New Proxmox box w/ ZFS - R730xd w/ PERC H730 Mini in “HBA Mode” - BIG NO NO?

[fanweiblue]

In updating the firmware on the H730, I found a setting in the Lifecycle Controller that allows for the cache of the H730 to be disabled. I believe the firmware updates are still going on, so I will wait to investigate this option in the BIOS, but should I get accurate SMART information (which I've heard multiple recent reports the H730 will give) then I see no reason why the H730 should have the reputation it does. It seems to simply require a bit more configuration to make it as robust for ZFS as an actual HBA, but given it's a higher-end RAID controller that shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Again, this is dependent on both accurate SMART information, and the cache actually being disabled, but I see no reason why either of these would fail or cause issue. I understand why the Proxmox and ZFS communities advocate so heavily against using RAID controllers, but it seems the majority of the information specific to the H730 is outdated or wrong. And as shown earlier in this thread, performance should not be an issue either. I see no reason why the H730 will not function perfectly fine with Proxmox and once I test my aforementioned assumptions, I will share my results. I expect that I will be sharing them with Proxmox installed and happily running on my server.

Sorry to activate this thread after 7 months ,but I'd like to know how's your experience so far with your setup. I am having the same hardware and about to set Proxmox up. Your and sb-jw's posts seem positive on this card and different from what I saw elsewhere.

 

[syringahospital]

I have acquired a Dell r830 with 4x E5-4650v4 2.20GHz processors with 56 total cores and 1TB ECC Registered ram for a sandbox to evaluate proxmox VE for a replacement to our existing ESXi environment.
I have set the controller to HBA with the cache disabled in the lifecycle controller. We are planning to using ZFS.
I will update with what happens as best I can.
Planning on installing Proxmox VE next week.

 

[DigiGoon]

I have Dell R730, with H730P Mini, I'll be using it in HBA with cache disabled. I'll let you guys know if anything goes wrong.

My changes over default config for H730P in BIOS (F2) > Device Settings:
1. Set Select Boot Device to None in Controller Management
2. Switched to HBA mode in Advanced Controller Management
2. Disabled Disk Cache for Non-RAID in Advanced Controller Properties