Hello, I have a Freenas-Mini-3.0-E that I purchased from iX Systems a couple of years ago with 16GB (2x8GB) of ECC RAM. I want to upgrade the RAM, perhaps to 32GB(2x16GB). I contacted iX Systems and was told that 16GB was the max supported for this model. However when I look at the spec sheet for the Intel C338 CPU, the max memory size is shown as 128GB, so perhaps the 16GB is a motherboard limitation. I do not know the motherboard model and the support didn’t tell me either. They recommended reaching out to the community. So, has anyone upgraded their RAM beyond 16GB for the Freenas-Mini-3.0-E?
Maybe this helps you to find the mainboard. This is a screenshot from a Mini XL, the UEFI Versions seems to be the mainboard type, in this case a Asrock server board.
I’d check the specific motherboard reference.
For the older mini Xl, I had a c2750d4i motherboard in there from Asrock Rack. It came from the factory with four 8GB RAM sticks for a total of 32GB. This RAM has been reliable for my use case.
Years later, I managed to snag some 16GB RAM sticks off the QVL on eBay for a comparatively OK price (as opposed to the usual unobtanium price associated with unbuffered, UDIMM, pixie-dust RAM that Asrock Rack qualified). The eBay RAM worked ok for a year or two and then started throwing errors. I subsequently went back to the RAM that the machine came with.
For the c2750d4i (in case you’re using it), the maximum per DIMM stick is 16GB. with four DIMM sticks possible, the maximum is 64GB, though many folk reported issues with that much memory.
This is from an article about the Mini E, looks pretty similar to the one below, but with two instead of four memory slots.
ASRock Rack C3758D4I-4L. If you cannot access the bios, the name is printed between the CMOS battery and the external connectors.
From the promotional video on youtube:
Thank you for the screenshot tip @prez02, I am attaching the picture. My Freenas-Mini-3.0E motherboard model is C3338D2I-4L Unfortunately spec sheets for this specific model are harder to come by than C3758D4I-4L.
The document below shows the difference between the C3338D2I-4L, the C3558D4I-4L and C3758D4I-4L.
The naming apparently is derived from the CPU type.
The C3338 supports up to 128 GB, I have not checked if the other versions of the Atom are different in this respect or ithe mainboard also plays a part. For sure it only has two slots not 4, so maybe it is limited to half of that.
The C3558D4I-4L apparently supports 16GB per module of UDIMM and 32 GB of RDIMM, the latter leads to the max 128 with 4 slots. With UDIMM an two slots the limit is likely 32GB.
Thanks @prez02 for the details! So to summarize, for C3338D2I-4L motherboard:
- UDIMM, 16GBx2 = 32GB max
- RDIMM 32GBx2 = 64GB max
Also I am attaching a picture of the current sticks in my motherboard (should have just done so in my previous post but oh well)
Well, thats a 8GB single rank 1Rx4 module.
The QVL list for the C3558D4I-4L board lists modules up to 16GB, so they have not tested larger dimms, maybe these were not available at the time?
A2Zeon also lists 32GB modules. The naming suggests those are 2Rx8 chips from either Samsung, Hynix or Micron.
Theoretically it should work, but it has not been tested by AsRock Rack or iX, or by another user?!
|2133MHz|PC4-2133|32GB|288pin|Registered|1.2V|Yes|1.23"|Dual|RD4R32G48S*2133|