DRAC on R710: serial console

[Adam Huffman]

On Thu, Jun 18, 2009 at 12:01:12PM +0100, Dr A V Le Blanc wrote:
> 
> Thanks very much for the pointer to the documentation, but, if I understand
> this correctly, it means the DRAC 6 cards do not have this functionality.
> To clarify what I am saying, when a machine has a DRAC 5 card, I can
> ssh into this card and give the command
> 
>      connect com2
> 
> for example.  This gives me a line-mode interface to the serial console.
> Thus I can, without having to use a web browser, get a virtual console
> which allows me to change BIOS settings, boot the machine with special
> parameters at boot time, etc.  As far as I can see, I can't do this
> with a DRAC 6 card on a poweredge 710; I was asking whether this is
> correct or not.
> 

I've done this via IPMI 2.0 serial over LAN on a DRAC5 and it looks like
it should be possible on the DRAC6, though I haven't tried it yet.  If
you mean a physical serial connection, I couldn't say.

> As far as my other questions, I have found that the DRAC 6 appears to
> give me access to the system console without having to direct the
> output or the input through a virtual serial interface.  This is
> definitely an improvement over the DRAC 5.  I have now worked out
> configurations which allow me to see messages and to give input to
> the console from the graphical interface which I can start via a
> web browser.
> 

One problem I've seen with the graphical interface is that the virtual
media applet doesn't seem to work on Linux - at least with the Java I
was using.

Adam

> The remaining question has not yet been addressed, and I have no
> solution to it.  Namely: is it possible to send Alt-Sysrq commands
> to a running linux on the 710 via the DRAC?  On some older DRACs
> it was possible to send a break followed by the command character,
> and to have this passed to the kernel.  I have not seen anything
> yet which explains how to do this on the DRAC 6 on the 710.
> 
>      -- Owen
> 
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