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All about the Asrock C2750/C2550 boards...


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Hi all,

 

I'm new here. Been hovering for a while and contemplating trying Xpenology on my Asrock C27504DI build. I know there are a few people around who are using these Avoton boards with Xpenology. I am about to do the install and thought it'd be very helpful for us all to have a central place were we could share our experiences. So I hope someone out there will entertain me a little and at least answer my first question.

 

Can anyone tell me if they have the latest release up and running on this board? Do you have all the SATA ports functional?

 

Is there anything else I should be aware of with this board?

 

Thanks in advance and I hope as I develop and get into this whole exercise I can be of some assistance to you all too.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

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  • 2 weeks later...

OK, so managed to get the system up and running with 5.2.

 

Ofcourse like others I got the " =trigger device plug event" on boot. This has something to do with the SATA Controllers. Disabling the two Marvell Controllers in the BIOS get around it but ofcourse you loose 8 SATA ports by doing that.

 

Alternative you can change the SATA controllers to IDE in the BIOS by going : South Bridge Chipset Configuration -> SATA Configuration -> SATA Mode Selection = IDE ...

 

I am playing around with this to see exactly how it affects the set up...

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OK, so managed to get the system up and running with 5.2.

 

Ofcourse like others I got the " =trigger device plug event" on boot. This has something to do with the SATA Controllers. Disabling the two Marvell Controllers in the BIOS get around it but ofcourse you loose 8 SATA ports by doing that.

 

Alternative you can change the SATA controllers to IDE in the BIOS by going : South Bridge Chipset Configuration -> SATA Configuration -> SATA Mode Selection = IDE ...

 

I am playing around with this to see exactly how it affects the set up...

 

I have the c2550 board, and it crashes the raid all the time when stressing it with file transfers.

 

Edit: This might be due to heat, trying to figure that out atm but just tried a freenas install aswell..

 

Note: This is the SilverstoneTek DS380 chassi.. seems to be utter crap when you actually fill it with even 5 discs for heat :/

 

http://silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=452&area=en

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yeah, I would have bought that Supermicro board but it was about AU$300 more expensive here in Australia. Ended up getting this C2750d4i cheap.

 

It seems to be working quite well, so I'm happy.

 

As an update to stability and functionality.

 

With regards SATA ports, it wasn't the Marvell controllers that were causing the crash at start. These are working fine with DSM 5.2. So that means 8 SATA3 ports functioning perfectly. The problem was the other 4 SATA2 ports. I had to scale them back to IDE - as explained above. This is fine for me as the DS380 case maxes out at 8 3.5in drives.

 

Some obstacles, mostly overcome...

1. Disable Speedstep in the BIOS. I was struggling with large file transfers and FXP server to server transfers. I was always loosing the connection. Disabling Speedstep seems to have solved this problem.

2. I am currently trying to figure out some issues with the IPMI, all the ports are confusing as one of the LAN ports is a fail over for the dedicated IPMI port. This is explained here of this tweaktown forum - http://forums.tweaktown.com/asrock/5902 ... issue.html . I'll report back once I clear it all up.

 

Lastly I purchased a Shintaro USB3 Pcie card (http://www.shintaro.com.au/assets/suppo ... ual%5D.pdf) to utilize the two USB3 ports on the DS380. But it crashed this mobo before POST. Wacked it in my other Windows box and it worked fine though.

 

So I moved onto a Orico card (http://www.amazon.com/ORICO-PVU3-2O2I-E ... B008717L0G) which is working like a purler (excuse my Australian slang), I'm happy.

 

Once I understand the IPMI confusion I'll post again...

 

Mazedk - try the Speedstep setting - that might help with the large file transfers. And the DS380 is fine for heat for me - I did install PWN fans in mine and spent a bit of time planning and laying out the cables to allow airflow though. Goodluck!

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Regarding the IPMI set up -

Basically just use one of the LAN ports as a standard NIC and use the IPMI for IPMI. The second LAN port is a failover for the IPMI and I had troubles if I tried to use it as a standard LAN port for data transfer.

 

7842d1440432981-c2750d4i-ipmi-network-configuration-issue-c2750_io-png

 

Illustration Ports 2 & 3 are used for IPMI. Illustration 5 is used as a standard LAN port.

 

Refer to the link above if you require more info...

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  • 2 months later...

DS380:

I read much about the issues with the DS380 after I encountered power-on issues under certain conditions depending on the number of connected HDDs.

It turned out to be an issue with the DS380 backplane (the board in the rear of the HDD cage) and after contacting SilverstoneTek I got it replaced one week ago, everything working fine now.

 

Fan:

Sadly I realized that besides setting some BIOS settings there is no possiblity to control the fans from XPEnology,

even with ipkg installed sensors etc packages (those show only the CPU cores, nothing else!)

 

Some guy from another project pointed out, that they are observed and controlled by the BMC, and can only be influenced using IPMI commands.

(https://lime-technology.com/forum/index ... ic=39238.0)

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Hi,

I use the C2550 card for 1 month. Everything works fine , I never tested the IPMI port. The other two network ports are used and work very well (link aggregation ) . 10 SATA ports are functional, marellSE9172 the controller is disabled , it caused a crash on startup . I'll try to switch it ide mode.

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  • 3 weeks later...
DS380:

I read much about the issues with the DS380 after I encountered power-on issues under certain conditions depending on the number of connected HDDs.

It turned out to be an issue with the DS380 backplane (the board in the rear of the HDD cage) and after contacting SilverstoneTek I got it replaced one week ago, everything working fine now.

 

what kind of issues did you exactly have with the ds380?

 

- I have 6 discs in mine. 5x 2tb, and 1x8tb

 

When I try and put load on my 5x2tb raid, it throws the discs and the raid fails .. :sad:

 

When just using the 8tb alone, theres no issue.

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Personally, I have 2x6tb, 2x3tb, 1x200gb, and one SSD 120gb. I have had no issues so far...

 

Actually the only problem so far, and due to human error, is that one of the SATA connectors busted, while trying to insert it. A piece lodged in the HD connector, I didn't notice and tried to put it in another DS380 connector, and it busted that one too. I manage to fixed them by replacing the two SATA port connectors but one is unstable. So out of the 8 bays HD I have only seven left, and one of those a bit iffy - it has to 200gb drive which I use for downloads.

 

Other than this the DS380 seems to work quite well!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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DS380:

I read much about the issues with the DS380 after I encountered power-on issues under certain conditions depending on the number of connected HDDs.

It turned out to be an issue with the DS380 backplane (the board in the rear of the HDD cage) and after contacting SilverstoneTek I got it replaced one week ago, everything working fine now.

 

what kind of issues did you exactly have with the ds380?

 

- I have 6 discs in mine. 5x 2tb, and 1x8tb

 

When I try and put load on my 5x2tb raid, it throws the discs and the raid fails .. :sad:

 

When just using the 8tb alone, theres no issue.

Is this with a C2750 / C2550?

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Just wanted to report my experiences with the C2550D4I.

 

My system:

- ASRock C2550D4I with 4x1GB DDR3 ECC RAM

- Silverstone DS380

- Hard drives: 3x8TB, 2x3TB, 3x2TB (8x8TB soon) on all the internal SATA3 controllers

- XPEnoboot 5.1-5055

 

BIOS Config:

- Advanced > Super IO Configuration > Serial Port 1 Configuration > Serial Port (Disabled)


- Advanced > Super IO Configuration > SOL Configuration > Serial port (Disabled)

- Intel RC Setup > South Bridge Chipset Configuration > SATA 3 Configuration > SATA Mode Selection = IDE 

 

What works:

1, All SATA controllers, so it is possible to have 12 hard drives connected.

2. Both Intel LAN ports.

 

What doesn't work:

1. Wake on LAN.

 

 

I also tested with XPEnoboot 5.2-5592 before reverting to 5.1-5055. Here are my experiences with it.

 

What works:

1. All the SATA3 controllers, so it is possible to have 8 hard drives connected.

2. Both Intel LAN ports.

 

What doesn't work:

1. The SATA2 controllers, so you will lose the ability to connect 4 hard drives.

 

 

Things I have not tried:

1. iSCSI

2. Installing or using packages

3. SSD cache

4. Hot spare

5. Changing serial number and LAN MAC addresses

 

I hope this helps others looking to use this motherboard. Also, I wanted to pass along a huge THANKS to the debs who make XPEnology.

Edited by Guest
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Just a few comments...

 

If I remember correctly the 4 SATA2 ports work but only as set to IDE in BIOS.

 

Also changing the serial number and MAC address works fine...

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Hello.

 

Did you use the DOS tools to flash the firmware to change MAC address?

 

Thanks in advance.

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I have the C2550D4i, you can use native SATA with Xpenology 5.0 or before without any problem.

But if you use 5.1 or later, you have to disable the SE9172 or you will have the " =trigger device plug event" issue, so that means you can use 10 drives max.

Do not use IDE mode, it incurs huge performance impact.

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Hi i could use some help tweaking this board. The C2750

 

I have have had this board now for a couple years. I upgraded to DSM 5.2-5592 and have it mostly working now but with some issues.

 

The most pressing issue relates to recognizing hard drives. I have 4x3TB drives and 2x4tb drives. All connected to the Sata3 ports. I verified they are not connected to sata2 It sees the the the 4 3xtb fine however it detects the 2x4tb as esata. I need to expand those drives into the volume however I need to get the new 4tb detected as internal not esata.

 

[*]Update[*] I was able to get the drives added and recognized properly by going in and enabling SATA3 in AHCI mode. I had to set the sata2 controller to ide or I did get the "trigger error" on boot.

Edited by Guest
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Just a few comments...

 

If I remember correctly the 4 SATA2 ports work but only as set to IDE in BIOS.

 

Also changing the serial number and MAC address works fine...

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Hello.

 

Did you use the DOS tools to flash the firmware to change MAC address?

 

Thanks in advance.

 

The Serial No. And Mac Address I changed on the Bootable USB - I run my setup on bare metal.

 

There is a great tutorial I'll send you later, sorry at work.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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I have the C2550D4i, you can use native SATA with Xpenology 5.0 or before without any problem.

But if you use 5.1 or later, you have to disable the SE9172 or you will have the " =trigger device plug event" issue, so that means you can use 10 drives max.

Do not use IDE mode, it incurs huge performance impact.

 

Thanks for the suggestion!! I followed what you did and performance is vastly improved for repairing and expanding volumes.

 

 

 

@ Bhakti and brantje:

 

Thanks for the info. I now have serial numbers and MAC addresses done. Working perfectly!!

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Just wanted to report my experiences with the C2550D4I.

 

My system:

- ASRock C2550D4I with 4x1GB DDR3 ECC RAM

- Silverstone DS380

- Hard drives: 3x8TB, 2x3TB, 3x2TB (8x8TB soon) on all the internal SATA3 controllers

- XPEnoboot 5.1-5055

 

BIOS Config:

- Advanced > Super IO Configuration > Serial Port 1 Configuration > Serial Port (Disabled)


- Advanced > Super IO Configuration > SOL Configuration > Serial port (Disabled)

- Intel RC Setup > South Bridge Chipset Configuration > SATA 3 Configuration > SATA Mode Selection = IDE 

 

What works:

1, All SATA controllers, so it is possible to have 12 hard drives connected.

2. Both Intel LAN ports.

 

What doesn't work:

1. Wake on LAN.

 

 

I also tested with XPEnoboot 5.2-5592 before reverting to 5.1-5055. Here are my experiences with it.

 

What works:

1. All the SATA3 controllers, so it is possible to have 8 hard drives connected.

2. Both Intel LAN ports.

 

What doesn't work:

1. The SATA2 controllers, so you will lose the ability to connect 4 hard drives.

 

 

Things I have not tried:

1. iSCSI

2. Installing or using packages

3. SSD cache

4. Hot spare

5. Changing serial number and LAN MAC addresses

 

I hope this helps others looking to use this motherboard. Also, I wanted to pass along a huge THANKS to the debs who make XPEnology.

 

 

This is great info, I currently have 2x HP N54L Micro Servers both running xpenology with 4 drives each and I have been wanting to upgrade, as well as consolidate the arrays. I was looking at the Asrock c2550 with the Silverstone ds380 exactly! This is all part of my grand plan to implement PFSense here as well haha.

 

Thank you so much for posting this!

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  • 4 weeks later...

Firtst post, but i've been lurking around this board for while.

 

I have been using a Qnap TS-453 pro (up for sale) for the last year, and I have nothing to complain over. But the urge to build something myself and to have a bit more ooomph from the CPU did it for me. I was lucky enough to get hold a slighty tested C2750 board with 16GB ECC RAM for a good price and went ahead with my project.

My originial plan was to use Ubuntu Server or Windows as i mainly use it as a plex server. After some fiddeling with Ubuntu, I scrapped that plan en went for Xenology (bare metal), and i will never look back.

 

I disabled both Marwell controllers as I don't need them, disabled serial port and got going. Everything works perfect, no errors during boot and I even got 120gb SSD as cache for 2x 4TB raid0 (no need for security). I transfered 4TB from the Qnap without any issues and maxed out the GB network (110-120GB/sek)

 

As a complete xpenology noob I think this went very well :smile:

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  • 4 weeks later...

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