Poweredge 860

Tue Jun 16 16:32:15 CDT 2009

-KVM only to fix updates/recompiles that go south at remote sites...

Sent on the Now Network™ from my Sprint® BlackBerry

-----Original Message-----
From: Adrian Schmitz <aschmitz at lehighgas.com>

Date: Tue, 16 Jun 2009 17:22:32 
To: 'markdundore at westernintl.com'<markdundore at westernintl.com>
Cc: Dell Linux PowerEdge MailingList<linux-poweredge at lists.us.dell.com>
Subject: RE: Poweredge 860

As far as I know, KVM depends mostly on VNC for remote console access, so if remote audio is a necessity and you're not doing it through some other means (RDP, etc) then KVM may not be a good fit for you.

-Adrian

From: Mark Dundore [mailto:markdundore at westernintl.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 4:06 PM
To: Adrian Schmitz; 'ChaseBolt'; Brian McGrew
Cc: Dell Linux PowerEdge MailingList
Subject: Re: Poweredge 860

These will be hosting critical VMs running apps that automate manufacturing processes. I have XP boxes remoting into these VMs, so they not only need audi, but also audio...

Will probably duplicate the VMs onto a secondary box and do upgrades on the secondary- then swap roles I can send an upgraded RAID array and copy the VMs from the primary if it goes south.

The test-bed is an 860- all the rest are on 2950s

-Mark

Sent on the Now Network(tm) from my Sprint(r) BlackBerry

________________________________
From: Adrian Schmitz
Date: Tue, 16 Jun 2009 15:46:44 -0400
To: 'markdundore at westernintl.com'<markdundore at westernintl.com>; 'ChaseBolt'<cbolt at datinggold.com>; Brian McGrew<brian at visionpro.com>
Subject: RE: Poweredge 860
We have DRAC cards in our PE servers.. priceless :). Not sure if those are available on the 860 or not. If not, then yes maybe a network KVM and PDU would do the trick if budget allows. Otherwise I guess just put your new kernel build in place, reboot and cross your fingers, if you have the stomach for that sort of thing.

From: Mark Dundore [mailto:markdundore at westernintl.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 3:37 PM
To: Adrian Schmitz; 'ChaseBolt'; Brian McGrew
Cc: Dell Linux PowerEdge MailingList
Subject: Re: Poweredge 860

That's useful info! How do you automate a build at the other end of a T1 (with no local tech)? Get a good PDU/KVM combo for remote console?

-Mark

Sent on the Now Network(tm) from my Sprint(r) BlackBerry

________________________________
From: Adrian Schmitz
Date: Tue, 16 Jun 2009 15:23:44 -0400
To: 'markdundore at westernintl.com'<markdundore at westernintl.com>; 'ChaseBolt'<cbolt at datinggold.com>; Brian McGrew<brian at visionpro.com>
Subject: RE: Poweredge 860
We did some testing in our lab of KVM and Xen and we found that KVM, at least in its later versions suited us pretty well. From memory, I think what we found was that Ubuntu shipped with KVM kernel modules that were mature enough for our environment. In our shop we use Openmanage to expose a number of parameters on our PE servers for monitoring by Nagios with SNMP. Unfortunately, we have had mixed luck with Openmanage on Ubuntu, whereas it's worked quite well for us under CentOS. In the end we found that CentOS with a current kernel build, current KVM build and current libvirt build worked nicely, and once we established a procedure for putting it together it's not the ordeal we worried it might be.

As far as patching of the kernel, KVM, and libvirt.. in our particular environment it's adequate for us to manually update the builds periodically. For more sensitive applications, I'm thinking some automation would be in order.

-Adrian

From: Mark Dundore [mailto:markdundore at westernintl.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 2:55 PM
To: Adrian Schmitz; 'Chase Bolt'; Brian McGrew
Cc: Mark Dundore; Dell Linux PowerEdge MailingList
Subject: Re: Poweredge 860

I'm pulling down the ISO now (at a blazing 24kb. ;) Is that KVM custom compile something you developed in-house? Also, what does the patching picture look like? (hate to recompile every time you turn around)...

Thanks,
Mark

Sent on the Now Network(tm) from my Sprint(r) BlackBerry

________________________________
From: Adrian Schmitz
Date: Tue, 16 Jun 2009 14:19:06 -0400
To: 'Chase Bolt'<cbolt at datinggold.com>; Brian McGrew<brian at visionpro.com>
Subject: RE: Poweredge 860
Agreed.. CentOS 5.2/5.3 here as well.. on a mix of PE 1900s, 1950s, 2950s, and R805s. It's treated us very well. For our virtual infrastructure we use CentOS with a custom kernel (>2.6.27) and KVM/libvirt..

-Adrian

From: linux-poweredge-bounces at lists.us.dell.com [mailto:linux-poweredge-bounces at lists.us.dell.com] On Behalf Of Chase Bolt
Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 1:54 PM
To: Brian McGrew
Cc: Mark Dundore; Dell Linux PowerEdge Mailing List
Subject: Re: Poweredge 860

We stick with CentOS 5.2/5.3 also. Along with XenServer for our VM infrastructure that we have been fiddling with.

Brian McGrew wrote:
CentOS 5.2/5.3 has ALWAYS been good to me on Dell Servers.

Fedora works well too but it's been a long time since I've been down the Fedora road.

-b

On 6/16/09 10:40 AM, "Mark Dundore" <markdundore at westernintl.com> wrote:
I am just starting out trying to put Linux on a poweredge.  I have been tinkering with Ubuntu without much success. 4x and 8x write speeds won't boot.  16x speed boots, but complains about corrupt files.  Is there a different flavor of Linux that is recommended?  I am trying to run an XP VM with audi output (otherwise I would go with ESX).

Thanks in advance.

-Mark

________________________________
_______________________________________________
Linux-PowerEdge mailing list
Linux-PowerEdge at lists.us.dell.com
https://lists.us.dell.com/mailman/listinfo/linux-poweredge
Please read the FAQ at http://lists.us.dell.com/faq

--

________________________________

_______________________________________________

Linux-PowerEdge mailing list

Linux-PowerEdge at lists.us.dell.com<mailto:Linux-PowerEdge at lists.us.dell.com>

https://lists.us.dell.com/mailman/listinfo/linux-poweredge

Please read the FAQ at http://lists.us.dell.com/faq

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.us.dell.com/pipermail/linux-poweredge/attachments/20090616/5a2f2cd7/attachment-0001.htm 