Best PCIe hardware based RAID controller (for Z390 and modern systems)

[Rakanoth]

I bought a raid controller. It is "StarTech 2 Port PCIe Controller RAID controller". It is a Marvell based RAID controller. It does not function well. I could not configure it. I cannot enter the configuration by pressing ctrl + m after BIOS enumeration. I researched it a lot. Many people complained about similar problems. They also say it is a low profile RAID controller. Therefore I want a proper and fully functional RAID controller.

There are very specific reasons for why I need a PCIe based RAID controller. Mostly for research. So, please let us not discuss why I should NOT get one :) I also do not want to use motherboard's RAID controller.

 

My motherboard is Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Master. Would you please recommend me a proper RAID controller? The budget isn't important. What is of paramount importance is that it is fully compatible with modern motherboards and functions well.

[ToastyBear]

I just bought an LSI 9361-8i off ebay. Theres a lot of cheap third party vendor LSI cards coming from China. Im skeptical about it but apparently other people got it to work and the price is right. I'll let you know how it goes but knowing china shipping it would probably take a month. I heard you can flash third party vendor cards with original LSI firmware. 

[Electronics Wizardy]

What drive setup do you have? SAS/SATA/PCIE?

 

How many drives? What speeds do you need?

 

Id probably go with a lsi card, there are many of them, depending on needs.

[Rakanoth]

1 hour ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

What drive setup do you have? SAS/SATA/PCIE?

 

How many drives? What speeds do you need?

 

Id probably go with a lsi card, there are many of them, depending on needs.

I have normal SSDs with SATA cable. I will connect 2 SSDs. Speed is not important. It is going to be used for research.

[Electronics Wizardy]

5 minutes ago, Rakanoth said:

I have normal SSDs with SATA cable. I will connect 2 SSDs. Speed is not important. It is going to be used for research.

Do you care about things like a bbu?
 

With only 2 drives, id probably go h700(dell branded version of lsi), or a lsi 9260-4i. Both are pretty cheap on ebay.

 

What type of research are you doing?

[Rakanoth]

16 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Do you care about things like a bbu?
 

With only 2 drives, id probably go h700(dell branded version of lsi), or a lsi 9260-4i. Both are pretty cheap on ebay.

 

What type of research are you doing?

What is a BBU? Backup battery unit? It is not necessary at all.

I will research PCIe bus communication for this type of devices. I also want to hide the serial numbers of SSDs from the operating system.

[Electronics Wizardy]

36 minutes ago, Rakanoth said:

What is a BBU? Backup battery unit? It is not necessary at all.

I will research PCIe bus communication for this type of devices. I also want to hide the serial numbers of SSDs from the operating system.

Depending on the raid controller, some still show the raw devices behind the controller for things like smart data. If you want to hid the hardware from the os, a vm is a much better option.

 

A BBU will allow you to ave write caching without any risk to data. Can speed it up by a good amount.

[Rakanoth]

2 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Depending on the raid controller, some still show the raw devices behind the controller for things like smart data. If you want to hid the hardware from the os, a vm is a much better option.

There are some malware or software that will refuse to run in a VM. So unfortunately it is not an option.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, Rakanoth said:

There are some malware or software that can detect a VM. So unfortunately it is not an option.

Is this for boot? You can also go iscsi if you want to just spool a device sn

 

Also if your just spoofing sn, you can do a single drive, no need for 2 drives.

[Rakanoth]

9 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

You can also go iscsi if you want to just spool a device sn

 

Also if your just spoofing sn, you can do a single drive, no need for 2 drives.

Thank you so much.

9 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Is this for boot?

Yes, I will use it (these SSDs or storage devices) for booting Windows. (I hope I understood your question correctly)

[hojnikb]

If it's a RAID1 setup, just setup software raid. It will be more reliable, as you're not depending on hardware to make it work.

[Rakanoth]

I got a cheap 9260-4i from eBay and it works quite well so far. It was easy to set up. Thank you very much again for all the responses.