Hi all, On to my next question about running 6.0 on a Dell PE1850, since it seems that the RAID card will work just fine... I'm thinking about getting the machine with a DRAC4 remote management card. This looks to be OS-independent (you can configure through the BIOS) so I expect it will just work. I've seen various posts talking about how it tends to take over the keyboard and render the real console inaccessible, but there are workarounds for that. Does anyone have the console redirection working? I'd like to leave the 'real' console (actually a USB keyboard attached to a KVM) active so the machine is accessible to someone actually in the server room, but still be able to get to the console remotely when necessary. The Dell docs imply that you can just point a browser at the DRAC and fire up a new console, but I'd like to hear from someone who's done this with FreeBSD! Apologies for all the dumb questions... I'd try all this stuff myself but the hardware isn't here yet and has to go into production pretty quickly once it arrives. All the similar machines in the building are already running Windows and someone would object if I 'liberated' any of them :) Cheers, Scott -- ==========================================================================Scott Mitchell | PGP Key ID | "Eagles may soar, but weasels Cambridge, England | 0x54B171B9 | don't get sucked into jet engines" scott at fishballoon.org | 0xAA775B8B | -- Anon
Scott Mitchell wrote:> Hi all, > > On to my next question about running 6.0 on a Dell PE1850, since it seems > that the RAID card will work just fine... > > I'm thinking about getting the machine with a DRAC4 remote management card. > This looks to be OS-independent (you can configure through the BIOS) so I > expect it will just work. I've seen various posts talking about how it > tends to take over the keyboard and render the real console inaccessible, > but there are workarounds for that.I'm not sure about that, but I have 15 of these machines in locations all over Ontario, running Windows2003 Server. To make the thing as secure as possible, there is no keyboard or monitor on the server, I attach through the client's LAN. The DRAC gets a static IP on the local subnet, so using a laptop with a connection (hard or wireless), I can access and control the server from inside the server room, from an office or desk in the building, or from anywhere in the world there is an Internet connection. The last option means having VPN access to the local building network.> Does anyone have the console redirection working? I'd like to leave the > 'real' console (actually a USB keyboard attached to a KVM) active so the > machine is accessible to someone actually in the server room, but still be > able to get to the console remotely when necessary. The Dell docs imply > that you can just point a browser at the DRAC and fire up a new console, > but I'd like to hear from someone who's done this with FreeBSD!Works for me! It's really cool! You can access multiple servers through additional browser windows. As long as there is another computer in the server room with access to your server, they can control it through the browser interface. No KBD or monitor are necessary. I'd like to assume FreeBSD will "just work". Ralph
Hi there, Scott Mitchell wrote:> Hi all, > > > I'm thinking about getting the machine with a DRAC4 remote management card. > This looks to be OS-independent (you can configure through the BIOS) so I > expect it will just work. I've seen various posts talking about how it > tends to take over the keyboard and render the real console inaccessible, > but there are workarounds for that.I don't know about the DRAC with FreeBSD, but I assume that the BIOS of this Dell still supports BIOS redirection to serial port. If so, you can have Monitor and Keyboard connected locally and use the serial console remote. Just get a small console server (depending on the amount of servers you have remote), for instance an old cyclades TS. Connect them and you can get on your serial port through the console server via ssh. There you go ;) ssh username:yourserver@console-server A pretty nice way to do remote management. HTH, Marian PS.: If you need additional informations, ask me. At work we have approx 1000 servers (appr. 300 dell's) remote managed with console servers. And it's working fine.
On Fri, Jan 06, 2006 at 01:57:17PM +0000, Scott Mitchell wrote:> Hi all, > > On to my next question about running 6.0 on a Dell PE1850, since it seems > that the RAID card will work just fine... > > I'm thinking about getting the machine with a DRAC4 remote management card. > This looks to be OS-independent (you can configure through the BIOS) so I > expect it will just work. I've seen various posts talking about how it > tends to take over the keyboard and render the real console inaccessible, > but there are workarounds for that. > > Does anyone have the console redirection working? I'd like to leave the > 'real' console (actually a USB keyboard attached to a KVM) active so the > machine is accessible to someone actually in the server room, but still be > able to get to the console remotely when necessary. The Dell docs imply > that you can just point a browser at the DRAC and fire up a new console, > but I'd like to hear from someone who's done this with FreeBSD! > > Apologies for all the dumb questions... I'd try all this stuff myself but > the hardware isn't here yet and has to go into production pretty quickly > once it arrives. All the similar machines in the building are already > running Windows and someone would object if I 'liberated' any of them :)Following up to myself for the benefit of the archives - I can confirm that the DRAC4 works very well with FreeBSD, and turns out to be quite a useful piece of kit. The DRAC attaches itself as a USB keyboard which on this system at least was probed as ukbd0, so I was able to install using the remote console (a Java applet downloaded from the DRAC's web server). The _really_ cool feature is the remote CD/floppy support - I was able to boot the 1850 off a 6.0 CD *in my local workstation* and do the entire install without ever going near it, so it could have been on the other side of the planet, not just in the next room. Pretty neat IMHO. After a bit of fiddling with kbdmux(4) and devd.conf I was able to get a second UDB keyboard on a KVM working as well. There are a few magic runes needed to boot single-user, but I expect all that to become a lot easier with the kbdmux(4) changes coming in 6.1. The DRAC can be configured to send out email alerts when interesting events happen - it will tell you when eg. RAID drives die and come back online, and I expect also when temperature limits etc. are reached. It also has console redirection to the serial ports, which I *believe* can also be reached via the telnet or SSH interface, but I haven't got around to setting that up yet (and rebooting the machine to tweak the BIOS now it's live would make me unpopular) Anyway, if you're buying a Dell server of any kind I can highly recommend getting one of these cards with it. Cheers, Scott -- ==========================================================================Scott Mitchell | PGP Key ID | "Eagles may soar, but weasels Cambridge, England | 0x54B171B9 | don't get sucked into jet engines" scott at fishballoon.org | 0xAA775B8B | -- Anon