Considering new SATA PCIe card

Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Alex]

Hi, I have a fedora33 server with an E31240 @ 3.30GHz processor with
32GB that I'm using as a backup server with 4x4TB 7200 SATA disks in
RAID5 and 2x480GB SSDs in RAID1 for root. The motherboard has two
SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.

Would there really be any benefit to purchasing a new controller such
as this for it instead of the onboard for the 4x4TB disks?
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ST9CPND/

The server is relatively responsive, but I was just wondering if I
could keep it running for a few more years with a faster SATA
controller.

I'm also curious if the SATA cables have improved over time, or are
the same cables I purchased five years ago just as good today?

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Ram Ramesh]

On 11/24/20 8:20 PM, Alex wrote:
> Hi, I have a fedora33 server with an E31240 @ 3.30GHz processor with
> 32GB that I'm using as a backup server with 4x4TB 7200 SATA disks in
> RAID5 and 2x480GB SSDs in RAID1 for root. The motherboard has two
> SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.
>
> Would there really be any benefit to purchasing a new controller such
> as this for it instead of the onboard for the 4x4TB disks?
> https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ST9CPND/
>
> The server is relatively responsive, but I was just wondering if I
> could keep it running for a few more years with a faster SATA
> controller.
>
> I'm also curious if the SATA cables have improved over time, or are
> the same cables I purchased five years ago just as good today?
If plan to use addon cards, please consider LSI SAS9211-8i cards. Well 
supported and reliable.

Ramesh

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Alex]

Hi,

On Tue, Nov 24, 2020 at 9:47 PM Ram Ramesh <rramesh2400@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/24/20 8:20 PM, Alex wrote:
> > Hi, I have a fedora33 server with an E31240 @ 3.30GHz processor with
> > 32GB that I'm using as a backup server with 4x4TB 7200 SATA disks in
> > RAID5 and 2x480GB SSDs in RAID1 for root. The motherboard has two
> > SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.
> >
> > Would there really be any benefit to purchasing a new controller such
> > as this for it instead of the onboard for the 4x4TB disks?
> > https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ST9CPND/
> >
> > The server is relatively responsive, but I was just wondering if I
> > could keep it running for a few more years with a faster SATA
> > controller.
> >
> > I'm also curious if the SATA cables have improved over time, or are
> > the same cables I purchased five years ago just as good today?
> If plan to use addon cards, please consider LSI SAS9211-8i cards. Well
> supported and reliable.

Oh yes, how quickly I forgot. I actually have one of these in another
server, but I think it's too long to physically fit in the case. Just
to be sure, this is the card you're referencing, right?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/LSI-SAS-9211-8i-8-port-6G-IT-Raid-Card-ZFS-JBOD-HBA-SAS-SATA6-0-2008-8I/143735992677

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Ram Ramesh]

On 11/24/20 9:14 PM, Alex wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Tue, Nov 24, 2020 at 9:47 PM Ram Ramesh <rramesh2400@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 11/24/20 8:20 PM, Alex wrote:
>>> Hi, I have a fedora33 server with an E31240 @ 3.30GHz processor with
>>> 32GB that I'm using as a backup server with 4x4TB 7200 SATA disks in
>>> RAID5 and 2x480GB SSDs in RAID1 for root. The motherboard has two
>>> SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.
>>>
>>> Would there really be any benefit to purchasing a new controller such
>>> as this for it instead of the onboard for the 4x4TB disks?
>>> https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07ST9CPND/
>>>
>>> The server is relatively responsive, but I was just wondering if I
>>> could keep it running for a few more years with a faster SATA
>>> controller.
>>>
>>> I'm also curious if the SATA cables have improved over time, or are
>>> the same cables I purchased five years ago just as good today?
>> If plan to use addon cards, please consider LSI SAS9211-8i cards. Well
>> supported and reliable.
> Oh yes, how quickly I forgot. I actually have one of these in another
> server, but I think it's too long to physically fit in the case. Just
> to be sure, this is the card you're referencing, right?
>
> https://www.ebay.com/itm/LSI-SAS-9211-8i-8-port-6G-IT-Raid-Card-ZFS-JBOD-HBA-SAS-SATA6-0-2008-8I/143735992677
Yes. Any one of those that mentions this controller and preferably IT 
(just HBA) firmware instead of IR (Raid) firmware as your raid will be 
implemented as SW mdraid over JBOD.

Regards
Ramesh

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Alex]

Hi,

> >> If plan to use addon cards, please consider LSI SAS9211-8i cards. Well
> >> supported and reliable.
> > Oh yes, how quickly I forgot. I actually have one of these in another
> > server, but I think it's too long to physically fit in the case. Just
> > to be sure, this is the card you're referencing, right?
> >
> > https://www.ebay.com/itm/LSI-SAS-9211-8i-8-port-6G-IT-Raid-Card-ZFS-JBOD-HBA-SAS-SATA6-0-2008-8I/143735992677
> Yes. Any one of those that mentions this controller and preferably IT
> (just HBA) firmware instead of IR (Raid) firmware as your raid will be
> implemented as SW mdraid over JBOD.

Thanks so much for your help. Are there other similar LSI cards that
are also well supported?

This looks like a 4-port version of the same card that would certainly fit.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-H1110-81Y4494-SAS-2-6Gbps-HBA-LSI-9211-4i-P20-IT-Mode-for-ZFS-FreeNAS-unRAID/143488380023

And here's a 1GB cache version?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/LSI-MegaRaid-SAS-9270CV-8i-1G-Cache-PCI3-0-6Gb-s-Raid-Card-SAS-Controller/143780173461

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Ram Ramesh]

On 11/24/20 9:28 PM, Alex wrote:
> Hi,
>
>>>> If plan to use addon cards, please consider LSI SAS9211-8i cards. Well
>>>> supported and reliable.
>>> Oh yes, how quickly I forgot. I actually have one of these in another
>>> server, but I think it's too long to physically fit in the case. Just
>>> to be sure, this is the card you're referencing, right?
>>>
>>> https://www.ebay.com/itm/LSI-SAS-9211-8i-8-port-6G-IT-Raid-Card-ZFS-JBOD-HBA-SAS-SATA6-0-2008-8I/143735992677
>> Yes. Any one of those that mentions this controller and preferably IT
>> (just HBA) firmware instead of IR (Raid) firmware as your raid will be
>> implemented as SW mdraid over JBOD.
> Thanks so much for your help. Are there other similar LSI cards that
> are also well supported?
>
> This looks like a 4-port version of the same card that would certainly fit.
> https://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-H1110-81Y4494-SAS-2-6Gbps-HBA-LSI-9211-4i-P20-IT-Mode-for-ZFS-FreeNAS-unRAID/143488380023
>
> And here's a 1GB cache version?
> https://www.ebay.com/itm/LSI-MegaRaid-SAS-9270CV-8i-1G-Cache-PCI3-0-6Gb-s-Raid-Card-SAS-Controller/143780173461

I am not an expert by any means. I have purchased just one 9211 card and 
it is working well so far. Yes, there are several. I think PCIe version 
may be newer with higher numbered cards, but not sure. In any case, 
vanilla simple 9211 will be more than enough for spinning disks.

I could not figure out if the cache version you list above is meant to 
do HW raid. I was told by those knowledgeable here that HBA or JBOD 
cards are more suitable for mdraid.

Like others have said, this is unlikely to speed up your disk access as 
spinning disks are too slow compared to PCIe/SATA line/cable rates. Buy 
RAM/SSD or do something more fancy  like bcache/lvm cache, if 
performance is a real need vs. feel good state.

Regards
Ramesh

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Mateusz]

On środa, 25 listopada 2020 03:20:20 CET Alex wrote:
> (...) server with 4x4TB 7200 SATA disks in
> RAID5 (...)  motherboard has two
> SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.
> 
> Would there really be any benefit to purchasing a new controller such
> as this for it instead of the onboard for the 4x4TB disks?

I doubt it, unless your MB HW/driver is broken, as usual max transfer rate of 
7200 HDD is  around 150MB  and SATA 2.0 ( 3 Gbit/s ) limit is 300MB
Check current HW performance by sth like:
iostat -x 3 -m
and verify if you are close to expected HDD values under real load/test 
stress.

> I'm also curious if the SATA cables have improved over time, or are
> the same cables I purchased five years ago just as good today?

If controller works in SATA-300 mode on all ports already, you will not get 
any benefit from newer (SATA-600) cables neither.

Regards,

-- 
Mateusz 
(...) mam brata - poważny, domator, liczykrupa, hipokryta, pobożniś,
	krótko mówiąc - podpora społeczeństwa."
		Nikos Kazantzakis - "Grek Zorba"

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Tim Small]

On 25/11/2020 02:20, Alex wrote:
>  I was just wondering if I
> could keep it running for a few more years with a faster SATA
> controller.


You don't say what the onboard controllers are, but in general, I
wouldn't expect any significant difference in throughput when using a
PCIe SATA add-in card vs. the onboard AHCI controller(s), except perhaps
when changing go a solution which uses battery-backed write cache
(depending on the workload).

If you need more I/O throughput from hard disk drives, then you might
want to look at something like bcache (especially if the alternative is
relying on the correct behaviour from proprietary raid implementations).

HTH,

Tim.

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Phillip Susi]

Alex writes:

> RAID5 and 2x480GB SSDs in RAID1 for root. The motherboard has two
> SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.

There is no SATA-6.  There are 3 generations of SATA.  SATA-3 operates
at 6 Gbps.

Re: Considering new SATA PCIe card

[Alex]

Hi,

> > RAID5 and 2x480GB SSDs in RAID1 for root. The motherboard has two
> > SATA-6 ports on it and the others are SATA3.
>
> There is no SATA-6.  There are 3 generations of SATA.  SATA-3 operates
> at 6 Gbps.

Thanks everyone for all of your help. Also, I did mean to say ports
and not controllers.

I always just assumed the onboard controllers were very basic.