Created RAID Volume Not Shown in Boot Order when 4kN Drives Used

Documentation

Troubleshooting

000024675

07/16/2024

What am I seeing?

After having created a RAID Volume on an Intel® RAID Controller with an LSI* SAS3108 Chipset using disks that are 4k Native for both their Physical and Logical Sectors, the RAID Volume doesn't show as being bootable in the Boot Order of the Motherboard BIOS.

Why am I seeing it?

The UEFI BIOS on current Intel® Server Boards doesn't support showing a boot volume containing a full 4k Native RAID Volume through these Intel® RAID Controllers until the operating system writes a Boot Manager to the file system during an UEFI-based installation of the operating system.

How can I work around this issue?

On these Intel® RAID Controllers, the recommended procedure for creating and booting to a RAID Volume containing only 4k Native disks is the following:

  1. Set the Motherboard BIOS to Legacy Mode rather than the usually required UEFI Mode.
  2. Save, reboot, and go into the RAID BIOS by pressing CTRL+R prompt during boot.
  3. Create the Virtual Drive as you would normally by selecting the required 4k Native disks.
  4. Save, reboot, and go into the Motherboard BIOS by pressing F2 during boot.
  5. Reset the BIOS to UEFI boot mode.
  6. Save and reboot once more.

Don't worry about checking the Boot Device tab or Boot Order in the UEFI RAID Configuration under UEFI Option ROM Control. The 4k Native RAID Volume won't show up there.

Continue a normal boot to your DVD, USB flash drive, or PXE Server. Start your operating system installation as you would normally and add the Intel® RAID Controller Drivers when asked. During the first reboot, the operating system installs as it would normally. The operating system should add itself to the Boot Order in the Motherboard BIOS. Thereafter, the RAID Volume containing the operating system is bootable as it would be normally.

For a list of Intel® RAID Controllers that support 4k Native disks, see Technical Advisory TA-1085.

For any RAID Volumes created as Secondary RAID Volumes, this procedure isn't required. You can use the UEFI RAID Configuration in the Motherboard BIOS or the Intel® RAID Web Console 2 or 3 instead.

If this procedure is followed and it's still not possible to install your operating system on the RAID Volume, contact Intel Customer Support.