Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Issues related to hardware problems
Post Reply
simon_lefisch
Posts: 92
Joined: 2017/07/12 21:02:02

Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Post by simon_lefisch » 2019/05/29 15:29:44

Hello everyone,

I have a Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo and am looking to enable the native (hardware) RAID for my OS drive (I will be adding a second SSD and mirroring my OS drive). I looked around and found something saying that board has fake-RAID, meaning I would need OS drivers as well in order to make it work. Is this really the case? Would there be any benefit in using this fake-RAID vs using software RAID in CentOS (mdadm)?

Obviously buying a RAID card would prob be best but want to get some info before making the decision to buy one or not. TIA :D
Hardware:
Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo
E5-2683v4 16-core CPU
112GB ECC RAM
2x 250GB SSD RAID1 (current CentOS 7 version)
2x 500GB SSD RAID1 (VM Disk Image Storage)
2x 4TB HDD RAID1 (Backup Storage via FreeNAS VM)
2X 6TB HDD RAID1 (Data Storage via FreeNAS VM)

ron7000
Posts: 162
Joined: 2019/01/15 20:00:28

Re: Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Post by ron7000 » 2019/05/29 17:07:33

https://www.supermicro.com/products/mot ... 0SRi-F.cfm

as for fake-raid not sure i would really say "fake". It does do RAID, maybe not as high performance as a dedicated RAID card on the pcie bus because it's being handled by the Intel C612 chipset... I guess that's what they mean by fake. But i don't think it would be any different than using any other motherboard (dell, hp, asrock, evga, etc) that support raid on the motherboard.

I found this:
https://support.siliconmechanics.com/po ... 12-chipset

I think the benefit of using your supermicro motherboard (hardware) raid would be better, and easier, than using software mdadm raid within centos, because it is hardware based and your N disks will simply show up as one to CentOS.

For your application, a single pc using 2 SSD's as RAID-0 I would use the supermicro RAID I doubt you would see any performance benefit or any other benefit if you were to use a full blown RAID pcie card.

if you haven't bough the x10sri-f mobo yet, here is the supermicro os compatibility list
https://www.supermicro.com/support/reso ... _list1.cfm
It only lists as high as centos 7.3 without a check, shows a check for centos 6.5, not sure if i would trust the accuracy of this list.

I would expect centos 7.6 to have the required drivers to interface with the C612 chipset and see your sata disks (as a raid)

simon_lefisch
Posts: 92
Joined: 2017/07/12 21:02:02

Re: Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Post by simon_lefisch » 2019/05/29 17:31:01

ron7000 wrote:
2019/05/29 17:07:33
https://www.supermicro.com/products/mot ... 0SRi-F.cfm

as for fake-raid not sure i would really say "fake". It does do RAID, maybe not as high performance as a dedicated RAID card on the pcie bus because it's being handled by the Intel C612 chipset... I guess that's what they mean by fake. But i don't think it would be any different than using any other motherboard (dell, hp, asrock, evga, etc) that support raid on the motherboard.

I found this:
https://support.siliconmechanics.com/po ... 12-chipset

I think the benefit of using your supermicro motherboard (hardware) raid would be better, and easier, than using software mdadm raid within centos, because it is hardware based and your N disks will simply show up as one to CentOS.

For your application, a single pc using 2 SSD's as RAID-0 I would use the supermicro RAID I doubt you would see any performance benefit or any other benefit if you were to use a full blown RAID pcie card.

if you haven't bough the x10sri-f mobo yet, here is the supermicro os compatibility list
https://www.supermicro.com/support/reso ... _list1.cfm
It only lists as high as centos 7.3 without a check, shows a check for centos 6.5, not sure if i would trust the accuracy of this list.

I would expect centos 7.6 to have the required drivers to interface with the C612 chipset and see your sata disks (as a raid)
Thanks for replying @ron7000. I already have the board and has been running the current of the OS just fine. Now I want to create a hardware RAID1 of my OS drives. I will take a look at those links and see if I can get it working. I do appreciate your help on this.

One more question tho, if I'm able to create the RAID volume, can I just clone to that volume using Clonezilla or would I have to reinstall the OS from scratch? I assume I'd be able to clone but not sure.
Hardware:
Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo
E5-2683v4 16-core CPU
112GB ECC RAM
2x 250GB SSD RAID1 (current CentOS 7 version)
2x 500GB SSD RAID1 (VM Disk Image Storage)
2x 4TB HDD RAID1 (Backup Storage via FreeNAS VM)
2X 6TB HDD RAID1 (Data Storage via FreeNAS VM)

User avatar
TrevorH
Site Admin
Posts: 33202
Joined: 2009/09/24 10:40:56
Location: Brighton, UK

Re: Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Post by TrevorH » 2019/05/29 17:32:00

Yes, that's FakeRAID. We do not recommend using FakeRAID at all. Use linux software RAID and avoid all the problems that come with FakeRAID.

As an example of FakeRAID problems, I've seen people post in this forum that they had a RAID disk on a FakeRAID setup and lost a disk. No problem, just replace it. Except that when they replaced it, it changed the name of the device from something like /dev/mapper/ddf_123478a to /dev/mapper/ddf_45612399 and rendered the system unbootable. That then meant that all the /etc/fstab entries referring to it were wrong and the system died on boot.

Either get a real hardware RAID card with CentOS support or use software RAID. Run away from FakeRAID as fast as you can.
The future appears to be RHEL or Debian. I think I'm going Debian.
Info for USB installs on http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/InstallFromUSBkey
CentOS 5 and 6 are deadest, do not use them.
Use the FAQ Luke

simon_lefisch
Posts: 92
Joined: 2017/07/12 21:02:02

Re: Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Post by simon_lefisch » 2019/05/29 17:36:35

TrevorH wrote:
2019/05/29 17:32:00
Yes, that's FakeRAID. We do not recommend using FakeRAID at all. Use linux software RAID and avoid all the problems that come with FakeRAID.

As an example of FakeRAID problems, I've seen people post in this forum that they had a RAID disk on a FakeRAID setup and lost a disk. No problem, just replace it. Except that when they replaced it, it changed the name of the device from something like /dev/mapper/ddf_123478a to /dev/mapper/ddf_45612399 and rendered the system unbootable. That then meant that all the /etc/fstab entries referring to it were wrong and the system died on boot.

Either get a real hardware RAID card with CentOS support or use software RAID. Run away from FakeRAID as fast as you can.
Ok, thanks @Trevor. I take your opinion with high regard so will look at a card. Any recommendations on one?
Hardware:
Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo
E5-2683v4 16-core CPU
112GB ECC RAM
2x 250GB SSD RAID1 (current CentOS 7 version)
2x 500GB SSD RAID1 (VM Disk Image Storage)
2x 4TB HDD RAID1 (Backup Storage via FreeNAS VM)
2X 6TB HDD RAID1 (Data Storage via FreeNAS VM)

User avatar
TrevorH
Site Admin
Posts: 33202
Joined: 2009/09/24 10:40:56
Location: Brighton, UK

Re: Hardware RAID on Supermicro X10SRi-F mobo

Post by TrevorH » 2019/05/29 23:13:29

All my kit has been either Dell or HP and I've never been sure if you can run their RAID controllers on a different machine. Mostly those are rebadged LSI or Adaptec controllers with different firmware.

Find out whether any candidate adapters have linux utilities before you buy. If they don't then you probably won't be able to determine the array status without rebooting which is not a great idea.
The future appears to be RHEL or Debian. I think I'm going Debian.
Info for USB installs on http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/InstallFromUSBkey
CentOS 5 and 6 are deadest, do not use them.
Use the FAQ Luke

Post Reply