Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Dave Pooser]

On 11/4/15, 11:54 PM, "Nikola M"  wrote:

>USB is not that good for high profile use anyway.
>USB does not do checking of data during transwer (came to the light when
>using USB wireless adapters).
>ZFS helps there with checksums, but for regular things I would stick to
>SAS and SATA.

True, but when you occasionally need to move a couple TB cross-country a
USB3 hard drive shipped overnight delivery is often less painful than
using zfs send. ;-)
-- 
Dave Pooser
Cat-Herder-in-Chief, Pooserville.com



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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Rich Teer]

On Thu, 5 Nov 2015, Jonathan Adams wrote:

> USB is good for ZFS on Linux (useful to set the ashift on a backwards
> compatible Solaris 10 zpool), but it's not really "prime time".

Just so that I'm absolutely clear, would I be correct in thinking that
eSATA is preferred over USB-3, assuming SAS isn't an option?  The low-end,
consumer-spec drive enclosure I'm using has an eSATA port and a USB-3
port.  The eSATA port requires the use of an HBA that supports port
multipliers (which the LSI HBA I'm using doesn't), and my Ultra 20 M2
"server" only has USB-2 ports.  So I'm looking at buying either a
USB-3 PCIe card, or an eSATA that supports port multiplers PCIe card.
The cost difference isn't that great (~$30 vs $60), but I'd like to
buy the one that's best (i.e., most reliable and more performant).

Illumos support would be ideal, but I'll also consider anything that
is supported by Linux or FreeBSD.  I'm currently thinking about getting
one of the StarTech eSATA or USB-3 cards.

Cheers,

-- 
Rich Teer, Publisher
Vinylphile Magazine

www.vinylphilemag.com

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Ian Collins]

Rich Teer wrote:

On Thu, 5 Nov 2015, Jonathan Adams wrote:


USB is good for ZFS on Linux (useful to set the ashift on a backwards
compatible Solaris 10 zpool), but it's not really "prime time".

Just so that I'm absolutely clear, would I be correct in thinking that
eSATA is preferred over USB-3, assuming SAS isn't an option?


eSATA works with Illumos, USB3 isn't supported.

--
Ian.


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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Nikola M]

On 11/ 5/15 07:07 PM, Rich Teer wrote:


Just so that I'm absolutely clear, would I be correct in thinking that
eSATA is preferred over USB-3, assuming SAS isn't an option?  The low-end,
consumer-spec drive enclosure I'm using has an eSATA port and a USB-3
port.  The eSATA port requires the use of an HBA that supports port
multipliers (which the LSI HBA I'm using doesn't), and my Ultra 20 M2
"server" only has USB-2 ports.  So I'm looking at buying either a
USB-3 PCIe card, or an eSATA that supports port multiplers PCIe card.
The cost difference isn't that great (~$30 vs $60), but I'd like to
buy the one that's best (i.e., most reliable and more performant).

Illumos support would be ideal, but I'll also consider anything that
is supported by Linux or FreeBSD.  I'm currently thinking about getting
one of the StarTech eSATA or USB-3 cards.


Avoid port multipliers on SATA at all cost, simply that is not supported 
by any illumso distro and can make big problems on any other platform. 
It is simply not wise to use any port multipliers and paying more for 
that option is not very sane.

Maybe if you really want to use eSATA port with eSATA enclosure.

External SATA (SATA port just put externally for connecting disks) is 
not same as eSATA and is cheaper.

You always get full speed on SATA versus described USB downsides.
One craddle , connected via external SATA (not eSATA) and putting bare 
SATA disk in it for transfer is cheapest and fastest option for small 
office, small server user.



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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Nikola M]

On 11/ 5/15 05:23 PM, Dave Pooser wrote:

On 11/4/15, 11:54 PM, "Nikola M"  wrote:


USB is not that good for high profile use anyway.
USB does not do checking of data during transwer (came to the light when
using USB wireless adapters).
ZFS helps there with checksums, but for regular things I would stick to
SAS and SATA.

True, but when you occasionally need to move a couple TB cross-country a
USB3 hard drive shipped overnight delivery is often less painful than
using zfs send. ;-)


There are no USB disk drives, they are all SATA inside
so external SATA or eSATA to SATA every one work at it's best speed. One 
occasionally can ship just SATA HD.
There are also craddles to put new disk into and devfsadm to make it 
available.


Also if zfs send between snapshots is too big, stream can be put into an 
file and sent with rsync,
until zfs send continuing transfer lands in OpenZFS. (Delphix works on 
it I think)



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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Jim Klimov]

6 ноября 2015 г. 0:59:52 CET, Ian Collins  пишет:
>Rich Teer wrote:
>> On Thu, 5 Nov 2015, Jonathan Adams wrote:
>>
>>> USB is good for ZFS on Linux (useful to set the ashift on a
>backwards
>>> compatible Solaris 10 zpool), but it's not really "prime time".
>> Just so that I'm absolutely clear, would I be correct in thinking
>that
>> eSATA is preferred over USB-3, assuming SAS isn't an option?
>
>eSATA works with Illumos, USB3 isn't supported.

(Disclaimer: Maybe it is FUD that follows, but one I believe ATM)

Also, over its long history, USB was not well known for reliability. Everybody 
cut corners here and there - cables, plugs, shielding (or lack thereof), 
controllers, firmwares, drivers. Even given the spec, somebody did not invest 
in implementing say 1% of corner cases, somebody else missed another % and 
overall the big stack is spotty - with different misses and errors depending on 
components you take and mix. Overall - who cares if a consumerish mouse or 
webcam has a hiccup? Reinit the session and try again.

On the other hand, storage technologies are more demanding in reliability and 
speed. There are also consumerish examples of corners cut, but at least you 
know one can always build an enterprisish stack of hardware pieces that works 
up to spec, though maybe not with sand-cheapest bits on the market. 

I gather (maybe wrongly, but it is a venue to research or discuss) that a SAS 
controller with external ports can drive an external SATA disk tower as well, 
and would cost some 100-200 bucks (depending on port count, vendor, model) for 
an IT-mode oem lsi hba card widely known to work well.

Anyhow, I've heard of enterprise storage components. I have yet to hear of 
enterprise USB ;)

A few years somebody wrote on the list that relying on USB as a permanent 
connection to a disk array is an open invitation for accidents to happen. It 
may be okay for plug-and-disconnect backups to removable media, but not quite 
good for life-long connections where you expect reliability. (That said, my 
home router with TomatoUSB "firmware" OS has an USB HDD plugged in so we have a 
shared storage cache for unimportant stuff at home - but it does often get lost 
from online access, and we have to shake the cabling or reboot the box to get 
the disk available again). 
--
Typos courtesy of K-9 Mail on my Samsung Android

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Nikola M]

On 11/ 3/15 08:52 PM, Rich Teer wrote:

I'm currently using the external drive bay with a USB 2 connection, plus
an eSATA drive (3-way mirror).  My plan is to drop the eSATA drive (it's
a 2 TB drive vs the 4 TB drives in the other drive bay), and stick to just
the USB port and (for the time being) live with the presumably crappy
performance that will bring.


USB is not that good for high profile use anyway.
USB does not do checking of data during transwer (came to the light when 
using USB wireless adapters).
ZFS helps there with checksums, but for regular things I would stick to 
SAS and SATA.



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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Philip Robar]

On Tue, Nov 3, 2015 at 3:12 PM, Rich Teer  wrote:

> On Tue, 3 Nov 2015, Jonathan Adams wrote:
>
> > You might be better off with a FreeNAS setup instead of Linux+ZFS, as
> long
> > as you don't mind configuring it via a browser interface ... We have 3 of
> > the beasties now running in production environments and they even have
> ZFS
> > boot (and they don't forget how to do ZFS when they get a new kernel)
>
> Hmm, that's a good idea (although the browser-only stuff gives me pause).
> I
> like the idea of ZFS boot.  I guess I should really take a closer look at
> ZFS
> on FreeBSD too...
>

Bear in mind that USB3 is still experimental in FreeNAS/FreeBSD 9.3—the
current stable version of FreeNAS—so you have to explicitly turn it on. My
USB3 PCIe card works, but the USB3 ports on my Lenovo ThinkServer TS140
motherboard don't. And while there has been a lot of USB work in FreeBSD
10.x, USB3 is still hit and miss based on which USB chipset you have.

Phil
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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Rich Teer]

On Sun, 1 Nov 2015, Guenther Alka wrote:

> Your options are mainly with Solarish systems
> 
> - Oracle Solaris with USB 3 support
> but the following options are far better, faster or more robust to connect
> disks

[...]

All good ideas, and I agree, probably better in a commercial environment.
However (and I forgot to mention this), this is for my home server and I'm
strapped for cash at the moment, so I'm looking for a *cheap*, reasonably
performant solution.

I'm currently using the external drive bay with a USB 2 connection, plus
an eSATA drive (3-way mirror).  My plan is to drop the eSATA drive (it's
a 2 TB drive vs the 4 TB drives in the other drive bay), and stick to just
the USB port and (for the time being) live with the presumably crappy
performance that will bring.

>From the feedback I've received here, it seems that for better performance
(considering my budget) I will have to go the USB 3 route, which also means
that I may have to abandon a Solaris-based OS. :-(  In the immediate term,
that probably means going the Linux + ZFS on LInux route.  I'll buy a cheap
($30 or so) USB 3 card that is supported on Linux, and take it from there.
(I can't believe that I just wrote that; my how times have changed!)

-- 
Rich Teer, Publisher
Vinylphile Magazine

www.vinylphilemag.com

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Apostolos Syropoulos via openindiana-discuss]

> From the feedback I've received here, it seems that for better performance
> (considering my budget) I will have to go the USB 3 route, which also means
> that I may have to abandon a Solaris-based OS. :-(  In the immediate term,
> that probably means going the Linux + ZFS on LInux route.  I'll buy a cheap
> ($30 or so) USB 3 card that is supported on Linux, and take it from there.
> (I can't believe that I just wrote that; my how times have changed!)
> 


There are a few things that must find their way into the kernel or else...
KMS, USB3, UDFS. The problem is that most people have no idea how to write
a driver...


A.S.


--
Apostolos Syropoulos
Xanthi, Greece

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Rich Teer]

On Tue, 3 Nov 2015, Jonathan Adams wrote:

> You might be better off with a FreeNAS setup instead of Linux+ZFS, as long
> as you don't mind configuring it via a browser interface ... We have 3 of
> the beasties now running in production environments and they even have ZFS
> boot (and they don't forget how to do ZFS when they get a new kernel)

Hmm, that's a good idea (although the browser-only stuff gives me pause).  I
like the idea of ZFS boot.  I guess I should really take a closer look at ZFS
on FreeBSD too...

-- 
Rich Teer, Publisher
Vinylphile Magazine

www.vinylphilemag.com

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Jonathan Adams]

On 3 Nov 2015 19:53, "Rich Teer"  wrote:
>
> On Sun, 1 Nov 2015, Guenther Alka wrote:
>
> > Your options are mainly with Solarish systems
> >
> > - Oracle Solaris with USB 3 support
> > but the following options are far better, faster or more robust to
connect
> > disks
>
> [...]
>
> All good ideas, and I agree, probably better in a commercial environment.
> However (and I forgot to mention this), this is for my home server and I'm
> strapped for cash at the moment, so I'm looking for a *cheap*, reasonably
> performant solution.
>
> I'm currently using the external drive bay with a USB 2 connection, plus
> an eSATA drive (3-way mirror).  My plan is to drop the eSATA drive (it's
> a 2 TB drive vs the 4 TB drives in the other drive bay), and stick to just
> the USB port and (for the time being) live with the presumably crappy
> performance that will bring.
>
> From the feedback I've received here, it seems that for better performance
> (considering my budget) I will have to go the USB 3 route, which also
means
> that I may have to abandon a Solaris-based OS. :-(  In the immediate term,
> that probably means going the Linux + ZFS on LInux route.  I'll buy a
cheap
> ($30 or so) USB 3 card that is supported on Linux, and take it from there.
> (I can't believe that I just wrote that; my how times have changed!)

You might be better off with a FreeNAS setup instead of Linux+ZFS, as long
as you don't mind configuring it via a browser interface ... We have 3 of
the beasties now running in production environments and they even have ZFS
boot (and they don't forget how to do ZFS when they get a new kernel)
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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Bob Friesenhahn]

On Sun, 1 Nov 2015, Guenther Alka wrote:


Your options are mainly with Solarish systems

- Oracle Solaris with USB 3 support
but the following options are far better, faster or more robust to connect 
disks


What about keyboard and mouse?

Bob
--
Bob Friesenhahn
bfrie...@simple.dallas.tx.us, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer,http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Tim Mooney]

In regard to: Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?, Bob Friesenhahn...:


- Oracle Solaris with USB 3 support
but the following options are far better, faster or more robust to connect 
disks


What about keyboard and mouse?


+1

Tim
--
Tim Mooney tim.moo...@ndsu.edu
Enterprise Computing & Infrastructure  701-231-1076 (Voice)
Room 242-J6, Quentin Burdick Building  701-231-8541 (Fax)
North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105-5164

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Guenther Alka]

Your options are mainly with Solarish systems

- Oracle Solaris with USB 3 support
but the following options are far better, faster or more robust to 
connect disks


- eSata for a single disk
- external SAS enclosures that supports up to 4 SAS/Sata disks per 
miniSAS Cable
- SAS expander  (similar to Sata port multiplier but a more frofessional 
solution) that supports hundreds of disks

- second NAS ex a HP microserver as a replication target for backups or
as an initiator source per FC, IB or iSCSI when needing more disks

You will not find either a good at all (on any platform) nor a Illumos 
supported Sata port multiplier solution.


Gea

Am 28.10.2015 um 22:45 schrieb Rich Teer:

On Wed, 28 Oct 2015, Bob Friesenhahn wrote:


USB-3 is not supported yet.  I have not heard of anyone working on it.

Ah, that is what I feared, but thanks for confirming it.


Consider ZFS on Linux or FreeBSD if you need USB-3 and ZFS within the next
year.

Yep; I've already started pondering those options...


Also consider eSATA since that can be supported by OpenIndiana and is commonly
available on external drives.

Agreed.  I was using eSATA with 3 single disk enclosures, and it worked well
until the latter started failing (not the disk in at least one case), so I
bought a 4-bay enclosure with eSATA and USB-3 connections.  The enclosure
requires that the HBA supports SATA port multipliers, but unfortunately the
LSI HBA I'm using doesn't.  I'm more than willing to give eSATA a try, if
someone is happy to recommend a cheap enough HBA that is known to work.




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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Private openbabel]

On 28/10/2015 21:45, Rich Teer wrote:

On Wed, 28 Oct 2015, Bob Friesenhahn wrote:


USB-3 is not supported yet.  I have not heard of anyone working on it.

Ah, that is what I feared, but thanks for confirming it.


Consider ZFS on Linux or FreeBSD if you need USB-3 and ZFS within the next
year.

Yep; I've already started pondering those options...
Theoretically there are adapters available for esata and usb 3 as a 
short term fix but remain untested for example 
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/NewerTech/ADESATA6USB3/
If a driver was available it would be best aimed at 3.1 or 
http://www.mhlconsortium.org/technology.aspx. You may ponder Qualifying 
corporate development funding for drivers in the UK under  
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/manuals/cirdmanual/cird81960.htm


Robert Jones


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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Apostolos Syropoulos via openindiana-discuss]

>
> Who within the Illumos or OI community is capable of doing the necessary
> development to add full USB3 support?
>
> Does anyone know if there's been discussion of funding someone to
> write the necessary driver(s)?
> 


Hello,

I have asked these same questions in the past. The problem is that it is not
easy to port the BSD driver to Solaris because it has a very strange and 

counterintuitive USB implementation. Writing the driver from scratch is out
of question...

A.S.


--
Apostolos Syropoulos
Xanthi, Greece

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[OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Rich Teer]

Hi all,

Hopefully a very quick question here: is USB3 supported yet, and if so, what
2+ port cards are recommended?  I'm specifically talking about using ZFS on
external hard drives, and am thinking of using SmartOS if that helps.  The
USB card would be going into a PCIe slot in my Ultra 20 M2.  (I'm currently
using one of the on-board USB2 interfaces, but the 480 Mb/s speed is killing
me!)

Cheers,

-- 
Rich Teer, Publisher
Vinylphile Magazine

www.vinylphilemag.com

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Rich Teer]

On Wed, 28 Oct 2015, Bob Friesenhahn wrote:

> USB-3 is not supported yet.  I have not heard of anyone working on it.

Ah, that is what I feared, but thanks for confirming it.

> Consider ZFS on Linux or FreeBSD if you need USB-3 and ZFS within the next
> year.

Yep; I've already started pondering those options...

> Also consider eSATA since that can be supported by OpenIndiana and is commonly
> available on external drives.

Agreed.  I was using eSATA with 3 single disk enclosures, and it worked well
until the latter started failing (not the disk in at least one case), so I
bought a 4-bay enclosure with eSATA and USB-3 connections.  The enclosure
requires that the HBA supports SATA port multipliers, but unfortunately the
LSI HBA I'm using doesn't.  I'm more than willing to give eSATA a try, if
someone is happy to recommend a cheap enough HBA that is known to work.

-- 
Rich Teer, Publisher
Vinylphile Magazine

www.vinylphilemag.com

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Bob Friesenhahn]

On Wed, 28 Oct 2015, Rich Teer wrote:


Hi all,

Hopefully a very quick question here: is USB3 supported yet, and if so, what
2+ port cards are recommended?  I'm specifically talking about using ZFS on
external hard drives, and am thinking of using SmartOS if that helps.  The
USB card would be going into a PCIe slot in my Ultra 20 M2.  (I'm currently
using one of the on-board USB2 interfaces, but the 480 Mb/s speed is killing
me!)


USB-3 is not supported yet.  I have not heard of anyone working on it.

I am also using USB-2 backup drives with ZFS (for over 6 years 
already) for backups.  I take care to constrain the amount of data 
which needs to be backed up and use compression so USB-2 still works 
for me.


Consider ZFS on Linux or FreeBSD if you need USB-3 and ZFS within the 
next year.


Also consider eSATA since that can be supported by OpenIndiana and is 
commonly available on external drives.


Bob
--
Bob Friesenhahn
bfrie...@simple.dallas.tx.us, http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/
GraphicsMagick Maintainer,http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/

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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[jason matthews]

On 10/28/15 1:58 PM, Bob Friesenhahn wrote:
Also consider eSATA since that can be supported by OpenIndiana and is 
commonly available on external drives. 


The electrical and protocol specification for esata is the same as sata. 
E-SATA cables I think need to be shielded. The only difference is the 
amount of line current the controller has to put on the circuit to work 
on a longer distance. This is a long way of saying you could in theory 
make an internal SATA jack an external jack with high quality shielded 
cables, and a little luck.


Something like this:
http://www.monoprice.com/Product?p_id=7638=CPKc4KyJ5sgCFYZefgodcowF_w

Be advised, cables may be one area in life where you get what you pay 
for. I am not sure monoprice is the right choice but you get the idea.


j.


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Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?

[Tim Mooney]

In regard to: Re: [OpenIndiana-discuss] Support for USB3?, Bob Friesenhahn...:


USB-3 is not supported yet.  I have not heard of anyone working on it.


The day is coming where USB3 or 3.1 is going to be the standard for
motherboards, and it's going to be difficult to find a MoBo with USB2.

Who within the Illumos or OI community is capable of doing the necessary
development to add full USB3 support?

Does anyone know if there's been discussion of funding someone to
write the necessary driver(s)?

Tim
--
Tim Mooney tim.moo...@ndsu.edu
Enterprise Computing & Infrastructure  701-231-1076 (Voice)
Room 242-J6, Quentin Burdick Building  701-231-8541 (Fax)
North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58105-5164

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