The bottom line is that the caching, redundancy and features provided by Hardware RAID will simply conflict with the caching, optimization, redundancy and features provided by ZFS. These cards usually mask S.M.A.R.T data as well that FreeNAS would use to determine disk health. Most RAID adapters will build a logical ‘container’ or ‘virtual disk’ of sorts that is exposed to the OS, and will not allow direct access to the disks. The PERC H200 may be functional with the Dell firmware, but one of the key requirements for FreeNAS is to have a non-RAID HBA that allows FreeNAS direct access to the attached drives. The most notable difference is the location of the SFF-8087 ports on the top of the card, instead of the end.
To my pleasant surprise, the card worked just fine.Īlthough this is a Dell branded part, the PERC H200 is essentially just a SAS 2008 based LSI 9211-8i adapter. It cost me only $25 CDN, and was an as-is, untested part so I took a chance on it. I had originally wanted to buy an LSI 9211-8i or an IBM M1015 card, but I came across a great deal on a Dell PERC H200 on eBay. Many would argue that a good storage build is focused around a good storage controller card.
This likely meant I’d be required to do a custom build from scratch. Some of the points above very rarely go hand-in-hand like “inexpensive” and “Xeon” or “Proper server-grade” and “quiet”. Preferably a Xeon based system and not an Atom or Avaton.Enough PCI-E expandability for a SAS card as well as a 10Gb NIC or Fiberchannel HBA in the future.
Using proper server-grade hardware with error correcting (ECC) memory.My goal was to bring something online that was: Over the years, I have used it in several capacities, including as a virtual machine, on consumer grade hardware and more recently as a virtual machine with PCI pass-through of SAS and network devices.Īfter the recent overhaul of my home lab, I decided that it would be a good time to build a ‘semi-proper’ FreeNAS box that feels more like a permanent fixture. Admittedly, I use only a fraction of what this powerful FreeBSD based solution is cable of, but I’ve always found it to be very reliable and it has met my needs. Since the early iterations of my home lab, I’ve been using FreeNAS for shared storage.
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