Save old Mac Pro using SAS card?

All your general support questions for OpenZFS on OS X.

Save old Mac Pro using SAS card?

Postby mkush » Mon Mar 11, 2019 7:52 am

As discussed in other posts, I have SSDs mounted in Akitio Thunderbolt 3 enclosures hooked to a 2013 Mac Pro.

I also have a nice 2010 Mac Pro that I would like to use as my main storage system if possible. Or at least I want to consider the possibility. I had forgotten about SAS cards and external chassis. This seems like a great way to (1) save the old Mac Pro and (2) get high-quality enclosures bigger than 4 drives, which is where most Thunderbolt enclosures seem to top out. Specifically, I’m not aware of any 2.5” Thunderbolt enclosures larger than 4 drives.

The card I most like the looks of is the ATTO H12F0 which is a 16 external port card. I know it is PCIe 3.0 and the Mac Pro isn’t but I think it will just run at 2.0 speeds. Chassis I’m not sure but seems easy enough to make one if necessary... just the right drive cages, cables and power supply.

Does anyone have any words of wisdom or experience to share?


Thanks!
mkush
 
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Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2014 1:17 pm

Re: Save old Mac Pro using SAS card?

Postby tangles » Mon Mar 11, 2019 2:55 pm

I'm using a a RR 7744 which is a 4 x SAS external HBA.

I have cables that go from the SAS connector to 4 x SATA connectors so I can route it back into the case via a PCI slot if I ever need to.

This card also works with FreeNAS, Windows and Linux etc etc so I can use the pool on different platforms very easily.

Just make sure that whatever you go with parses disks to the OS as individual disks or JBOD. This way ZFS has full access to the disks without any layers of conventional RAID in the mix which is not good.

Cheers,
tangles
 
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