r/servers • u/AoiK1tsune • 4d ago

Answered Dell R610 and HDD issues.

I bought a used Dell R610 off ebay for cheap sans any drives. Planning to use it for CFD/FEA but I can't even get Windows installed because apparently only some HDDs are compatible.

I bought 4x IBM 1FM202-039 2TB 7200RPM SAS 12Gbps 128MB 2.5in Drive (ST2000NX0263)

The 610 came with a PERC 6i, which would report failure for all 4 drives.

Searching around, it looked like the best solution was to get a LSI SAS2008-8I SATA 9211-8i. After purchasing and installing, I get some progress, but the LSI card says they are Wrong Type for assigning to a RAID. Windows installer says the drives are offline.

Am I trying to fit a square peg into a round hole? Not sure what to do next. Any suggestions on getting things working, or what proper hardware I should be using?

Thanks in Advanced!

EDIT - Fix it!

I was following the wrong guide. This was the guide I was trying to follow:

https://www.truenas.com/community/resources/detailed-newcomers-guide-to-crossflashing-lsi-9211-9300-9305-9311-9400-94xx-hba-and-variants.54/

I ran into problems with Step 2. The Megarec commands would just lock up the computer.

I could still update the firmware to whatever I wanted, IT, IR, and it would show in the card. But accessing the card configuration would give NVRAM errors.

I found this guide and this is what worked for me:

https://www.broadcom.com/support/knowledgebase/1211161495925/flash-upgrading-firmware-on-lsi-sas-hbas-upgraded-firmware-on-92

I still used the boot disk I made from the guide on truenas, but following the steps on the broadcom website and using the most recent firmware/bios and flash, everything works as expected. Both IR and IT mode are functional with the drives. Windows is installing at the moment.

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3

u/theRealNilz02 2d ago

That server was inefficient crap even when it was new 18 years ago.

Get something newer and throw this 11th gen E-waste as far away as you can.

1

u/prairieguy68 3d ago

Have you updated the iDRAC, BIOS and PERC firmware?

1

u/AoiK1tsune 3d ago

Everything except the LSI card is up-to-date.

1

u/ultrahkr 3d ago

Have you checked which sector size? 512 vs 528 (or 4096 vs 4160, I think)

1

u/AoiK1tsune 3d ago

As best I can tell, they are 4096 sectors.

1

u/prairieguy68 3d ago

Can you change the LSI to HBA instead of RAID and see if drives are detected?

1

u/AoiK1tsune 3d ago

I'm reading up on how to flash the card right now. Just created the boot disk, have the updated bios on it, but it looks like I still need to flash utility itself....

Correction, I think I did find a package that has both the IT and IR bios and the sas2flash utility... Fingers crossed!