Dell Server Help

[Treboren]

Hi!,

 

My I've managed to find a PowerEdge T110 II server cheap, I have no experience with proprietary servers. I will probally run linux, however the raid cards it ships with do not support it, I was wondering, Is it possible to add my own raid card that is compatible? Also is it possible for me to install a different version of Linux, or something like FreeNAS?

 

Thanks for the help.

[alpenwasser]

Hi!,

 

My I've managed to find a PowerEdge T110 II server cheap, I have no experience with proprietary servers. I will probally run linux, however the raid cards it ships with do not support it, I was wondering, Is it possible to add my own raid card that is compatible? Also is it possible for me to install a different version of Linux, or something like FreeNAS?

 

Thanks for the help.

Looking at the specifications here: http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/poweredge-t110-2/pd

(I hope that's the right one), it's being listed as having a few PCIe expansion slots,

so I'd think you could add your own controller in there, yes.

I'm not too experienced with proprietary servers either though, @Eniqmatic seems to know

this stuff pretty well, maybe he has some input too.

What RAID card does the server ship with? The Perc H200 can apparently be cross-flashed to

the LSI9211-8i, so it should work in Linux (or FreeBSD): http://blog.michael.kuron-germany.de/2014/11/crossflashing-dell-perc-h200-to-lsi-9211-8i/comment-page-1/

The S100/S300 doesn't work under Linux (or FreeBSD, I'd guess), although opinions seem to

differ on whether or not it can still be useful as a non-RAID card (see comments):

http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/dell-poweredge-s100-s300-linux-driver-raid/

Also, FreeNAS is based on FreeBSD, which isn't Linux. It's a long story, and I'll spare you

the details (unless you're interested), but it matters because driver support differs between

the two lineages. I'm not sure about this specific server, but I have read of a few people

running FreeNAS on Dell servers (for example, it seems somebody did it on the predecessor

of your model: https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/not-getting-the-console-setup-after-a-new-install.10924/).

[Eniqmatic]

@alpenwasser is correct in what he's saying, however if you could provide the model numbers of the RAID card it has inside it would probably be easier for us to help you.

 

Does it come with a DRAC?

 

Looking at the specs it says 6GB/s SAS HBA which is a little bit vague. I would imagine it would take an LSI card although it's hard to say for definite.

 

Is there on-board SATA ports? Wonder if you could connect them directly there, although it may not have it and depends how many drives you want to connect.

[Treboren]

Thanks both of you, very helpful. I've contacted the seller asking for more details. One more question If I were to run ZFS would you consider it fine to run non ECC RAM, I've heard it can cause problems? Also @Eniqmatic what part of Scotland are you from, I'm about 40 miles outside inverness.

[Eniqmatic]

Thanks both of you, very helpful. I've contacted the seller asking for more details. One more question If I were to run ZFS would you consider it fine to run non ECC RAM, I've heard it can cause problems? Also @Eniqmatic what part of Scotland are you from, I'm about 40 miles outside inverness.

 

I wouldn't since it literally costs a couple of pounds if that more than regular, plus you have the ability to do so, so why not do it?

 

I'm also 40 miles from Inverness, but to the north east, how about you?

[alpenwasser]

Thanks both of you, very helpful. I've contacted the seller asking for more details. One more question If I were to run ZFS would you consider it fine to run non ECC RAM, I've heard it can cause problems? Also @Eniqmatic what part of Scotland are you from, I'm about 40 miles outside inverness.

I would advise against it, and if you do run non-ECC RAM, disable scrubbing. If you

scrub your pool and get a data error in the RAM, if that error is in the filesystem

info, you could corrupt your entire pool, and it's almost impossible to recover from

that.

But as Eniqmatic has said, ECC RAM really isn't much more expensive, and since the

server has the capability to run it anyway, seems like a waste not to.

[Treboren]

I wouldn't since it literally costs a couple of pounds if that more than regular, plus you have the ability to do so, so why not do it?

 

I'm also 40 miles from Inverness, but to the north east, how about you?

east, south. They were laying fiber close to me, should be coming later this year

[Eniqmatic]

east, south. They were laying fiber close to me, should be coming later this year

Cool, we must be fairly close though!

[alpenwasser]

east, south. They were laying fiber close to me, should be coming later this year

Lucky bastard!

EDIT: No, no I'm not jealous at all...