FreeNAS pcie/sata passthrough

jeschke

New Member
Oct 31, 2019
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hi all,

I am planning to setup a freeNAS VM and pass through the relevant controller.

my setup:
- supermicro x10sdv-6c
- 1x m.2 nvme for proxmox OS etc
- 4x sata HDD to pass through to freeNAS

my question now:
would it make more sense to
A: pass through the on-board sata controller to the freeNAS VM and add a pcie-ssd for VM's, backups etc
B: get a LSI-controller to pass through the HDD's and use the onboard sata for one more SSD for VM's, backup etc.

I am grateful for any help!

Cheers,
jeschke
 
Can you pass through the on-board SATA controller? Is it in its own IOMMU group? Did you test this beforehand? Given this choice, I would go with option B.
Adding an additional controller for the HDDs would allow you to use it as slow but reliable storage (RAID-Z) for ISOs and backups. Then add additional SSDs for fast storage for running VMs. I prefer to run the Proxmox system on at least a mirror,in case one of the drives dies. The fast storage for VMs does not need to be mirrored if you make backups often, and you will probably enjoy the speed.