[NEWS] Chenboro SAS2 6G Expander Board

D

DJ_Datte

Weaksauce
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Hey all.

I hope this isn't old news that I completely missed ;)

After seeing the part @ CEBIT, and being unsure if I had imagined it a few days later, I mailed Chenboro, asking for confirmation.

Here is their reply I just received:

Dears,

The latest 6G version CK23601 will be launched on Q2/2011.


Philippe / Technical Support Dept.

Chenbro Europe B.V.
[email protected]
www.chenbro.eu


________________________________________
From: XX
Sent: 3/8/2011 [星期二] 1:23 下午
To: Technical Support
Subject: Chenboro SAS2 Expander Info
Hello!

I am wondering if Chenboro has a SAS2 / 6G expander in the works to replace the old CK13601 or similar cards ?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

I am pretty happy about these news, if it's competitively priced, and uses the same LSI SAS2X36 that is used in all SuperMicro chassis, it will be a end to the compatibility issues we've been having with SAS expanders at a reasonable price, and those cards can be powered without a slot to stick them in, as opposed to the HP expander.

//
 
I have a Chenbro CK23601. It's working beautifully with a Supermicro AOC-USAS2-L8i running 24 drives. The L8i is flashed with LSI's latest BIOS and Supermicro's latest IT firmware. OS is Solaris Express 11.
 
Wow, I only see them for sale in the asian country ?!?! ^^ price and where you got it would be awesome!
 
This would be awesome for my build - when I expand to 20 disks from 10. Anyone know what they are going for? The micro ITX board I'm using never had space for the HP SAS expander.
 
Was sourced direct from Chenbro in Taiwan by the authorised Chenbro dealer here in Australia. I couldn't find one at a reasonable price online. (Could only find European and Japanese sources and those were extremely expensive.)

I had been looking for Chenbro expanders for my home server for some time and had decided to wait until the 23601 was available, or at least until I knew how much it would cost. I then planned to make a final decision to get one or go back to trying to find a 13601.

Then I discovered an R&D project at my work that was trying to source a SAS expander so jumped at the chance to get myself involved. They only needed one for a week or so and now they're done with it and I've been able to buy it. Work took off the shipping and tax and I convinced to project manager to knock off another 15% 'cos it's "used". I've ended up with the card for <AU$300.

I'd imagine a reaonable premium was paid going through an authorised dealer who really only sells complete solutions. To get an idea how much these cards are likely to end up costing, consider that the quoted price for the CK23601 was around AU$55 more than the CK13601.

From the dealer's query, stock levels at Chenbro, as of 3 weeks ago were "have only few in stock" for all expander models. They've got a big show coming up at the end of the month so I'm guessing a full product launch then with stock suddenly appearing everywhere.
 
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If my math is right, that would put it at about $310 USD once it is out.
It looks like I'm not the only one who has been waiting for this card to finally come out. That intel card just doesn't have enough ports for the Norco 4224 and the HP card just doesn't work with so many sweet raid cards.
 
grogthegreat said:
If my math is right, that would put it at about $310 USD once it is out.
It looks like I'm not the only one who has been waiting for this card to finally come out. That intel card just doesn't have enough ports for the Norco 4224 and the HP card just doesn't work with so many sweet raid cards.
Click to expand...

If it get that close to $300, I already know i am buying it just to make my server last another 6-12 months. :D
 
Looks like this card just showed up on Provantage's website for $314.04. Looks like my guess of $310 was pretty close.
ttp://www.provantage.com/chenbro-micom-ck23601~4CHEN11K.htm

Is there any way of knowing if this would work with a LSI 9260 or 9265 without just buying it and trying? If this works with most of the popular raid cards than this is by far the best SAS expander on the market.
 
MacMall has it as well ($365 w/ free shipping). I shot an email to NewEgg to see if they plan on carrying it.
 
Well I just ordered the card. I plan on using it with a LSI 9260-4i so I will report here how well it works.
 
grogthegreat said:
Looks like this card just showed up on Provantage's website for $314.04. Looks like my guess of $310 was pretty close.
ttp://www.provantage.com/chenbro-micom-ck23601~4CHEN11K.htm

Is there any way of knowing if this would work with a LSI 9260 or 9265 without just buying it and trying? If this works with most of the popular raid cards than this is by far the best SAS expander on the market.
Click to expand...

Well I'll venture to guess that my order for a gen 1 card will probably be changed to this. I just hope the new card is backwards compatible with the old cards since I'm planning on daisy chaining them.
 
Any updates from someone who purchased the expander? Working well? Interested in this card.
 
ugly said:
Any updates from someone who purchased the expander? Working well? Interested in this card.
Click to expand...
I got a CK23601 36port one. connected it to the 1880i and connected some random old drives. The raid controller didnt fret and the drives showed up just fine. I havent tried newer drives, but i cant see why they wouldnt work.
 
Can someone who already has this comment on whether or not the ports are hard-configured or can they be setup for input/output however you like?

Chenbro's product page lists:

Internal: 1x SFF-8087(IN), 6x SFF-8087(to Backplane)
External: 1x SFF-8088(IN), 1x SFF-8088(OUT)

I'm curious if that is a default configuration or the only configuration possible. I think it would be more convenient to dual-link the SFF-8088 external ports between the HBA and SAS expander.

Something along the lines of:
[CK23601 External 1] <-- SFF-8088 to SFF-8088 SAS cable --> [AOC-USAS2-L8I External 1]
[CK23601 External 2] <-- SFF-8088 to SFF-8088 SAS cable --> [AOC-USAS2-L8I External 2]
[CK23601 Internal 1] <-- SFF-8087 to SFF-8087 SAS cable --> [Norco 4224 Backplane 1]
[CK23601 Internal 2] <-- SFF-8087 to SFF-8087 SAS cable --> [Norco 4224 Backplane 2]
[CK23601 Internal 3] <-- SFF-8087 to SFF-8087 SAS cable --> [Norco 4224 Backplane 3]
[CK23601 Internal 4] <-- SFF-8087 to SFF-8087 SAS cable --> [Norco 4224 Backplane 4]
[CK23601 Internal 5] <-- SFF-8087 to SFF-8087 SAS cable --> [Norco 4224 Backplane 5]
[CK23601 Internal 6] <-- SFF-8087 to SFF-8087 SAS cable --> [Norco 4224 Backplane 6]
[CK23601 Internal 7] -- Empty.
 
Im nitpicking here, but only one of the external 8088s is an out port. The second out port is internal and 8087.

I'd test but i dont have a 8088 cable. Have you contacted chenbro about dual linking?

(Is 24gbit not enough?)
 
kennypowers said:
I'd test but i dont have a 8088 cable. Have you contacted chenbro about dual linking?

(Is 24gbit not enough?)
Click to expand...
24gbit sounds about right for the performance of my current drives, but as they get replaced with better tech (SSD's) then I think it will start to bottleneck with all 24 drives going at once. I'm lacking real experience here so this is all theory crafting, but I figured it would be nice to have the dual linking working if the hardware supported it. Chenbro basically said that it was dependent upon the raid card and the backplane hardware. Supermicro said their cards support it:

me: "Do any of the UIO SAS RAID (HBA) Cards support Dual Linking with a SAS Expander? I am specifically considerering the AOC-USAS2-L8i and AOC-USAS2-L8E."

them: "If you are referring to dual paths, yes you can choose those backplanes with 2 expanders, which you can connect 2 paths, for example 836E2, 846E2&#8230;etc. And those cards with 2 internal connectors, you can connect 2 cables to 2 connectors for each expander on backplane."

kennypowers said:
Im nitpicking here, but only one of the external 8088s is an out port. The second out port is internal and 8087.
Click to expand...
I was really hoping it would function more like the HP expander, where the SAS ports work like a network switch and you can plug your IN's and OUT's wherever you want -- not just the way they are labeled. Anyhow, I just got off the phone with Chenbro and they said the ports would have to be used in the direction designated so I guess even if it was supported, trying to dual-link the two IN's is not very practical because you'd have to connect to an internal and external OUT from your HBA/RAID (or deal with adapters).
 
So my new CK23601 SAS expander arrived in the mail today!
I can confirm that the expander works without any issues with the 9260-4i
I currently have the 8087 internal 'in' port connected to the 9260-4i and one of the 8087 internal ports to four 500GB sata drives using a SATA breakout cable. I already had a raid5 configuration on the raid card before suddenly adding the sas expander in the middle. The raid card didn't even seem to notice and the computer booted normally.

I will be testing to see if the 8087 'in' port can be used as an 'out' port and I will also see if any of the 'out' ports can be used as an 'in'. I am unable to test the two 8088 ports as my raid card doesn't have an 8088 port on it plus I don't own a 8088 cable.

Some info about the card that isn't obvious from the chenbro site: The card has four LEDs on it. One tells you if the card passed its initialization, failed, or has no power. One tells you if the 'out' 8088 port is in use, not in use, or disconnected. Another one does the same thing but for the 'in' 8088 port. The last one gives you same info but for the 'in' 8087 port.

That is it for now. I'll update after more testing.
 
Any documentation with regards to a LED status header? There's some talk in the norco thread about possibly getting the LED fault indicator to work with the right cables and cards.
 
agheno: The only documentation that came with the card is a 'quick start guide' so I don't have much to go on. I'm not sure if this relates to a LED status header but there is a I2C connector labeled CN1 which the quick start guide says is for 'function for environment monitoring'. It is a 4 pin white connector near the top left of the card.


At this point I can confirm that any of the 'out' ports can be used as an 'in' connection to the raid card. I'll be checking next if the 'in' 8087 port can be used as an out. One thing that I can not check is if SATA3 drives are seen and work at proper 6Gbps speed since I don't yet have any 6Gbps drives. This is one of the major faults of the HP sas expander and I plan on testing this once I get some new drives.
 
Hmm UEK2-13601 seems like a real easy to make an expander enclosure.

I wonder when the UEK version for this card will be released
 
grogthegreat said:
agheno: The only documentation that came with the card is a 'quick start guide' so I don't have much to go on. I'm not sure if this relates to a LED status header but there is a I2C connector labeled CN1 which the quick start guide says is for 'function for environment monitoring'. It is a 4 pin white connector near the top left of the card.


At this point I can confirm that any of the 'out' ports can be used as an 'in' connection to the raid card. I'll be checking next if the 'in' 8087 port can be used as an out. One thing that I can not check is if SATA3 drives are seen and work at proper 6Gbps speed since I don't yet have any 6Gbps drives. This is one of the major faults of the HP sas expander and I plan on testing this once I get some new drives.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the update Grog. It's good news that the port assignments are flexible! I'll be suprised if the 6Gbps doesn't work since I believe that is the main difference between the CK23601 and the previous CK13601.

jonnyjl: You can also go the DIY route using some of the parts from HWTools (example: http://www.hwtools.net/PDF/SWEX_brief.pdf) to supply the on/off switch in your external enclosure and power the card.
 
I will be doing more testing latter on today but a quick word of warning to anyone who has ordered the card: The card does have a fan installed on the heatsink in the middle of the card. This card under load produces a lot of heat. The small fan just isn't enough all by itself if there is little or no airflow over the card. The area of the case where I have this card installed has very little airflow and it places the sas expander very close to the raid card. I ended up needing to install an additional fan in that area to supply the expander's fan with fresh cool air.
This won't be an issue for most people out there as a card like this is supposed to be installed in a good server case which obviously has good airflow but in water cooled case like mine with the side panel off it can become a problem.
 
agheno said:
jonnyjl: You can also go the DIY route using some of the parts from HWTools (example: http://www.hwtools.net/PDF/SWEX_brief.pdf) to supply the on/off switch in your external enclosure and power the card.
Click to expand...
I've seen a few DIY options, just at this point in time, I'd really like something simple that I can buy especially when its going to be pretty much the same in price. Sigh... too busy.

The current UEK looks to be had pretty cheaply, I'm just wondering if there's issues with the current MPT drivers in OS/OI.

I do have to expand out soon... I've been sitting around 5TB free space for months and its bugging the living be-jesus out of me.
 
jonnyjl said:
I do have to expand out soon... I've been sitting around 5TB free space for months and its bugging the living be-jesus out of me.
Click to expand...

I've been sitting at less than 10GB of free space for months while I waited for this card to come out!

A quick little update: The sas expander works just fine with the Norco 4224 backplanes. I have tested regular 7200RPM SATA2 drives as well as 15K rpm SAS 3Gbps drives. Amazon is have a sale on the Hitachi 3TB 5400RPM 6Gbps drives for only $107 w/ free shipping so I just ordered 6. Once those get in I can confirm that 6Gbps sata drives work well with this card.

I did take the heatsink/fan combo off in order to get a look at the actual chip. Mine says the following:
LSI *
500001430
LSISAS2X36
1036 e1
APM36002
TAIWAN
ARM FUSION-MPT

While most of that doesn't mean much to me, it is nice to confirm that this card is using the LSISAS2X36 chip that Chenbro advertises.

For those of interested in that 4 pin I2C connector on the card; there is a small labeling describing what each pin is.
Pin1: SDA
Pin2: GND
Pin3: SCL
Pin4: 5V

Hope this info is useful to some people.
 
Sorry for the double post but the following info isn't on Chenbro's site and is probably important to people wondering if this card will fit in their case:

The card doesn't use the slot it goes in for anything so it seems the clever Chenbro engineers designed this card to fit into PCI-E 16x slots as well as regular PCI slots. This gives me more placement flexibility than I was originally expecting.

This card is very long. It also places four SAS connectors on the back of the card and most 8087 mini sas cables don't like to make sharp 90 degree bends right at the connector. This means that the total length required to fit this card in your case is right about 10.5 inches. This will change slightly depending on how flexible your sas cables are. This makes the sas expander almost as long as my GTX260 video card and means that if you have a small case, please measure first!

Again sorry for the double post but I felt that both of these points may make or break the card for some people so I wanted to bump this thread back up to the top.

EDIT: I didn't want to do triple post so I guess I'll put this info here: The SAS expander is now in my norco 4224 case. So far I have tested it with four 15k rpm 3Gbps SAS drives and it works great. I have also tested it with six SATA3 3TB drives (Hitachi 5k3000) and am glad to report that the sas expander works at 6Gbps for SATA drives. I have it hooked up where each drive it on its own backplane so that each 8087 port on the expander is in use. Those 6 drives in RAID0 |(128KB strip) got me 793.4MBps read and 719MBps write in ATTO at 8192 file size. Total length set to double 9260-4i cache.
 
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Did you ever get a chance to test the SFF-8088 external ports to see if they function interchangeably as in/out ports? Also any chance to test dual-linking?

It's confirmed that any of the internal SFF-8087 "in" ports can function as an "out" port and vice versa, correct?

I'm about to order the dual sff-8087 to sff-8088 bracket to make an external norco das, and i want to know if i'm up for some disappointment if I can't get dual linking working via 2 external sff-8088 cables.
 
Lerdsu:
Sorry but I am unable to test the 8088 ports. Provantage did accidentally ship me two of these expanders but I didn't have any 8088 cables on hand to test with. My 9260-4i doesn't have a 8088 port either. Also because of my 9260-4i, I can't test dual linking since my raid card has only one 8087 port. Unless you are hooking up a good number of SSDs, you shouldn't need to dual link.
Yes I was able to confirm that any 'in' port could be an out port and vice versa.

MarkL:
The drive you linked to is the OEM version. The ones on sale were the full retail version. They arrived in the mail in their original retail box and even included HDD screws. It was an epic sale and 6 was all that I could afford. I had been planning on 2TB drives but at $107 they were just about the same GB/$ ratio as $70 2TB drives but meant that I'd leave more HDD trays open in the Norco4224 for future expansion.
 
I was able to test the dual linking external sff-8088 ports and it appears to be working. Don't know where in the Areca GUI I can check but the drives initialized fine and the RAID-6 array appears to be normal.

I used the SFF-8087 to SFF-8088 adapters to turn the two internal connectors on the ARC-1880i into external connectors and dual linked them into a Norco 4220 Chassis with 9x3TB Hitachi 5k3000 drives.
 
FYI - My supplier has said the UEK-23061 has an ETA on release of mid-September..
 
MarkL said:
FYI - My supplier has said the UEK-23061 has an ETA on release of mid-September..
Click to expand...

Same situation here, I ordered at the beginning of August and the ETA has been pushed back three times, now 12th September. And I have a feeling it's going to be pushed back again :(
 
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