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Bad SAS Backplane?

FAQBytes
By FAQBytes
in Servers, NAS, and Home Lab
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Alright, so I recently acquired a 2008 Cisco server from a pawn shop($215). If I remove the power to the SAS/SATA back plane, it boots just fine. A little loud, which will be dealt with, but it works just fine. 

 

However, if the back plane is attached, the front panel throws a failure warning led and emits this horrible beeping noise that is somehow louder than the PSU fans.

 

Observations:

Boots fine with and without.

The second row of hard drives show an orange LED, and will do the same no matter which hard drives are installed.

There is a very loud beeping, before post of about 3-4 beeps per second. Once the computer posts, it slows to about half that.

Removing all the hard drives does not change anything.

 

 

Specs (pertinent):

Chenbro RM31212 Chassis

AMCC 9550SX-12mi-i

Unknown back plane, but can find out if necessary.

 

Any help diagnosing the problem would be helpful.

 

Thanks in advance.

COMPUTER: Mobile Battlestation  |  CPU: INTEL I7-8700k |  Motherboard: Asus z370-i Strix Gaming  | GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 | Cooler: Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev. b |  PSU: Corsair SF600 | HDD: Samsung 860 evo 1tb

 

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probably fine, not sure tho might not be

I spent $2500 on building my PC and all i do with it is play no games atm & watch anime at 1080p(finally) watch YT and write essays...  nothing, it just sits there collecting dust...

Builds:

The Toaster Project! Northern Bee!

 

The original LAN PC build log! (Old, dead and replaced by The Toaster Project & 5.0)

Spoiler

"Here is some advice that might have gotten lost somewhere along the way in your life. 

 

#1. Treat others as you would like to be treated.

#2. It's best to keep your mouth shut; and appear to be stupid, rather than open it and remove all doubt.

#3. There is nothing "wrong" with being wrong. Learning from a mistake can be more valuable than not making one in the first place.

 

Follow these simple rules in life, and I promise you, things magically get easier. " - MageTank 31-10-2016

 

 

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10 hours ago, scottyseng said:

Hmm, maybe the hard drives are dead? What are you using to connect to the backplane? Raid Card? HBA? It sounds like you're angering some kind of RAID setup...

 

 

I will be doing more diagnostics today, didn't have enough time to do complete tests. I assume there is an issue with the array, but all the hard drives seem to work fine. It boots into Suse Linux just fine. I don't have the password, so I loaded my Ubuntu stick and it showed everything was Okay. (12 x 500GB Raid 5 with 1 hot spare showed a 5 TB volume.) I made a server 2008 R2 USB installer yesterday and I will install today and report back.

 

The card is a raid card. Model is specified in OP.

 

Thanks.

COMPUTER: Mobile Battlestation  |  CPU: INTEL I7-8700k |  Motherboard: Asus z370-i Strix Gaming  | GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 | Cooler: Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev. b |  PSU: Corsair SF600 | HDD: Samsung 860 evo 1tb

 

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53 minutes ago, FAQBytes said:

I will be doing more diagnostics today, didn't have enough time to do complete tests. I assume there is an issue with the array, but all the hard drives seem to work fine. It boots into Suse Linux just fine. I don't have the password, so I loaded my Ubuntu stick and it showed everything was Okay. (12 x 500GB Raid 5 with 1 hot spare showed a 5 TB volume.) I made a server 2008 R2 USB installer yesterday and I will install today and report back.

 

The card is a raid card. Model is specified in OP.

 

Thanks.

Oh, I didn't register that model as a 3Ware RAID card, sorry. Geez, that model is really old. PCI-X...I kind of wonder how old the hard drives are now...

 

I can see why the system was cheap for you.

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33 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Oh, I didn't register that model as a 3Ware RAID card, sorry. Geez, that model is really old. PCI-X...I kind of wonder how old the hard drives are now...

 

I can see why the system was cheap for you.

The board is a 2004 SuperMicro board, but everything else was made in 2008. The system was hardly used. I think there was less than 150 hours logged. It was rediculously clean when I took it apart.

COMPUTER: Mobile Battlestation  |  CPU: INTEL I7-8700k |  Motherboard: Asus z370-i Strix Gaming  | GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 | Cooler: Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev. b |  PSU: Corsair SF600 | HDD: Samsung 860 evo 1tb

 

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5 hours ago, scottyseng said:

Oh, I didn't register that model as a 3Ware RAID card, sorry. Geez, that model is really old. PCI-X...I kind of wonder how old the hard drives are now...

 

I can see why the system was cheap for you.

Whelp, went into the 3ware BIOS, and saw that there was a small issue that needed resolved. It was so small that I can't even remember what was wrong. Everything is working dandy now. Question now is to choose between raid 0, 5, 10, and 50.

COMPUTER: Mobile Battlestation  |  CPU: INTEL I7-8700k |  Motherboard: Asus z370-i Strix Gaming  | GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 | Cooler: Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev. b |  PSU: Corsair SF600 | HDD: Samsung 860 evo 1tb

 

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5 hours ago, FAQBytes said:

The board is a 2004 SuperMicro board, but everything else was made in 2008. The system was hardly used. I think there was less than 150 hours logged. It was rediculously clean when I took it apart.

Great to hear. Yeah, the RAID level choice is a very personal thing. Wow, that RAID card doesn't support RAID6 though?

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1 minute ago, scottyseng said:

Great to hear. Yeah, the RAID level choice is a very personal thing. Wow, that RAID card doesn't support RAID6 though?

While it doesn't support raid 6, it does support RAID 5 and supports hot spare functionality, so it basically will do the same thing. It's preferred to me when doing multiple Raid 5 setups (See 50/51, etc) as the hot spare can take the place of any failed drive. I know some people don't like hot-spare tech, but it'll be fine for what I'd use it for.

COMPUTER: Mobile Battlestation  |  CPU: INTEL I7-8700k |  Motherboard: Asus z370-i Strix Gaming  | GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW ACX 3.0 | Cooler: Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev. b |  PSU: Corsair SF600 | HDD: Samsung 860 evo 1tb

 

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