When will Ubuntu be supported with Intel VROC?

[DWall21]

We recently purchased Supermicro servers with M.2 root drives and Intel VROC hybrid RAID controllers. We configured the disks in BIOS and found that the RAID group was not visible during the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS install. We had to use the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS HWE install until Intel supports Ubuntu. Is Ubuntu support coming soon?

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, DWall21.

Good day,

Thank you for contacting the Intel Community Support.

I checked your ticket regarding Ubuntu and Intel® VROC, I will be glad to assist you.

We are not able to provide information/comments regarding unannounced updates or products, please also bear in mind that Intel® VROC is an enterprise-oriented solution and its supported configurations will also depend on your system manufacturer, in your case Supermicro, they may provide other details regarding supported configurations.

You can use the document below as a reference, currently listing SUSE Linux Enterprise and RedHat Enterprise:

• Intel VROC supported configurations: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000030310/memory-and-storage/ssd-software.html

If you have other questions or concerns, just let me know.

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel

[DWall21]

Hi Bruce - Supermicro has indicated they will support it. They won't sell me a configuration that isn't supported by them. My question referred to the Intel document that you reference. That document only lists RHEL, SLES, and Windows. That implies that Intel will only support this configuration with those operating systems and not Ubuntu. My question remains when will Intel add Ubuntu support to that document?

Sorry if I was unclear in my question.

Thanks,

Dan

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, DWall21.

Thank you for the response.

We currently do not have an update regarding Ubuntu support for Intel® VROC, this is the reason why we cannot comment or provide information besides what is publicly available in the document of supported configurations.

This being said, I cannot assure you that it will or will not be supported in the future.

Let me know if you have other questions or concerns.

Regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, DWall21.

I wanted to follow up on your thread to check if you have other questions or if you would like to close the ticket.

Let me know if I can be of assistance.

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel

[DWall21 · Accepted solution]

Forgive me for not responding sooner as I was working on the problem. I had shared your reply with my Supermicro and Canonical contacts as well as continuing to test on our machines. The actual ownership for supporting the VROC drivers and features lies with Canonical (for Ubuntu). They are researching support for the Intel VROC hardware. We also were at the same time able to get the base Ubuntu 18.04 LTS install to recognize the VROC based RAID1 group. I am told that covers the basic RAID functionality, but not the complete feature set from Intel. Canonical is looking at the additional features of VROC. MY hope here is that when Canonical completes that, they will make it part of their mainstream code, and they will notify you so that you can include it on your documentation.

Sorry, but a long way to say yes, I appreciate your help and you can close my case.

Thanks,

Dan

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, DWall21.

Thank you for the response and for all the additional information.

That is certainly good to hear, thank you for letting me know.

If we can be of assistance in the future, you can always contact us back.

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

A Contingent Worker at Intel