I love your videos, i find them extremely useful especially since my passion is repurposing older technology into "enterprise" like use for home networks ie building hi spec laptop mobos into 1u rack mount cases to run as a server. Im currently working on upgrade project for a couple of servers and want to add a jbod to my rack in the guise of a dell powervault md1200 populated with 12x 4tb 3.5" sata HDDs and was wanting to ask you which hba you could suggest ? Do you also have a discord wher we could make contact? Any way keep up the great work i look forward to more of your videos and thank you for sharing your time and knowledge with us

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you for your kind words. I'm happy to hear you find my channel helpful! :-) As for your MD1200, I think LSI 9200-8e will make a good choice for your use case. yes, I have a discord server. Reach out to me directly under the "about" tab on my channel and I'll give you the invite.

[@Jetta4TDIR]

@@ArtofServer you're very welcome. I dont really use Facebook but for the purposes of getting the discord link ill use an unused Facebook profile.

[@ArtofServer]

@@Jetta4TDIR No, no need for facebook. My about tab should provide you an email where you can reach me.

[@Jetta4TDIR]

@@ArtofServer email sent... I couldn't find it at first, but its done now.

[@andersgjerlw9636]

Got a question,how many drives does the 7.8 GB/s support in a NAS environment. I'm thinking of building myself a SC847 with a x11 MB with 36 bay. 24 of them will be SATA HDD. Remaining 12 will be for SATA SSD array for configs for routere/switches,backup for server 2016 and 2019 for GPO etc and some PowerShell scripts ,VMs. Or should I just skip to SAS3 and use a card that take SAS3 and convert it to SATA that supports 24 drive and 12 ssd drive array?

[@littlenewton6]

这个视频太有用了！！！！感谢您！

[@ArtofServer]

謝謝你！

[@temp50]

Wow, thank you!

[@ArtofServer]

You're welcome!

[@gabrielfair724]

Linus Tech Tips needs to hire this guy!!

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks! But Linux can't hire me... LOL

[@anthonystrohmayer9191]

Also I bought a used HP Smart Array P822 / 2GB FBWC 6GB SAS RAID Controller which had my workstation CPUs, my Nvidia GTX 1070 video card, and the raid card so hot it nearly started my PC on fire. The new p822 I bought is much cooler but still quite hot. It needs an active cooling solution. Can you tell me what I need to use the ds2246 on my Dell Poweredge r620 server or my Dell Precision t5610?

[@K24Dryvr]

Which card would you recommend? I can obviously get away with a card that can support 8 more SATA drives, but in the interest of future proofing if 16 drives is doable for not much more maybe that would be better? My setup: PLEX Running Stablebit DrivePool for storage management which does read striping 6700k (16 PCI-E Lanes) Z710 Asus viii Hero MB (20 PCI-E Lanes) 1080ti Video Card 1 - M.2 NVME (??Uses 4 PCI-E Lanes??) 6 - SATA HDD's going to MB (48TB Total) Just shucked another WD Elements 12TB to add to the system and now I'm out of SATA ports. Do I have enough PCI-E lanes to add a card without encountering any bottle necks to other devices like graphics or NVME M.2 drive or the drives themselves considering they can do read striping? Do I need to pay attention to which PCI-E port it goes in? Thanks in advance! Love the videos!

[@kingneutron1]

Thanks!

[@ArtofServer]

Thank you so much for your support! :-)

[@PainBlame]

I have a sas9210-8i and i cant get 8 sas drives to work on this, only can get one port to run four 15krpm sas drives at a time. I tried each port and both ports work but i cant run 8 15k rpm sas drives on both ports at the same time. Anyone know how to fix this?

[@GonePh1shing]

G'Day! Thanks for the awesome explainer video. Looking at buying one of these cards from your store to put in an R720 I have to run Proxmox. It's just for a home lab, so was hoping I'd get away with using some consumer SSDs for cost reasons. Are there any drive compatibility issues I should look out for with the 2308 based cards?

[@ArtofServer]

For the R720, you should watch this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/qWLEqKGje7xmodk

[@GonePh1shing]

@@ArtofServer Much appreciated mate! I'm about 90% certain the chassis is already populated with an H710, so I should be able to flash that (Which I presume you also have a video on?).

[@michaeldaly3166]

hi, found this video while searching for a cross flashing solution for a 9440-8i that is Dell 'locked' due to a different subvendor ID to the standard Broadcom version. A variation of storCLI, ie storCLIO, which used to be shipped with storCLI, lets you do that, but it's nowhere online now. Any suggestions please?

[@martinborovansky5186]

Great video! Do you have any experience with an HPE E208i-p G10 controller? I got one cheap, but it's refusing to cooperate with the SSA on my HP DL380p G8, probably due to the Gen difference. As far as I know, it can't be configured from either ESXi, or FreeNAS. Are there any other OEN firmwares I could try?

[@ArtofServer]

No, sorry.

[@psilan1]

I didn't watch it all because you are cool to post an index. But i'll be back :>

[@ArtofServer]

That's exactly how I intended for people to use this video.

[@emaPug]

@art of server I just found your channel now, if I knew sooner I'd had bought from you. Quick question, I have 2 EMC 1.98 SAS SSD, I tried pointlessly to have my LSI 5015 SAS adapter to recognize them, both the BIOS and the software show them as incompatible. I did some research and some people say that is because the drives are formatted with a 520k sector, but in the SSD proprieties I see that these drives have 512k sectors. Is there a way to be able to use those drives at all, or am I SOL? Thanks

[@ArtofServer]

You'll need a HBA, not a RAID controller, but you can reformat them following the instructions in my video here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/enLEhZmsbpuJb9k

[@geektronics]

Ok to anyone having those issues, found a fix, use scotch tape to tape pins 5 and 6 of the front of the card (heatsink facing you), DO NOT use electrical tape (it will melt and screw the motherboard) or try to cut the board or drill it, the backpins electrical channels are super close to the front pins, if you try to mess with them in any way you will ruin your card (i just did, but I had so many to test anyway I didn't care), problem is pins 5 and 6 are SMBUS pins, and OEMs use them for some weird things, they mess with your computer memory channels, thus blocking the card for users trying to use them in normal computers, after that the card will work fine on any computer

[@Eone7954]

I’ve purchase a HP H240 from your eBay store. I running freenas 11.2 and have 6 SAS3 drives on a raid z2 running solid. I didn’t have to install any drivers I just plugged it in and connect the drives freenas recognized the drives fine

[@ArtofServer]

Wow?? Really H240? Or did you mean H220?

[@HoopesJohnC]

I have a stack (30-40) 3TB SAS drives that I'd like to format and flip. I may even consider using some myself for basic home data/media backup. What would you recommend is a good set up to get started? (I've looked at external enclosures, they're stupid expensive...A lot of people have commented on power consumption - are there ways to have them sleep like a regular windows SATA network drive that wakes up only when in use?) - thanks in advance!

[@ArtofServer]

I haven't investigated putting SAS drives to sleep. I think it is possible, but I might test it out and make a video about it in the future!

[@AceBoy2099]

Question for you, hopefully you can help me. I just got a supermicro sc846 (24 bay, came full of sas drives i have sata to put in, all spinning rust, no ssds aside from on the internal sata headers for the os) and inside it is a lsi 3ware 9690sa-414e with unknown firmware and such (but unraid will not see the drives put in it, dont know how to use proxmox so cant say on that yet, this was suppose to me my learning system for that.) and connects to the backplane with a single cable. Can you somehow assist me on getting this card to work or recommend another that will but won't break the bank?

[@ArtofServer]

Based on your other comment, I think you should look at upgrading the backplane. Then, any of the SAS-2 HBAs mentioned in this video should work. For the 846 chassis, I personally like the vertical port cards like the 9220-8i or 9223-8i and use the foldable 3M SAS cables to route them high in the chassis and out of the path of airflow. The background banner photo in my channel page is from my 846 with the folded cables.

[@_m.a-x]

Great content, sir! I am curious about one use case that you've been recommending against: use of SAS2008 with SSD storage. Can you please confirm or contradict the following: #1: 6x SATA SSD will max out at around 3.5GB/s and will NOT bottleneck the PCI-E 2.0, so I'm good with an H310. #2: 8x SATA SSD will bottleneck, but I could plug in another H310 and extend my PCI-E throughput to 8GB/s (4 SSD drives on each controller) #3: SAS vs SATA is full-duplex vs half-duplex. Does it mean that SAS2 can do 6GB/s in both directions simultaneously, therefore twice transfers than SATA?

[@ArtofServer]

Good questions. In response to each question: 1) I think you're right with regards to SATA SSDs. Looks like they max out at around 4.3Gbps, so 6x is about 25.8Gbps. PCIe2.0 x8 is about 32Gbps, so plenty in terms of bandwidth. (more on this point below) There are SAS-2 SSDs that I think can go faster though... 2) Sure, you can distribute the bandwidth load across multiple cards. 3) This is a good question, and off the top of my head, I don't know enough to give you a good answer. Now, so far the discussion above has been focused just on bandwidth. But with SSDs, there are other dimensions of performance... one area where SSDs beat out old HDDs is in IOPS, or their ability to do many more transactions per second. In a situation where you are demanding IOPS more than bandwidth (lots of small transactions), the SAS2008 IOC running at 533Mhz is less capable than the SAS2308 IOC which runs at 800Mhz. That's a pretty large bump in core clock speed, and is one of the reasons why I recommend the SAS2308 for SSDs (at least for SAS2 or SATA3). Keep in mind, that brings along with it a lot more heat and a bump in power consumption.

[@_m.a-x]

@@ArtofServer Thank you very much for the reply! I appreciate you taking time and answering my questions in such detail! I do have an H710 card, but it is an external card from a T420 box P/N 0VM02C. I couldn't find any info on how to flash it. Also, the online specs are showing that this is a PCI-E 2.0 card. If flashing would open the PCI-E 3.0 potential (just like in one of your videos - 5.0GT before and 8.0GT after flashing), then it could be worth it. Do you thing it's a good idea to try and continue my reearch?

[@ArtofServer]

@@_m.a-x It really depends on the H710... there are several H710 models (and i'm not familiar with the particular P/N you have) and they have the same Dell specs, but may have different revisions of the LSI SAS2208 chipset. If you have a Rev D1, then yes, you might be able to enable PCIe 3.0 on the card if you can flash it with the LSI SAS2308 firmware. If you have Rev B0, then it is PCIe 2.0 only.

[@TerryMundy]

Can someone in one sentence tell me what an IT mode SAS controller is? I'm into storage but have limited off work hours to dedicate to something that may not be for me.

[@billycroan2336]

@ArtofServer Why do I often see two different model numbers? for example. I think I have two 2308 cards. one is a SAS2308_2(D1)/SAS9217-8i and the other is SAS2308_2(D1)/H220 Can both run the same latest fw image?

[@ArtofServer]

As long as the controllers have the same chipset, and revision of chipset (like D1), it can run the same firmware. The ability to run a particular firmware also depends on SBR configuration, as well as hardware options. Cards like 9207-8i vs 9217-8i differ by an onboard NVRAM chip to store RAID configuration data. So only the 9217-8i supports the IR firmware, but both support the IT firmware. The H220, designated as 9205-8i, is really the same as 9207-8i, with a "HP" logo sticker over the "LSI" logo.

[@tristankordek]

OMG IT'S GREAT, THX And I thought it would be a waste of time😉

[@ArtofServer]

Glad it wasn't a waste of time. LOL

[@JIeTpyxa]

thank you!

[@ArtofServer]

You're welcome. Glad it was helpful.

[@JIeTpyxa]

@@ArtofServer after yours videos I'm now expert in HBA SAS too :D

[@ViszlaBoss]

Hi, if I'm using a mix of SAS driver: ST4000NM0025 and SATA SSD's should I stick with the LSI SAS 2308?

[@ArtofServer]

Yeah, if there are enough SATA SSDs to require the higher PCIe 3.0 bandwidth, I would recommend a SAS2308 card. Just be aware it requires more airflow/cooling.

[@insidejob8309]

Agree on temps and the single cpu sas cards running cooler. I put a LSI 9286CV-8e (external) to run a DAS full of 3.5 SAS drives. Its a dual core and runs pretty hot. In a 1u dell it was running 87c under heavy load. Running the fans of the server a little more gets it to 71c idle 75c load. I don't think it shuts down till like 105c seems to work fine but was wondering if changing out the thermal past would have much of a effect. Sometimes I've done it and really not much change. Wondering if you had tested that out.

[@ArtofServer]

You are right that often times changing the thermal paste doesn't make much difference. It really only matters if the old thermal paste has completely dried up and cracked, leaving air gaps between the heat source and heatsink - air is a very poor thermal conductor. Going to a higher grade thermal paste from a lower grade that is still functional might gain you a couple of degrees lower max temperatures, but not much more. Ultimately, if you want significantly lower temps you need to increase heatsink size and airflow.

[@insidejob8309]

@@ArtofServer Its hard to know the true operating range using chip temps. LSI now states 200 LFM air flow in the case and adaptek goes my temps measured 1" from the cpu. Im quite sure when my card is 80c the temp 1" from it is not 80c but no idea what it is, 1U case you dont have much room. So from what I have read is the range seems to be up into the 80s. The people that lower it are doing it because they worry. I've not read too many that said the card stopped working etc. And well I've not had any fail yet in 6 years and they all runnning hot vs what most people would be comfotable with. But when they have a temp sensor in the chip why go by air flow and not chip temp or at least have both.

[@shell11]

How much cooling do I need for the 3 central boards (internal vertical oriented SAS2008) 21:43 ? I'd use one of them in a classical gaming computer air-cooled, I'd avoid noise if possible, I've a silent and cold computer.

[@ArtofServer]

LSI SAS2008 isn't as hot as the other chips. As long as you have some airflow over the cards heatsink, it should be okay.

[@dlat80]

Runs the SAS3008 hotter or cooler than the SAS2308?

[@ryanbell85]

Any changes/updates in your advice for late 2023? Figured supply/demand on more modern controllers have changed since early 2020.

[@ArtofServer]

99% of this video still applies. When we are talking about bulk storage using HDDs, we are talking about old technology that hasn't changed much except for capacity.

[@Canada_Immigration_Bible]

Thank you for great video. Quick question, one thing i was expecting in your video is talk little bit about the heat that is generated by the 3008 and 3408 cards compared to the 2308's. Do 3008 and 3408 cards produce similar heat as the 2308's ???? Do they need very high cooling ?? Thank you from Canada.

[@ArtofServer]

That's a great question and might be worth a video on it's own or I can incorporate it in a new edition of this video. (thanks for the idea) I don't have actual measurements, but based on power consumption figures, which roughly correlate to heat generation: LSI SAS2008: Nominal=6.4W, Worst-Case=14.63W LSI SAS2308: Nominal=9.8W, Worst-Case=16.00W LSI SAS3008: Nominal=14.5W, Worst-Case=22.5W So, as you can see, the newer the I/O controller chip, the more heat it seems to generate. In fact, the old SAS-1 LSI 1068E chip typically didn't even have a heatsink! So, if you want really low power consumption and heat, use SAS drives and the old SAS-1 controller! :-)

[@Canada_Immigration_Bible]

@@ArtofServer Thank you so much for the update.

[@pcxdrone]

Is it true I should disable EPC and Power balance Features on Seagate Exos drives when attaching to a HBA card like the 9207-8i?

[@ArtofServer]

Sorry, I'm not knowledgeable about that particular issue.

[@FSULAUBACH]

If I wanted to build out a truenas scale server with all ssds. What hba do you recommend from your eBay store? I would like to purchase a new one as I think the one I purchased more recently can't handle the bandwidth or the ssds.

[@ArtofServer]

It depends on what kind of SSDs you're talking about? SATA? SAS-2? SAS-3? NVMe? For SATA/SAS-2, I think any HBA based on the SAS2308 or newer will do great. For SAS-3, I would focus on SAS3008 based or newer. And for NVMe, well, that's connected directly to your PCIe bus so no need for any SAS controller.

[@MisterRorschach90]

What’s crazy to think about is how pcie 5.0 is already a standard. When they start making controllers for that standard people will be able to get x1 cards with a single sff 8643 port. That will make adding a ssd raid to your desktop cheap and simple. But even more incredible is gen 5 x16 cards with 16 sff 8643 ports giving you 64 drives on one card. This will make high speed small form factor petabyte servers attainable. Technology is so exciting.

[@ArtofServer]

Yeah, I was thinking about this in my recent video about the Lenovo P620 with 128 PCIe gen 4 lanes. It got me thinking, even with Gen 4, perhaps GPUs can go back to x8 instead of being x16 all the time. This would help conserve PCIe lanes, and divert those resources to NVMe storage.

[@t0d0r]

Recently I got gifted an HP H220 (the one that says SAS9205-8i on the back). I was planning on building two zfs raid sets on it, one with 4 SAS HDDs and the other with 4 SATA SSDs using the appropriate cables. Is mixing SAS and SATA on one card problematic? Also, for some reason it seems to be recognized as PCI-E gen 2.0 x8 instead of 3.0 x8, although I've installed it in a gen3 slot. Love your videos :)

[@ArtofServer]

use sas2flash and check the revision of the chipset. is it B0 or D1? sounds like you might have B0, but I've never seen a H220 with B0 before, only the H221 seems to have B0.

[@t0d0r]

@@ArtofServer Tested it in another machine, this time says 3.0 x8, so it's not the card at least, sas2flash showed SAS2308(D1). How about mixing SAS and SATA drives on the same card, is that good idea or should I avoid it?

[@anthonystrohmayer9191]

What card should I use with a ds2246 shelf? The ds2246 is sff-8436 and the cables I have for it are sff-8436 to sff-8436 but the raid cards and hba card I bought are sff-8088. I have a pile of NetApp hard drives that I need to format to 512 bytes using the ds2246 and Ubuntu or linux

[@ArtofServer]

I honestly haven't worked with the DS2246 so I can't say for certain. From what you describe, it sounds like all you need is a SFF-8088->SFF-8436 cable.

[@ierosgr]

Do you happen to know which chips are based of the RAID P410i 512MB from HP and the P812 1GB ?? Thank you

[@ArtofServer]

sorry, no idea..

[@k31myx]

Hi, thanks for this great tutorial. Please can you inform if Dell PERC H800 can be flashed to IT mode as well as I am unable to find any inform on the internet.

[@ArtofServer]

No, I don't know of a way to flash the H800 to IT mode, I believe it is an external version of the H700 RAID controller. If you need an external HBA, probably look for a 9200-8e or 9207-8e.

[@NdxtremePro]

These can be flash to the LSI version, but there is no IT mode for those LSI cards. I have seen someone mention downgrading them to the 9211 LSI cards, but have not tried it myself, so you would be on your own if it works.

[@dunderfunder9026]

Thanks bruv ill try to order soon first lets see what happens with the 9201-8i ;-)

[@ArtofServer]

Thanks for your support! :-)

[@democratssuckcritic1030]

will the lsi 2008 work in a regular motherboard thats not a sever ? my goal is to install 7 more HHD an i only have 1 sata port left open

[@ArtofServer]

Yes, you just need a PCIe slot large enough to fit one of these HBA cards.

[@drtweak87]

Still use to 1068/1068E cards haha have a few Dell SAS 5/6 PERC/HBA cards that I use just for mass wiping. Also jerry rigged a PE 2900 Power supply, the dual power supply board, and Back plane WITH the HDD caddy enclosures so that I don't need to use a breakout cable anymore.

[@ArtofServer]

Those 1068E cards perform surprisingly well when used with just HDDs. Have you seen my R410 storage option video where I benchmark the 1068E vs SAS2008? other than the 2TB SATA issue, it's really still very usable.

[@drtweak87]

@@ArtofServer Hey got one question! So again most of the older Dell cards i use just to toss drives on to do wiping and what not. I do have a PERC S300. Is that able to be flashed to IT Mode? I know it is a less common adapter and isn't a huge deal if it doesn't, just having another 8 drive adapter would be nice since I only have 1 HBA card that does 8 drives.

[@ArtofServer]

@@drtweak87 I don't have direct experience with the PERC S300. My understanding it's based on LSI SAS1068E chipset, but with some Dell hybrid firmware. If it has a 1068E chip, I would think it would be possible to run the LSI firmware, but I haven't done it myself, so no 1st hand experience.

[@anthonystrohmayer9191]

I also bought an emc vnx sae shelf but I have no idea what I need to install it to either my workstation or the server. It has mini sas connections but I've been told it only works with a proprietary NetApp os not windows server.

[@ArtofServer]

sorry, don't know anything about that unit.

[@danimoosakhan]

Is there a video that shows how to install H710 mini with IT mode firmware in Dell R720xd?

[@ArtofServer]

there is, but I don't recall exactly which one. it should be in one of videos in this playlist though: kzbin.info/aero/PL28eVGz5vFQ9oS1zdvqqoAluxxt6BKNMx

[@sodkim6193]

Hi, I'm considering building a NAS server with a 4U 24bay chassis. Currently I have 16TB sata HDD x 24 and LSI 9300-8i (2ports) x 1. Looks like there are several backplanes available on alibaba. 1. 6gbps backplane (6port on rear panel) 2. 6gbps backplane with LSI 2X36 expander chip (2port on rear panel) 3. 12gbps backplane (6ports on rear panel) 4. 12gbps backplane with LSI 3X36 expander chip (2~3port on rear panel) I'm not considering connecting SSD to the chassis. In this case, which one will you recommend?

[@ArtofServer]

Personally, I think I would choose #2. 6Gbps is more than fast enough for HDDs. #4 could work too, and would link at 12Gbps with the 9300-8i you have. That might simplify cabling. But it would depend on the cost difference between #2 and #4.

[@starscream2092]

Hello, i got an SAS drive and would like to connect it to my normal PC desktop, is it possible with one of these ?

[@ArtofServer]

Indeed.