Issues getting PBS to install on HP ML310e

[user73937393]

Hi Guys,

I've encountered a few problems repurposing an old ML310e Gen 8 server into a PBS. I realise this is old hardware, but I thought I would post it here if anyone else ran into the same problems.

I've tried lots of different configurations, all of which ended up with the same outcomes:

1. PBS would not detect RAID configured in the onboard HP StorageWorks RAID mobo-raid. Instead, all of the HDs would show at the PBS installation. No matter which HD I installed PBS on, PBS would never boot, no matter what boot order I selected.
2. Installing PBS on ZFS RAID1 would complete successfully but PBS would never boot, no matter what boot order I selected.
3. Installing PBS on EXT4 (single drive) would complete successfully but PBS would never boot, no matter what boot order I selected.
4. I tried removing the RAID card plugged into the mobo PCIe, plugging the HDs SAS/SATA table directly from the HD cage backplane into the Mobo (and reattempting all of the above). That did not change the outcomes above.
5. When I disable the RAID in BIOS (i.e. "HP Dynamic Smart Array B120i RAID Controller"), the PBS says it cannot detect hard drives and will not proceed.
6. I tried disconnecting the backplane entirely and installing PBS on SSD connected via a SATA cable directly to the mobo. The PBS installation would complete successfully but PBS would never boot, no matter what boot order I selected.

Any chance anyone had any luck getting PBS installed on a HP ML310e Gen 8?

 

[Brian Read]

I have pve 8.1 installed on an ML310eGen8. I have 4 HD in a single zfs raid array. The onboard raid is disabled in the BIOS. I also have an SSD plugged into the CD-ROM/DVD Sata connector on the mobo, which is in use for a cache.

I discovered that the system will not boot from the SATA connectors on the mobo, but it boots successfully from the zfs array, as configured by the installation procedure.

I suspect your problems are due to not getting things right in the BIOS probably related to the hard drives and the Raid controller . As my system is in constant use I am unable to give you details of how things are configured, except to say that it works!!

 

[user73937393]

Thanks, @Brian Read. After quite a bit of research, I found this post on the HPE website.

In my case, I completely removed my raid card from my ML310e and plugged the drive cage directly into the motherboard. Then, within BIOS, I disabled the "HP Dynamic Smart Array B120i RAID Controller" under the PCIe settings. Then, I selected SATA Legacy Support under System Options > SATA Controller Options > Embedded SATA Configuration. Once I did that, I was able to install and boot to PBS, as well as create a `backups` ZFS pool. I haven't done backup testing yet, but I have no reason to think backups won't work.

In my case, I decided to have a single SSD disk as the boot disk. Then, use a second SSD as a write cache for my 4-disk `backups` RAIDZ pool. Whilst I can appreciate this isn't the ideal configuration, I think this will suffice for now until I replace the ML310e with updated hardware. In the interim, I'm just glad to see PBS up and running.