# NVMe HBA Adapters



## Phishfry (Feb 21, 2019)

I got my tax refund and I want to get me an enterprise NVMe setup with four 960GB Samsung 2.5" U.2 drives.
Looking at an SuperMicro HBA controller.


			AOC-SLG3-4E4T | Add-on Cards | Accessories | Products - Super Micro Computer, Inc.
		


Not alot of options on the market. This controller uses an OCuLink cable type. 
Some others (LSI-Tri mode) use a SAS3 type conector (SFF-8639).
Some have a PLX controller, some don't.

What are you using for an NVMe HBA controller?

Planning on an Icy Dock for the cage.
https://www.icydock.com/goods.php?id=255


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## Phishfry (Feb 21, 2019)

I wonder if the NVMe driver can handle hot swaps.


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## olli@ (Feb 21, 2019)

Any reason you want U.2 instead of M.2? The latter is more compact and requires no cables. There are dual and quad M.2 PCIe cards that work fine with FreeBSD, e.g. search for “quad M.2” on Amazon. However, make sure you get a card that actually does support NVMe (there are also cheap ones that support only SATA/AHCI M.2). I also recommend to get a card that comes with a heatsink for the M.2 SSDs.

Personally I have the Samsung 970 Pro 1TB (M.2 NVMe SSD). I'm quite happy with the performance.
Here's a simple comparison that I made some time ago on stable/11 with diskinfo(8); it might be even better now since some improvements went into the nvme, nvd and nda drivers. According to the specs, the 970 Pro can do 3.5 GB/s read, 2.7 GB/s write and 500,000 IOPS.



diskseek time (ms)transfer (MB/s)IOPS*SATA HDD (3TB Hitachi)*24.985​149​180​*SATA SSD (OCZ Vertex-2)*0.142​253​32083​*NVMe SSD (Samsung 970 Pro M.2)*0.020​2324​147890​


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## olli@ (Feb 21, 2019)

Phishfry said:


> I wonder if the NVMe driver can handle hot swaps.


No, it can't.


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## Phishfry (Feb 21, 2019)

olli@ said:


> Any reason you want U.2 instead of M.2?


I really wanted to try out enterprise class NVMe drives. From what I can tell most M.2 drives are consumer class drives.
Intel P3600 drives look interesting.

Right now I have a bunch of M.2 to PCIe adapters. Using Toshiba XG3 and Samsung drives.


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## Phishfry (Feb 25, 2019)

Well thanks olli@ for questioning my judgment. I decided to tip toe into U.2 arena instead of wasting my loot.

So I like the U.2 form factor instead of M.2 even if not hot-swappable.
What I got was one Samsung drive, a simple pass through paddle card and a U.2 to SFF-8643 cable.
The overall cost was less than a Samsung 970EVO of the same 1TB size. (Samsung PM983)








						Samsung ‎MZ-QLB1T9NE 960 GB 2.5 in Internal SSD for sale online | eBay
					

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Samsung ‎MZ-QLB1T9NE 960 GB 2.5 in Internal SSD at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!



					www.ebay.com
				



24 dollar paddle card:








						U.2 SSD Mini SAS(SFF-8643) to PCI-e 4 X 3.0 Adapter for Intel 750  | eBay
					

The connection has required extensive signal tuning to retain maximum performance. NOTE Cable and SSD in Picture is not included. Cable Options for Adapter  Support Following Motherboards ASUS Z97 Z170 H170 X99.



					www.ebay.com
				




I might end up with a pair of these drives in the end.


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