RAID CONTROLLER Areca 1210

M

Matteo05822

New Member
Jun 15, 2025
8
0
1
I installed an Areca 1210 RAID controller in my Proxmox latest release server just created. I am having some problems.
To view the rebuild and array creation status I have to restart Proxmox and access the controller's nios (unfortunately this entry model does not have a dedicated NIC)
I found drivers and CLI on the Areca site but I can't install them or at least I can't view anything from the GUI.
Can you help me?
I am reporting the Areca link.
It is also essential to view any anomalies in the array

Thanks to anyone who can help me
 
The last release of that software was 15 years ago. You are unlikely to get that to work with any modern system. If it doesn’t have the built in NIC then you have to use the BIOS tool upon restart.
 
yes clear. I know the controllers. I have used many. this for a proxmox server at home.....
anyway, even if it does not have the dedicated nic, with drivers and cli commands, I need to be able to query it.
and if the drivers exist for proxmox I assume I can receive the warnings.....
 
You mean like remote support? The procedure is pretty simple, download the binary from the website (https://www.areca.us/support/downloads.html) and unzip it then try to run the binary (cli64) , see what error messages you get. You don’t need a driver (this isn’t Windows) to make it work, the drives should just show up, as you probably already saw.

The problem with the CLI tool is going to be whether it will run on your current kernel version.
 
I tried to download and install the deb package again
this is the result

root@pve:/tmp# dpkg -i arcmsr_1.50.0X.14-2-Proxmox8.0-2-k6.2.16-3_amd64.deb
dpkg: warning: downgrading arcmsr from 1.51.0X.16-2 to 1.50.0X.14-2
(Reading database ... 54075 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack arcmsr_1.50.0X.14-2-Proxmox8.0-2-k6.2.16-3_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking arcmsr (1.50.0X.14-2) over (1.51.0X.16-2) ...
Setting up arcmsr (1.50.0X.14-2) ...



Proxmox 8.4.1
 
I think you are mistaken. There is no Deb package necessary, arcmsr should
be in the base kernel but that only provides the driver, not the cli tool. For the cli tool go to the Areca website, go to deprecated models and download the Linux CLI (not firmware)
 
Yes, so you unzip those, then out comes cli64 binary. That should be able to be ran on the command line, provided it is still compatible with modern Linux kernels.

If it doesn't work, there is nothing we can do, Areca doesn't support your card anymore, they're unlikely to fix and recompile for modern versions of Linux. That is why hardware RAID is always a bad idea.
 
in the end following the instructions I managed to install it and use it correctly.
Now I wonder......in addition to cli64, is there a way to manage or at least see the controller from proxmox? receive warnings, errors or other?
I see an SNMP but I don't know how to configure it. Is there anything native or has anyone already encountered the situation?
Thanks 1000
 
cli64 is proprietary and output is highly specific to your controller. There is not much you can do with it outside the terminal.

SNMP and HTTP support is on the network interface of the controller, which you said you didn’t have.
 
I understand that I can't get any info from proxmox. I could be in a dangerous situation and only find out when the server restarts because it starts to beep?
is there no system or workarroud? it's a dangerous and unpleasant situation.....
thanks in advance to anyone who can help me....
 
Welcome to the world of proprietary hardware RAID, if you had a NIC, it used to have an email function. I would check to see if your SMART status gets passed through. Typically if the "RAID" is unhealthy, higher end controllers can pass through the SMART status of the 'array'.

The other option would be to set up a script with cli64 to alert you of errors. Eg if you use Prometheus or Zabbix you can put the status in a custom script to then get parsed by some sort of matching rule.

Again, if this is semi-important, a cheap controller will outperform this relic on every aspect.
 
Last edited:
Matteo05822 said:
I could be in a dangerous situation and only find out when the server restarts because it starts to beep?
Click to expand...
I think you have a completely... optimistic outlook on what you are expecting from this solution. You can ACHIEVE the functionality you desire, but no one is going to make it for you.

For starters, Areca controllers have built in features including alert remote, but you have to provide the middleware. Again, this requires you to read the documentation and UNDERSTAND it. I haven't touched these in about 20 years, but IIRC their utility exposes a port to your network which you can use to access their interface. BUT even if it didnt, you could script notifications just as @guruevi suggested.

guruevi said:
Again, if this is semi-important, a cheap controller will outperform this relic on every aspect.
Click to expand...
I stopped suggesting controller based RAID for PVE years ago. ZFS beats them all for virtualization workloads (maybe thats what you meant?)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom