Good Cheap Server - HP Proliant Microserver 4 BAY - OWNERS THREAD

fish said:
Cheers bud I look forward to some testing
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As a minor follow up, I've just flashed the BIOS on my other MicroServer, and things are looking promising.

This one has got five drives (4 in the cold swap bays, and a system drive using the internal ODD SATA port mounted in the 5.25" bay). All are now running in AHCI mode having performed the BIOS flash and made the necessary changes in the BIOS. The Operating System doesn't half run faster now it's not running off a drive in IDE emulation mode!

As promised, I'll be flashing the BIOS of the other MicroServer, and getting six drives hooked up — one using the eSATA port, exciting stuff! — in that one tomorrow (or later today, looking at the clock!) :D
 
Again, a minor update.

Have flashed the BIOS of my six drive MicroServer and hooked six drives up (one via the internal ODD SATA port, one via the external eSATA port). All six drives are being recognised at POST as AHCI drives. All looking good.

Going to swap one of the drives out for a 2.5" laptop drive (can fit both a 2.5" and 3.5" in the 5.25" ODD bay) and install Oracle Solaris 11 Express on it later; should hopefully have a five drive ZFS raidz1 array and a separate system drive in no time!

You mentioned previously that you'd tried flashing the BIOS, but have you subsequently disabled the SATA combined mode under the Southbridge configuration menu in the BIOS? :)
 
Myocardial Inf said:
Do you have a link to the bios you've flashed to?
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Links to the hacked BIOS and firmware with instructions here: http://forum.wegotserved.com/index....roserver/page__st__124__p__104539#entry104539

The only slightly misleading thing about those instructions is the instruction to copy the .bat file "onto itself". The poster just means creating a copy of the flash.bat file, renaming it ahci.bat and editing the contents (very straightforward) so it includes a reference to the hacked BIOS rather than the original.

In my case I used a FreeDOS USB stick created on linux. At the DOS prompt, just execute the ahci.bat file you've created, the flash takes all of five seconds and you're good to go.

This hack, I should point out, is based on the latest firmware from HP (version 2011.01.17) as opposed to the previous hack that is based on the previous update, 2010.09.30.

You'll note the boot-up screen changes from one that simply states 'HP ProLiant' to one stating 'HP ProLiant MicroServer' with the updated BIOS, and the hack creates a new 'Southbridge configuration' tab in the BIOS :)
 
Thanks, will go have a read and download now.

Just setting up my machine, although I've not received my 4x 2Tb Sammy's yet.

Have been thinking of fitting a Highpoint RocketRaid 2640x1 in the Pci-e x1 slot and connecting that to a 4 bay 2.5" caddy placed in the ODD and running a second 4x 1Tb array.

Will be running the thing from the internal 5th Sata port using a Super Talent 16Gb Horizontal 22-pin SATA Flash Disk Module.

This would leave me with the full size Pci-e slot to allow me to install an Intel ET Dual Gigabit Server adapter.
 
Quick test against WHS2011 and Drive Bender & 4x 2TB Samsung F4 drives & 4GB of ram & a 60GB SSD for the OS.
Not using the onboard nic using a dual port HP NC360T which is teamed up connected and configured lacp& jumbo frames to a HP Procurve 1810-24 Port switch.



I will edit this later once I start copying the larger ISO's/and mkv files.



Speeds so far and much better compared to freenas 8... I won't be using this as my main system for another 3 weeks or so, still need to run some more testing using zfsguru/openindiana/nexenta ect.
Should have another 4GB of ram in tomorrow then I will reinstall the system again, thank goodness for clonezilla :)
 
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Rudeboy said:
What kind of network throughput are you guys able to get on yours?

I've now tried ESXi with WHS2011 and Ubuntu Server as VM's and also a native install of Windows 7 x64 to compare against and each time my network transfer speed is rubbish (30-50MB/s usually dropping off to about 14MB/s towards the end). I also updated the NIC driver in the native install of Windows 7 to the latest available from Broadcom as HP's drivers seem to be about 2 yrs out of date.

I've done some tests on the RAID5 array and that can easily hit 250MB/s write and nearly 300MB/s read with 4x 2TB WD Green drives in the array. Controller is P410 with cache and battery module. Internal file transfers between different physical LUN's are fast. No problems there.

Next step is to try and source a compatible Gigabit NIC (pref Intel) and see if that makes a difference. I know it's not just me as my boss also bought a Microserver after seeing mine and is looking at the native install route and is also struggling with getting any decent network throughput.

If you're able to hit and sustain 100MB/s or more, could you list your hardware and software config for me? Thanks.
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So after a weekend of additional testing and multiple rebuilds, I'm now convinced that Windows is the problem with regards to my NIC speed issues.

If I natively install Ubuntu Server and setup SAMBA using my current setup of 4x WD20EARS disks in RAID5, then I can happily read and write from the microserver at between 100 and 120MB/s all day long.

I've even tried removing the P410 RAID controller and running the disks directly off the internal SATA connections and configuring them as an MDADM RAID5 array within Ubuntu and that also exceeds 100MB/s for reads and writes when testing without problem.

However, whenever I take one of these working setups with Linux where I'm able to saturate the NIC fully and just install Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 SP1 or WHS2011 straight over the top of the existing install, so that there's no disk re-configuration when installing Windows, the NIC is never able to transfer more than 50MB/s and usually hovers around 35MB/s. I've applied all the latest patches/updates and also made sure that I've applied all firmware updates, BIOS etc and also running genuine drivers, but it doesn't make a difference.

I'm now wondering if Windows is seeing my WD20EARS disks and automatically limiting the throughput due to the disk type. This is the only thing common between this build and my last build on an HP MediaSmart x510 server that also had similar problems with NIC throughput that forced me to move over to Ubuntu Server permanently on that system to be able to get 100MB/s or more across the network. Even though my WD20EARS disks are connected to a hardware RAID controller and can easily push 300 to 400MB/s, I'm now wondering if these disks could be the cause of the problem.

I've checked partition alignment in Windows installs (as they're 4K disks) and all partition start and end points are wholly divisible by 4096, so there shouldn't be any problems there.

Is anyone else who's able to get 100MB/s or more on one of these Microservers using Western Digital Green drives?

Sorry for the long post, but I've spent a week on this now and am starting to get a bit fed up with it and desperately need to find a solution.
 
Rudeboy said:
Is anyone else who's able to get 100MB/s or more on one of these Microservers using Western Digital Green drives?
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WDC WD20 EARS and Samsung HD204UI
Transferring a 2.5 TB iso over gigabit through a TP-Link TL-SG1005D switch between WHS2011 & Win7

With a WHS 2011 folder on the WD I get xfers about 95 bottoming at 80.
When the same folder is on the Samsung xfers are about 115 bottoming at 100.
 
I managed to saturate the gig link to 70% by just copying a file over smb.

This is using windows 7 and the catalyst drivers.
 
Rudeboy said:
Sorry for the long post, but I've spent a week on this now and am starting to get a bit fed up with it and desperately need to find a solution.
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Could be, symptoms of a badly-behaved Broadcom. Download HP's Network Configuration Utility, use it to change some settings on the Broadcom NIC to anything-but-default, save the settings, then change them back to default and save them again. For some reason, this seems to make the onboard NIC behave a lot better. http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsuppor...kId=135&swItem=MTX-d92400e70c234b23a8eb330860
 
Simpic said:
This is how I have mine set up with the 2.5 inch HDD on the esata connection. All running at full speed.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/networking-nas/1429720-tims-7-24tb-tiddler-unraid-nas.html

Very useful BIOS instructions.
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Simpic, have you managed to get both the eSATA and internal ODD SATA ports working at the same time (i.e. you have six SATA drives)? In the thread you link the author connects an eSATA to SATA cable up and ponders using it for a cache drive but, frustratingly, never attempts it.

I've now run into the roadblock it seems a few people here have. Despite having flashed the BIOS, disabled SATA combined mode, etc. I can only get the internal ODD SATA to work. I get no response from the eSATA port at all.

Looking ahead to plan b, does anyone have any experience adding a cheap-as-chips 1/2-port PCI-X RAID controller card to one of these? I don't intend to use the RAID function, but I'd be using it for the boot drive(s) so would need it to be recognised as an AHCI device at POST. Any pointers? :confused:
 
Al Vallario said:
Simpic, have you managed to get both the eSATA and internal ODD SATA ports working at the same time (i.e. you have six SATA drives)? In the thread you link the author connects an eSATA to SATA cable up and ponders using it for a cache drive but, frustratingly, never attempts it.

I've now run into the roadblock it seems a few people here have. Despite having flashed the BIOS, disabled SATA combined mode, etc. I can only get the internal ODD SATA to work. I get no response from the eSATA port at all.

Looking ahead to plan b, does anyone have any experience adding a cheap-as-chips 1/2-port PCI-X RAID controller card to one of these? I don't intend to use the RAID function, but I'd be using it for the boot drive(s) so would need it to be recognised as an AHCI device at POST. Any pointers? :confused:
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I'm running win2008 R2 with a HP P410 Smart Array Raid controller. I have 4 x Hitachi 2TB in raid 5 on this. Gives 5.45TB usable. I have a 4 x 2.5 dock in the ODD bay with 4 x 500GB in raid 5 on the P410 also for another 1.36TB. Attached to the eSata port I have a Startech 4 bay raid enclosure with 4 x 2TB WD20EARS in raid 5 for another 5.45TB . No problems using eSata at all.
Bios was flashed for the AHCI mod and I'm using the onboard sata port for the ODD for another 500GB for the OS and VM's. Lets me with the 4 ports of the motherboard free. May later take a multilane feed out to another external enclosure.
 
I think he was wondering if you were using a sata to esata cable for the external port. Although that is a serious amount of drives there :)
 
I have been ummming and arrring all month about one of these and may have missed the Boat, hopefully they continue the Cashback offer next month
 
howamidifferent said:
Bios was flashed for the AHCI mod and I'm using the onboard sata port for the ODD for another 500GB for the OS and VM's. Lets me with the 4 ports of the motherboard free. May later take a multilane feed out to another external enclosure.
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fish said:
I think he was wondering if you were using a sata to esata cable for the external port. Although that is a serious amount of drives there :)
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Yep, that's what I'm wondering.

howamidifferent, if I understand correctly you have four of the internal SATA ports free? It seems to me the system can only handle 5 SATA devices at once, unless using a SATA->eSATA adapter changes things? :confused:
 
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