fury Posted March 15, 2016 Share Posted March 15, 2016 (edited) Hi guys, I've been thinking about this for way too long without trying to see if it can work. I figure i'll ask the question and see if it's possible. Ultimately I want to run an SSD and 4 HDD's in AHCI mode and boot from the SSD in the 5th slot on my HP Gen 8. I don't want to run through the raid controller because the HDD's never spin down. I don't want to use an add in raid card because i'm hoping to add a graphics card to the only PCI-E slot available (when NVidia's next gen low power cards come out). Is it possible to "boot" from USB, but have the bootloader direct the server to boot from the SSD? If so, could anyone share how this may be possible? I'm running WHS2011 but hopefully it can be used for any OS. Any help or thoughts would be much appreciated. Edited March 15, 2016 by fury Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fury Posted March 15, 2016 Author Share Posted March 15, 2016 After doing a bit of searching it looks relatively easy with linux/ubuntu but no real sign of how to do it with windows? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gingerbeer Posted March 15, 2016 Share Posted March 15, 2016 Any reason why you need the HDDs to spin down? I have four HDDs in mine and I can't hear them. If it's for power saving, I don't really think it's worth the effort. Waiting for a drive to spin up when accessing it is quite infuriating after a while too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fury Posted March 15, 2016 Author Share Posted March 15, 2016 Power saving is the main reason. Heat is the secondary reason. This server will be on 24/7, and usage will be minimal (3-4 hours per week usage only). It will also be in a fairly enclosed comms cupboard with no current ventilation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmwills Posted March 15, 2016 Share Posted March 15, 2016 The SSD will generate virtually no heat so why no boot to it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
schoondoggy Posted March 15, 2016 Share Posted March 15, 2016 Forum member TheBiggerMan posted this to give Gen8 owners the ability to boot from the ODD SATA port in AHCI mode using a microSD card: http://homeservershow.com/forums/index.php?/topic/5886-gen8-25-hdd-in-the-odd-bay-discussion/page-3#entry67539 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fury Posted March 15, 2016 Author Share Posted March 15, 2016 Oh thats awesome. I'll give it a shot this weekend and see how it goes. Cheers! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fury Posted March 20, 2016 Author Share Posted March 20, 2016 This process worked great. Only issue i had was the bootsect command didnt work. I ended up creating a boot disc under WHS2011 tools and everything worked fine. Just means i have to use the internal USB over the SD slot (no big deal). Cheers! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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