Issues with Using HGST SN200 NVMe Drives in Dell XE2420

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Asked By TechSavvy99 On

Hey everyone,

I've got a bunch of HGST Ultrastar DC SN200 NVMe drives (Dell OEM) set up in my Dell PowerEdge XE2420. The drives are showing up fine in iDRAC and Proxmox logs like dmesg and lspci, but I'm having trouble making them usable in the OS—they just won't mount. The system itself is running smoothly with dual SSDs on the BOSS card in RAID 1.

Let me break down the specs:
- **Model**: HGST Ultrastar DC SN200 Series (Dell OEM)
- **Capacity**: 7.68TB U.2 NVMe
- **Firmware**: G130
- **Host System**: Dell PowerEdge XE2420
- **BIOS/iDRAC**: Updated to the latest versions.

Here's what I've attempted so far:
- Checked for the latest BIOS and iDRAC updates.
- Made sure all NVMe-related BIOS settings are enabled (like Hotplug and PCIe power management).
- Tried creating a namespace using the command `nvme create-ns /dev/nvme0`.
- Did some controller resets, namespace rescans, and formatting attempts.
- Tried running the Dell Linux firmware .BIN updater, but it just says "Not compatible with your system."
- Confirmed the drives show up in iDRAC and Proxmox logs.

But here's the current situation:
- The drives are listed in lspci, but I can't find any usable `/dev/nvme*` devices.
- The `nvme list` command yields empty or inconsistent results.
- I keep running into errors like resetting controllers due to AER, resource temporarily unavailable, and no such device errors.

So, I'm wondering if anyone's encountered similar issues with these OEM SN200s on Dell systems? Is there any way to reinitialize or unlock these drives (through namespaces, formatting, firmware tweaks, etc.)? I'm having no luck with Dell's firmware package and Western Digital's tools don't recognize them either. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

3 Answers

Answered By IT_Wizard45 On

Your best bet is to try these on Windows Server with the XE2420, using Dell's drivers to see if that makes them visible. If they still don't show up, they might just be incompatible with Linux/Proxmox due to their OEM firmware. You might want to consider selling them and getting some standard NVMe drives instead.

TechSavvy99 -

I appreciate the insight! I just forked out quite a bit for some new drives, and it seems like there’s a firmware issue. I tried them in another NVMe server, but they wouldn't initialize either, leading me to AER errors. The vendor thinks the firmware is faulty, and dealing with Dell and WD for the right firmware is a hassle. For now, I've had to buy my way out of this mess!

Answered By DataWhiz73 On

It sounds like these drives might be firmware locked by the reseller. I just tried installing Windows and it couldn't detect the NVMe either. Honestly, dealing with Dell can be a nightmare sometimes.

Answered By GadgetGuy42 On

Have you checked if Proxmox is possibly passing the NVMe controller to a VM? Sometimes that can cause issues like this. Also, it might be worth trying to disable MSI or ASPM in the BIOS to see if it helps. As a last resort, testing them in a Windows environment could clarify if they’re really locked or not.

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