Not able to run raid console with Intel Server Board S5520HC

[Rakshasa]

I am having Intel Server Board S5520HC motherboard and the problem that I am facing with the same is that it is not able to run raid console, I am not able to find out any other information then "Press <Ctrl><G> to enter RAID BIOS Console" is there anyone who has an good idea about the same and can help me out in dealing with it????

[Cain]

I am having Intel Server Board S5520HC motherboard and the problem that I am facing with the same is that it is not able to run raid console, I am not able to find out any other information then "Press <Ctrl><G> to enter RAID BIOS Console" is there anyone who has an good idea about the same and can help me out in dealing with it????

Before suggesting you I wanted to know following things:

• Version of the raid that you are using ?
• Are you having "Quiet Boot" disabled in the BIOS?

Just answer me these so that I can have a better idea of the issue that you are facing and will help you out with the same.

[Rakshasa]

I am not very sure about the raid that I am using I mean that I have just bought the Intel Server Board S5520HC mainboard and I feel that it is having a raid controller, as far as the Quiet Boot is concerned I have checked out the same and it is disabled, is there anything else that I should check out???? Any further help for the same will be highly appreciated.

[Cain]

If you are not having a RAID controller then you would have not got Ctrl-G prompt that you have mentioned, anyways for using the onboard SATA ESRT2 RAID you will have to enable the same in BIOS and after that you will get a Ctrl-E prompt, you can just check out the below demo for more information, just check it out and see if it is helping:
How to configure ESRT2 RAID using the BIOS console

[Rakshasa]

Hey thanks for the same , it was really helpful , I have made it now but then the further issuer that I am having is that the server is working very slow, I just wanted to know what might be the possible cause of the same is there anything I can do about the same as well?? Is it just because of the raid (raid 1). I also wanted to know if the raid controller on the board will work fine or I should better get a raid controller?? What will you suggest???

[Cain]

In that case you can try out the below solutions and see if it is helping:

• First just update the BIOS of the board from the Intel Download Center
• After that disable the PCI AER Support in the BIOS setting before installing the os and for that you will have to go in to BIOS > Advanced > PCI Configuration.
• When you are done with the same then just connect the network ports to a network before the operating system loads the embedded NIC driver.
• Once the installation is complete just get the latest Network Drivers for Windows and you are done.

Just try out the same and this should end the issue.

[Rakshasa]

I have now tried out the above solution and it is appearing to be helping me out with the NIC but then the server is still slow, as far as I can guess it is because of the embedded raid, it might not be having a good quality, should I consider an external raid controller here??? Or just using raid 10 will be a better idea??? Do you have experience with raid 10??? Will it be helping???

[Cain]

I don’t think it should be that slow, is it really that slow??? Can you just elaborate the symptom that you are facing?? As far as the raid 10 is concerned I had used it and I think that it will be faster than RAID 1 but then for getting that you will have to find out the real bottleneck, other than this you will also have to make sure that you are having HDDs from a Tested memory and hardware list and for that you can refer to the below link and find it out, I also wanted to add that SATA drive can be very sensitive to vibration so better get a HDDs, just check it out and see if you are finding out a compatible and supported one. Hope that helps.