Freenas 11-u4 and 9211-8i SAS card, updating firmware to IT mode?

[paddy-stone]

Hi, if anyone could tell me how to do the above from within freenas console preferably please?

 

I also couldn't find a firmware that said 9211-8i, only 9210-8i or much higher... I tried searching for this, but there is a LOT of information out there and most of it seemed to date from like 2012, so wasn't sure if it was relevant anymore even as freenas has moved on considerably since then.

The card is already installed in the server, and also the drives detected fine and the volume was found, seems to be operating normally apart from the read speeds seem slightly lower when backing up from it to my backup server. Getting approx 80-90MB/s instead of 100-112MB/s.

 

Would be greatful if anyone can help me here, I have some inkling of what I have to do through reading some of those posts, but didn't want to mess it up... I am planning on re-trying my ESXi setup with Freenas as a VM again, so need to know that it will pass the card through to freenas from ESXi. Thank you

 

These are what I have so far 

[dalekphalm]

4 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

Hi, if anyone could tell me how to do the above from within freenas console preferably please?

 

I also couldn't find a firmware that said 9211-8i, only 9210-8i or much higher... I tried searching for this, but there is a LOT of information out there and most of it seemed to date from like 2012, so wasn't sure if it was relevant anymore even as freenas has moved on considerably since then.

The card is already installed in the server, and also the drives detected fine and the volume was found, seems to be operating normally apart from the read speeds seem slightly lower when backing up from it to my backup server. Getting approx 80-90MB/s instead of 100-112MB/s.

 

Would be greatful if anyone can help me here, I have some inkling of what I have to do through reading some of those posts, but didn't want to mess it up... I am planning on re-trying my ESXi setup with Freenas as a VM again, so need to know that it will pass the card through to freenas from ESXi. Thank you

 

These are what I have so far 

It's unlikely that you're going to be able to easily flash the card while inside FreeNAS. Almost every guide I've ever read tells you to use the Firmware Update tool which is a bootable USB.

 

https://nguvu.org/freenas/Convert-LSI-HBA-card-to-IT-mode/

[paddy-stone]

52 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

It's unlikely that you're going to be able to easily flash the card while inside FreeNAS. Almost every guide I've ever read tells you to use the Firmware Update tool which is a bootable USB.

 

https://nguvu.org/freenas/Convert-LSI-HBA-card-to-IT-mode/

Thanks for the info, I will have a look through... just FYI though I know that freenas 11 now has the SAS2flsh tool on it, I can remember seeing it during my travels around the forums. From what I can remember of it, you just open the console and type sas2flsh with the commands... I'll link it if I can find it again, so at least it may help others if not myself.

I was more concerned with the disparity of not being able to find firmware that says 9211-8i, but I have found it now thanks to the guide you linked me to, so appreciate the help, thank you. I will have another skim through the pages I bookmarked the other day to see if it's more clear on how to flash from within freenas, and if I can't find a definitive answer I will just have to bugger about taking apart the server again to flash the card in windows... which I am trying to avoid if possible as it's a pain in the arse.

 

Anyway, thank you for your response, at least it gives me some more reading and knowledge of how to do it in windows, just more work for me to do is all, lol

 

[dalekphalm]

12 minutes ago, paddy-stone said:

Thanks for the info, I will have a look through... just FYI though I know that freenas 11 now has the SAS2flsh tool on it, I can remember seeing it during my travels around the forums. From what I can remember of it, you just open the console and type sas2flsh with the commands... I'll link it if I can find it again, so at least it may help others if not myself.

I was more concerned with the disparity of not being able to find firmware that says 9211-8i, but I have found it now thanks to the guide you linked me to, so appreciate the help, thank you. I will have another skim through the pages I bookmarked the other day to see if it's more clear on how to flash from within freenas, and if I can't find a definitive answer I will just have to bugger about taking apart the server again to flash the card in windows... which I am trying to avoid if possible as it's a pain in the arse.

 

Anyway, thank you for your response, at least it gives me some more reading and knowledge of how to do it in windows, just more work for me to do is all, lol

 

You don't need to flash it in Windows.

 

The guide I linked shows the flashing process. You can flash entirely through a bootable USB drive, which IMO is the better way to do it, even if FreeNAS has SAS2Flash in it now.

 

I'd personally feel more comfortable flashing it via a bootable OS rather than through my live production OS.

[paddy-stone]

4 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

You don't need to flash it in Windows.

 

The guide I linked shows the flashing process. You can flash entirely through a bootable USB drive, which IMO is the better way to do it, even if FreeNAS has SAS2Flash in it now.

 

I'd personally feel more comfortable flashing it via a bootable OS rather than through my live production OS.

Ahh I see, sorry I only glanced through it and misunderstood.. I apologize for that, will have a proper look through later. And yes, I would prefer to do it that way too, especially as I don't have to dismantle that way

 

Thank you again.

[Mikensan]

One more source just in case.

 

https://digitalcardboard.com/blog/2014/07/09/flashing-it-firmware-to-the-lsi-sas-9211-8i-hba-2014-efi-recipe/

 

Unfortunately the website I had bookmarked for downloads removed the page, but here it is on the wayback machine...

https://web.archive.org/web/20160304192032/http://www.avagotech.com/products/server-storage/host-bus-adapters/sas-9211-8i

 

Click downloads, and you should be able to download what you need.

[paddy-stone]

52 minutes ago, Mikensan said:

One more source just in case.

 

https://digitalcardboard.com/blog/2014/07/09/flashing-it-firmware-to-the-lsi-sas-9211-8i-hba-2014-efi-recipe/

 

Unfortunately the website I had bookmarked for downloads removed the page, but here it is on the wayback machine...

https://web.archive.org/web/20160304192032/http://www.avagotech.com/products/server-storage/host-bus-adapters/sas-9211-8i

 

Click downloads, and you should be able to download what you need.

Thank you for the information and trying to help. I don't need it now, but hopefully if anyone else is in the same situation, they might find it useful.

 

Just to clear this up a bit. I couldn't use the msdos boot USB method.. the commands would not work, specifically to do with win32 files or soemthing, sorry I didn't take more notice of the actual error, but I did research it and apparently it's a common error.

So instead I found a guide on flashing with efi, which was a LOT simpler IMO.. even though the guy that wrote it didn't seem to know how to phrase things properly in the guide, I had to re-read some of the steps several times and even then it didn't make sense how he tried to explain it... but I got there in the end and was much simpler overall.

Guide here  https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/how-to-flash-lsi-9211-8i-using-efi-shell.50902/

 

If anyone wants a simplified version with no extraneous language I would be happy to translate it

 

Anyway, so got it done, using efi shell is much simpler IMO, just need the files on a USB and enter the efi shell from within UEFI/BIOS, mine was in the BIOS/UEFI save menu, literally last option in the BIOS/UEFI... this was on a b250 motherboard BTW.

Just 2 commands to input, one to erase the firmware ready for the new firmware, and one to write the firmware into the memory. My card was already version 20 BTW, just NOT the IT firmware, but IIRC it doesn't make ANY difference to the steps needed. Just make sure you have the firmware version needed for the freenas build you are using, as they have to match up.

 

 

I know I moaned at the guy for the long winded way of doing/explaining things in some of it, but all credit to the guy, he did link directly to the files needed for the package needed, and took the time to write the guide.. so apologies for the critique, and really appreciate that the info was there for me to use.

Once I understood what he meant, it took all of 10-20 mins, with less confusion it would have taken 5 mins from start to finish to flash the new firmware.

 

Thanks to everyone for their input and trying to help me get this done. BTW you can do it directly in freenas, and can have the files needed to flash, minus the sas2flash file as you don't need it. Just need to enter the commands same as efi way IIRC, BUT I do agree now with what @dalekphalm said about not doing it that way. And the efi way takes very little time anyway.

[Mikensan]

On 2/9/2018 at 5:15 PM, paddy-stone said:

Thank you for the information and trying to help. I don't need it now, but hopefully if anyone else is in the same situation, they might find it useful.

 

Just to clear this up a bit. I couldn't use the msdos boot USB method.. the commands would not work, specifically to do with win32 files or soemthing, sorry I didn't take more notice of the actual error, but I did research it and apparently it's a common error.

So instead I found a guide on flashing with efi, which was a LOT simpler IMO.. even though the guy that wrote it didn't seem to know how to phrase things properly in the guide, I had to re-read some of the steps several times and even then it didn't make sense how he tried to explain it... but I got there in the end and was much simpler overall.

Guide here  https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/how-to-flash-lsi-9211-8i-using-efi-shell.50902/

 

If anyone wants a simplified version with no extraneous language I would be happy to translate it

 

Anyway, so got it done, using efi shell is much simpler IMO, just need the files on a USB and enter the efi shell from within UEFI/BIOS, mine was in the BIOS/UEFI save menu, literally last option in the BIOS/UEFI... this was on a b250 motherboard BTW.

Just 2 commands to input, one to erase the firmware ready for the new firmware, and one to write the firmware into the memory. My card was already version 20 BTW, just NOT the IT firmware, but IIRC it doesn't make ANY difference to the steps needed. Just make sure you have the firmware version needed for the freenas build you are using, as they have to match up.

 

 

I know I moaned at the guy for the long winded way of doing/explaining things in some of it, but all credit to the guy, he did link directly to the files needed for the package needed, and took the time to write the guide.. so apologies for the critique, and really appreciate that the info was there for me to use.

Once I understood what he meant, it took all of 10-20 mins, with less confusion it would have taken 5 mins from start to finish to flash the new firmware.

 

Thanks to everyone for their input and trying to help me get this done. BTW you can do it directly in freenas, and can have the files needed to flash, minus the sas2flash file as you don't need it. Just need to enter the commands same as efi way IIRC, BUT I do agree now with what @dalekphalm said about not doing it that way. And the efi way takes very little time anyway.

Glad you got it working! I think the guide I sent covers EFI and it's only 3 commands long as well, very simple. Whichever environment you can get into to run sas2flash works equally well. Ultimately all that matters is getting that bios on safely so you can rock on.

 

Keep us up to date on your build man, have fun!

[paddy-stone]

47 minutes ago, Mikensan said:

Glad you got it working! I think the guide I sent covers EFI and it's only 3 commands long as well, very simple. Whichever environment you can get into to run sas2flash works equally well. Ultimately all that matters is getting that bios on safely so you can rock on.

 

Keep us up to date on your build man, have fun!

Thank you, yeah I appreciate the help from everyone, I had an interesting read out of the links from everyone at least, kept me informed of a few things.

It shouldn't take long, it's pretty much just using ESXi as the hypervisor that's different for the time being. But thought I may as well do it, as at least I can then run some other VMs as well as freenas. I may as well get some use out of the other logical cores on the i7 that's in there. I wanted to explore pfsense anyway, but may have to hold off on that for now as I realised the board I am currently using only has 1 x16 slot, and that's being used by the LSI SAS card, so don't have room to put my quad NIC in there anymore

It's not a problem right now as I'm not needing more, but obviously I'll need it for pfsense.. I may have a play around with pfsense on my desktop first for testing, to see if I'll end up actually doing anything useful with it.. then if so I'll have to fork out for another board. I've seen a dual x16 board for £70 so that's not bad, just wish I'd forseen this when I bought the damn b250 board I have in there now, lol