Compatibility and Performance of SAS 12Gbps SSDs (3.84TB, 3.5-inch) in TrueNAS

TrueNAS General
1

Hi everyone,

I’m considering adding a few SAS 12Gbps SSDs 3.84TB-3.5Inch (3.84TB, 3.5-inch form factor) to my TrueNAS setup and wanted to get some feedback from the community.

  1. Compatibility: Has anyone successfully used SAS 12Gbps SSDs in TrueNAS? Are there any known compatibility issues or specific HBA/controller recommendations for these drives?
  2. Performance: For those using similar drives, what kind of performance are you seeing (especially in terms of IOPS and throughput)? Are there any tuning tips to get the most out of these SSDs?
  3. Use Case: I’m planning to use these drives for a high-performance storage pool for VMs and databases. Does this seem like a good fit, or would you recommend a different approach?
  4. Reliability: How has the reliability been for SAS SSDs in your experience? Any brands/models you’d recommend or avoid?

Thanks in advance for your insights! Looking forward to hearing your experiences and recommendations.

Best,

2

Same as anything SAS: LSI 9300 or 9305 (3008, 3216/3224) controllers.
With SSDs, you want to avoid the PCIe 2.0 9200 (2008). But I’m not sure you’re gaining much from 12G SAS SSDs over 6G SATA—and probably losing on the usefulness of SMART reports.

Look out for SAS SSDs with 520 bit sectors which could NOT be reformatted to 512 (or 4k).