Converting to Hardware Raid from default Software Raid, backplane 1 connector A0 is not connected Issue.

Question

I have a newer Dell R330 server that came with three 128GB SSD's as well as a software raid S130. After setting up a Raid 1 with single hot spare, I realized that ESXI is not fully compatible with software raids. I pulled an PERC H200 from an extra R710 and installed on the R330, trying to setup a raid and utilize ESXI.

After installing the H200 Raid Controller into the R330, the controller was found during boot and configured the Raid with the wanted configuration with no issues. All drives were found, and configuration was flawless. That is to say that until after a restart, an error was thrown.

iDrac Settings:

CBL0009: Backplane 1 connector A0 is not connected.

UEFI0116: One or more boot drivers have reported issues.

Check the Driver Health Menu in Boot Manager for details.

Press F1 to continue, F2 for system setup, F10 fro lifecycle controller, F11 for boot manager.

After pressing F1, ESXI loads with no issues and all is well. The only problem is, after every single restart, I must press F1 in order for the sytem to boot up properly. Not good...

What I tried to remedy the issue is to disable Software Raid in BIOS settings as well as try to disable iDRAC (which is not possible).

There are four SAS connectors. 1. Connector A on motherboard 2. Connector A on H200 RAID Controller 3. Connector B on H200 Raid Controller 4. Connector on Frontplane where the SSD's are seated into

First setup was Frontplane SAS connector to Conector A on H200 RAID Controller. System operates but iDRAC error still shows up.

Second setup was Frontplane SAS connector to Connector A on H200 RAID controller and Connector A on motherboard to Connector B on H200 RAID controller (read this may fix issue in dell support post). Sysem operated but iDRAC error still shows up.

How can I get rid of this error? Is there a setting option that I am missing that would allow me to disable the Connector A on motherboard?

R330 Server Hardware View RAID Controller setup image

Answer 1

Spoke to an Enterprise Associate at Dell and there are two solutions to this:

1. The older H200 card has a different protocol that may not be compatible with the newer R330 server and should be replaced with either a PERC H330, PERC H730 or PERC H830.

2. Disable "Press F1 to Continue" message in BIOS Settings -> Miscellaneous Options.

I will try to disable "Press F1 to Continue" first and if that fails, I will get a different controller.

Answer 2

I know this is an old post, but still relevant and I wanted to add my results in case it helps someone else. I ran into the same issue with ESXi on a T330 with the S130 builtin controller. Installed an H730 Perc per Dell support, and everything was fine (once I got a cable with the correct connectors) except the "Backplane 1 connector B0 is not connected" message. I disabled the "F1/F2 on error" settings in the miscellaneous settings in the BIOS. The message still appears at boot, but the system continues to boot without intervention, which comes in real handy when the customer takes it upon himself to power cycles the server every time he has a problem, but that is a story for another time.