Good HBA card for FreeNas?

[y3llowduk]

Hello All, I'm after recommendations for a PCIe HBA card for my SATA drives in a freenas server. I'm a bit confused with all the different types. I'm building on a serious budget, and don't need amazing performance. I'm in the UK. Would only really need an extra 2 or 3 SATA ports to add to the 4 already on the mobo.

[leadeater]

Pretty much any LSI or LSI OEM HBA or RAID card in IT firmware mode is good for what you need. You'll find lots of them on ebay for cheap enough prices and are high quality.

 

Search for LSI 9207 and 9211

[Windows7ge]

LSI 9207-8i would be my go to but if you can find it cheaper a Dell PERC H310 flashed with a LSI firmware (IT mode) also works well.

[WereCatf]

34 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Pretty much any LSI or LSI OEM HBA or RAID card in IT firmware mode is good for what you need. You'll find lots of them on ebay for cheap enough prices and are high quality.

Alas, actually getting them can be problematic. I've now spent a tad over a year trying to get one, but every single time I've ordered one, I've either gotten mail that eBay has banned the seller and I've been refunded, or the order never arrive and I have to demand a refund. Obviously, it may just be that I'm unlucky, but my experience would suggest that it might be best to look elsewhere for those. The vast majority of everything else I order on eBay does arrive just fine, so I dunno what's going on there.

[y3llowduk]

1 minute ago, WereCatf said:

Alas, actually getting them can be problematic. I've now spent a tad over a year trying to get one, but every single time I've ordered one, I've either gotten mail that eBay has banned the seller and I've been refunded, or the order never arrive and I have to demand a refund. Obviously, it may just be that I'm unlucky, but my experience would suggest that it might be best to look elsewhere for those. The vast majority of everything else I order on eBay does arrive just fine, so I dunno what's going on there.

Is that in the UK?

[WereCatf]

Just now, y3llowduk said:

Is that in the UK?

No, Finland.

[leadeater]

11 minutes ago, WereCatf said:

Alas, actually getting them can be problematic. I've now spent a tad over a year trying to get one, but every single time I've ordered one, I've either gotten mail that eBay has banned the seller and I've been refunded, or the order never arrive and I have to demand a refund. Obviously, it may just be that I'm unlucky, but my experience would suggest that it might be best to look elsewhere for those. The vast majority of everything else I order on eBay does arrive just fine, so I dunno what's going on there.

I tend to go for the OEM server ones as I know they are real items from decommissioned servers, IBM M1015 for example.

[paddy-stone]

I bought mine from this seller, and was pretty quick to the UK IIRC, and card came very well wrapped to prevent damage.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LSI-9211-8i-Internal-SAS-SATA-6Gbps-8-Ports-HBA-PCI-E-RAID-Controller-Card/142280748330?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649

 

Mine has been operating for a few years with no problems. I did have to flash the IT firmware myself, but it wasn't hard, can be done from UEFI CLI the easiest FWICR, but there are other ways of flashing it. I still had the files and stuff from flashing it until recently, but was cleaning out the not needed stuff from my software backups and it fell into that category.

[Windows7ge]

12 minutes ago, WereCatf said:

-snip-

I ordered 3 LSI 9201-16i cards off Ebay once and US Customs grabbed them under suspicion for one reason or another they didn't actually say. Held them up for something like 2~3 weeks before they let them through.

 

When I got the shipment sure enough all the packaging was opened up. I sure hope they found and confiscated the drugs or weapons of mass destruction in my box full of HBAs.

 

Good news is they didn't break any of them because I'm sure the people at customs had no idea what they were.

[Velcade]

 

I buy these.  I've had 3 so far and they're rock solid.

[Jarsky]

8 hours ago, WereCatf said:

Alas, actually getting them can be problematic. I've now spent a tad over a year trying to get one, but every single time I've ordered one, I've either gotten mail that eBay has banned the seller and I've been refunded, or the order never arrive and I have to demand a refund. Obviously, it may just be that I'm unlucky, but my experience would suggest that it might be best to look elsewhere for those. The vast majority of everything else I order on eBay does arrive just fine, so I dunno what's going on there.

 

I've bought multiple cards from this seller without issue, well packaged and legitimate cards: https://www.ebay.com/usr/ebl2018

Also as @Velcade suggested, The Art of Server....he's a great seller and validates the cards. https://www.ebay.com/usr/theartofserver

 

He makes very good videos about servers, storage controllers and flashing them and how to recover bricked cards etc.... https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKHE9DEep52XlmwLbZUKvyw

 

[Velcade]

13 minutes ago, Jarsky said:

He makes very good videos about servers, storage controllers and flashing them and how to recover bricked cards etc.... https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKHE9DEep52XlmwLbZUKvyw

nice! I had no idea he had a youtube.

[WereCatf]

4 hours ago, Jarsky said:

I've bought multiple cards from this seller without issue, well packaged and legitimate cards: https://www.ebay.com/usr/ebl2018

Also as @Velcade suggested, The Art of Server....he's a great seller and validates the cards. https://www.ebay.com/usr/theartofserver

If my latest attempt at purchasing one doesn't work out, I'll give those sellers a try. Thanks for the introductions, appreciated.