The original post: /r/homelab by /u/AcceptableMonk6008 on 2024-09-07 22:38:50.

Hi Everyone -

I recently migrated two LTO 8 SAS drives from separate desktop cases (Thudnerbolt 3) into a 1U Rackmount (IBM 7226 Chasis I got on eBay)) Besides the PSU & associated cables (4pin molex) the case was empty.

So I purchased a simple SAS adapter card to go in the case (https://a.co/d/fxxksVq)

I purchased an SFF 8643 fan cable (1 SFF8643 to 4 SAS8482 each with a 4pin molex (https://a.co/d/dyqKBhL) and connected two ends of the fan to the LTO drives + a molex to each drive. I then verified that each drive was getting proper power and spun up.

I’m connecting to a computer via an optical SFF 8643 to SFF8643 cable (https://a.co/d/5ouZOoN) since the run from the drives to the computer is about 20M. The HBA in the computer is an ATTO 1280GT 12GB SAS card.

The computer sees the HBA card no problems and has proper drivers, the card also sees the optical cable but I can’t see either of the LTO drives.

My hope was that I could have both drives connected via a single external connection to the computer (hence the fan cable) and it’s my understanding that SAS can be multi-channel.

However, I’m wondering if the fan cable is the issue and I need each drive to have its own connection to the adapter and then to the HBA or maybe a wonky adapter card in the case?

I removed the cable being the issue as I tested a different SAS device with it and the HBA and worked fine.

Thanks in advance for any advice.