IBM M1015 controller (LSI 92xx-8i)

[tived]

Hi guys,

I have just bought two of these controllers which are the IBM M1015, but on them is also written LSI SAS9220-81 and LS2-SAS9240-8i (B) for only AUD$60 each plus posting from the UK. I bargain - if I can get them to work :-)

Looking at the 9240-8i on the LSI web-site, they look similar
http://www.lsi.com/storage_home/prod...-8i/index.html

The IBM M1015
http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstract...054.html#m1015

Ok, I have the EVGA SR-2 mainboard which I am wanting to use these or at least one of these controllers.

I have flashed the controllers firmware to 20.10.1-0020 (Build Nov 19 2010), and I have installed the LSI 9240 drivers onto my windows 7 Pro OS. At the moment I only have one installed and it is seen by the OS correctly.

However, when I boot up, I am not able to get into the web-bios using CTRL+H, and I have no idea at the moment how to use the other option which I think is Crtl+Y :-)

I currently have 5 SSD's connected to the SR-2's onboard ICH10 controller, and with these installed I am having no luck at all getting into the Web-bios.

It would be really great if someone could please help me getting this thing up and running so I can create arrays on the controller.

(I have managed to create a Virtual Drive of RAID-0 of my current 3x WD Black Caviar 1TB) using the LSI MegaRAID Storage Manager

thanks

Henrik

[tived]

keeping this going ;-)

thanks

Henrik

[F@32]

OK, how about we don't delete this thread, but instead folks would share their benchmarks, tips and tricks about the card?

First of all, this is a rebadged LSI 9240-8i without RAID-5 out of the box. ServeRAID M1000 could be bought for another $120 to enable RAID-5 on it. The card could be had dirt cheap on ebay. $75 is not unheard of price for a new or open box controller.

Right now I can't get nice QD1 4K random writes out of this card. All benchmarks below are with Gen1 X18-M on P67 motherboard. (@CT, I did try another PCI-e and can't get these numbers up).





4K QD16 Random Read

[tiro_uspsss]

I have one of these.. pity R5 is so expensive to add on

[F@32]

I have one of these.. pity R5 is so expensive to add on

Well, if you think of it... $75 or so for the card, another $130 for R5 key and you have R5 8 port PCIe-8x SATA 6Gbs controller for $200. It's very hard to beat.

P.S. I saw the thread at OC AU, but there were no benchies posted, so I hope to see some SATA 6Gb SSD numbers...

[robbicfc]

I got one of these and it seems to be working nicely on my rig. Bios options are limited to stripe size, I am unable to set the read type or write policy. So currently set at no read ahead and write through. Saying that I have no idea what they actually do






Do the above look ok for 2 Gen 1 Ocz Vertex in Raid 0?

[EniGmA1987]

Is this the page for the Windows drivers?
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...&brand=5000019

It takes me here, which doesnt really seem like the right place:
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...d=MIGR-5082394




Also, do the Server 2008 drivers work for Windows 7? Or does it have to only be a server OS?

[robbicfc]

Is this the page for the Windows drivers?
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...&brand=5000019


It takes me here, which doesnt really seem like the right place:
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...d=MIGR-5082394

Try this link for the firmware update
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...d=MIGR-5082826

This for the Megaraid software
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...d=MIGR-5077712

This for the CLI stuff
http://www-947.ibm.com/support/entry...d=MIGR-5082326

or alternatively go to LSI.com and download the drivers / software for the MegaRaid 9240-8i controller.

http://www.lsi.com/lookup/License.as...0set&locale=EN

[mattkosem]

Wow, $75 shipped! I grabbed one. We'll see how the c300s go.

--Matt

[F@32]

This.

Try this link for the firmware update
go to LSI.com and download the drivers / software for the MegaRaid 9240-8i controller.

http://www.lsi.com/lookup/License.as...0set&locale=EN

LSI FW and drivers worked like a charm ;-)

[mattkosem]

Grr... This card seems to have some incompatibility with my mobo. I get the bios screen on boot but cannot get into the webbios option. I was able to build a stripe using the PCLI environment, but cannot get any OSs to boot with it in-place. The windows boot loader (tried both win7 and vista) says that there's no memory in the required area. Grub says that there is no upper memory. I'm able to boot into the Ubuntu installer and install it (it uses ISOLINUX to boot), but the OS won't boot after it's installed because of the aforementioned grub issue.

I tried the latest bios from LSI as well as the latest bios from IBM (which is actually slightly newer (22 vs 20)) and have the same issue. Dos boots without issues.

Any ideas?

--Matt

[tiro_uspsss]

Grr... This card seems to have some incompatibility with my mobo. I get the bios screen on boot but cannot get into the webbios option. I was able to build a stripe using the PCLI environment, but cannot get any OSs to boot with it in-place. The windows boot loader (tried both win7 and vista) says that there's no memory in the required area. Grub says that there is no upper memory. I'm able to boot into the Ubuntu installer and install it (it uses ISOLINUX to boot), but the OS won't boot after it's installed because of the aforementioned grub issue.

I tried the latest bios from LSI as well as the latest bios from IBM (which is actually slightly newer (22 vs 20)) and have the same issue. Dos boots without issues.

Any ideas?

--Matt

I couldnt get into mine either
I just configured everything thru the LSI software (Mega-whatever)

[mattkosem]

I couldnt get into mine either
I just configured everything thru the LSI software (Mega-whatever)

At least you are able to get into a proper os. Wonder if a different mobo would work better. I'm guessing it would.

--Matt

[robbicfc]

Guys, when you are booting, what storage is attached at that time to the Motherboard? And the Bios, have you set the Hard Disk Priority to External Raid Card? You will be unable to start the Web Bios if another HD is set as bootable for example.

[mattkosem]

Guys, when you are booting, what storage is attached at that time to the Motherboard? And the Bios, have you set the Hard Disk Priority to External Raid Card? You will be unable to start the Web Bios if another HD is set as bootable for example.

In my case, none and both onboard controllers are disabled. There weren't any other bootable devices in my scenario. I was able to do everything that I needed in the PrebootCLI though, so that wasn't a big deal to me.

--Matt

[F@32]

Gigabyte and LSI have compatibility issues. I found multiple cases on-line. I could set-up and run 9260 and 9240 RAID on 890gpa but Win 7 would not install on it no matter what. On TweakTown forums there was floating beta BIOS for one of the older chipsets (P45 or X48) that fixed Gigabyte and LSI compatibility issue. One of the reasons I switched to ASRock is that it runs fine with LSI...

[mattkosem]

Gigabyte and LSI have compatibility issues. I found multiple cases on-line. I could set-up and run 9260 and 9240 RAID on 890gpa but Win 7 would not install on it no matter what. On TweakTown forums there was floating beta BIOS for one of the older chipsets (P45 or X48) that fixed Gigabyte and LSI compatibility issue. One of the reasons I switched to ASRock is that it runs fine with LSI...

Yeah, I saw a lot of complaints about them not working well with gigabyte boards. I wonder what the fix that was employed in that bios was. I'd be delighted to be rid of this board anyways though. The vrm cooling sucks, even with a 120 blowing straight down on the cooler.

--Matt

[mattkosem]

It works properly on the MSI 785G mobo in my HTPC. I guess I'll give that brand a shot.

--Matt

[tived]

I am not sure what happened here but MSM informed me that a drive had dropped out of my raid-0 of 4 disks (WD Black 1TB), something about not being initialized on time.

i rebooted and got a messaged to add foreign drive to virtual drive, which i did and when I booted up, both my two arrays were all accounted for.

It was just weird - has anyone else experienced this?

thanks

Henrik

[tiro_uspsss]

I am not sure what happened here but MSM informed me that a drive had dropped out of my raid-0 of 4 disks (WD Black 1TB), something about not being initialized on time.

i rebooted and got a messaged to add foreign drive to virtual drive, which i did and when I booted up, both my two arrays were all accounted for.

It was just weird - has anyone else experienced this?

thanks

Henrik

if the hdds are late model blacks, then u probably can't turn on/off tler, which would have a negative effect..

[tived]

tiro, thanks

I would think they are late models as they are sata-3 64mb cache

Henrik

[mattkosem]

I ordered an MSI 890FXA-GD65 to replace my crummy gigabyte board. Hopefully all will be well with it.

--Matt

[mattkosem]

Definitely works with the MSI board. Performance seems a bit low though. I'm not sure how to check if NCQ is enabled. Any ideas? Anything I should look at?

--Matt

[F@32]

Definitely works with the MSI board. Performance seems a bit low though. I'm not sure how to check if NCQ is enabled. Any ideas? Anything I should look at?

--Matt

Performance is close to your SB850 score, isn't it? I wonder if SB850 has a limit for data transfers regardless if it's SATA directly connected or through PCIe controller... I hoped to see 1,420MB/s with sequential read on LSI.

All your settings in MSM look right. You can check for NCQ in WebBIOS during boot-up when you press Ctrl-H.

[mattkosem]

Performance is close to your SB850 score, isn't it? I wonder if SB850 has a limit for data transfers regardless if it's SATA directly connected or through PCIe controller... I hoped to see 1,420MB/s with sequential read on LSI.

All your settings in MSM look right. You can check for NCQ in WebBIOS during boot-up when you press Ctrl-H.

NCQ is on. Yes, it's pretty close. SB850 is better on 4Ks than this, but 512k reads are like 300 MB/sec faster and seq is up about 70MB/sec. I broke the stripe, partitioned and formatted the drives, trimmed them, and rebuilt the stripe. It improved a small amount.

--Matt