I didn't give up - PowerEdge 1900

S

Silvers24

Gawd
Joined
Oct 11, 2007
Messages
514
The raid 5/i is the most annoying pci-e card i've EVER dealt with.

What in gods green dying earth does this POS use for RAM?

The only thing that has worked thus far is a 256MB DDR2 3200R and this has MultiBit ECC errors. Then if it does work, it hangs, when loading.
(I have gotten a OS installed and loaded, but then it just stops working and hangs.)
I have tried so many different rams it is annoying, just now I tried 1GB 3200R, and 2 different 2GB sticks.

I know, I can bypass this shit and use the sata connections, and honestly I might, but I have three NAS drives that isn't designed for sata. Which is annoying.
Unless someone knows how I can use them with regular sata. LMK thanks.



And I have no clue where a thread likes this goes honestly anyways, ive never discuess computer server hardware before.
 
I have a 1900 tower and parts. Ram too. I can look at the ram.
 
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If you guys give me about a half hour, i'll be able to get pictures uploaded. I have pics of the parts, and epsecially of the raid controller.
Thank you guys so much. I'll have that posted when I can.
 
Raid5_i.jpg
raid5_iback.jpg
 
everything i can find shows it with a single sided 256MB stick but i cant find any info about it...
 
Oh you need RAM for THAT? Jesus...I think my 1900 is using the onboard RAID controller. Why not just buy one of those off of ebay with the RAM already installed?
 
THUMPer said:
Oh you need RAM for THAT? Jesus...I think my 1900 is using the onboard RAID controller. Why not just buy one of those off of ebay with the RAM already installed?
Click to expand...
thats what i was about to suggest. theyre only like $20. still cant find anything about the ram stick other than "DDR2" 256MB and single sided. no pics/info of just the ram.
 
Yeah in the end I don't know.
Ill search ebay either for ram or for a perc 5, i will see. It is very annoying ha.
Anyways, thanks for the find. I can't find what dell considers qualified, so I am hoping I stick within the specs I should be good. And that is 3200R?
 
I see, so it is safe to use different raid cards. Makes sense, still new to the hardware of servers. So i am trying to learn as much as I can.
Does that card need a battery? Because this raid one does, and the battery is on its last leg. Most likely why it was given away (Along with the ddr2 failing in it, as when I first got it, it had a 4gb regular ddr2 kingston stick in the perc5 controller.)
 
HBA and raid cards are just a PCIE cards at the end of the day so as long as you have the slot and bandwidth available you can toss whatever into it.
Since its Dell I'd stick with a Dell part they're often cheaper than the branded LSI equivalent, but not required either.

Batteries are not required, but the server will complain if its not installed and you risk data corruption or loss should you suffer a power outage while data is being written.

I use Dell H310s for my raid and HBA needs.
 
itll be in a place where it wont matter how big, loud or hot it is.
But it will handle live security feeds and other stuff if I get the raid to work. (plus other stuff but this first and formost)
Honestly, for what I use it for, I may not even care for raid. Not really sure. hah
 
The PERC 5/i can actually use up to 512MB RAM. How do I know? Because I did this a few years ago.

It will even work just fine with a 1GB stick, but it only reports 512MB even though the throughput is slightly higher with the 1GB stick compared to a 512MB stick.

See here for RAM requirements:
https://www.overclock.net/forum/320...59025-perc-5-i-raid-card-tips-benchmarks.html

You can also flash it with the LSI MegaRAID SAS 8480E BIOS.

See here:
https://hardforum.com/threads/how-to-turn-perc-5-i-into-sas-hba.1719111/
 
i figured sooner or later someone around here would find/provide more info
 
Speaking of, also thank you all for this info.
What is the SMBus pin 5+6 trick? I wonder if this would help?
I also notice, that this was or is supposed to have HS/F?
Would flashing the LSi bios be better? It sounds like it?
Although, me trying to flash anything on this may be tricky without a stable ram stick. LOL
 
These cards were meant to be in a server with a good amount of forced air flow. I added an 80mm fan mounted above the card blowing down onto the motherboard. A modified slot cover works great for mounting a fan.

I would either remove the RAM before flashing or get a compatible stick of RAM before trying to flash it.

I never did anything with the pin 5+6 thing.
 
So, I just did the 5+6 pin trick thing.
And I stuck my original stick of ram in this machine, the only one that has ever worked, but still would hang/cause issues.
Covering those pins up, and booted up the system, created the raid with the three NAS drives I have....
Saved it all, was not expecting anything.

Then it actually passed the logical drives and loaded!
WTF?'
This might be a fluke....but i'll test it for a while and report back. First I have to check if ProxMox reads the drives, and if it does. Then see if it causes issues still.
If not....then it was the damn pin trick this entire time. O_O
 
Unless someone has a better explanation as to why this works...
So far all is good. After all the rams i've tried, it was a pin thing issue.

Weird.jpg


I wouldn't of gotten this far if not for the help from you all so thank you all! :D

Well only for ZFS to not work with raid controllers. hah.
 
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