From the category archives:

Hardware

DELL Tutorial: Create RAID Using PERC 6/i Integrated BIOS Configuration Utility

by Ramesh Natarajan on May 4, 2009

DELL Server LSI Logic Create Hardware RAID
Disk space is never enough. On an on-going basis system administrators will be getting request to increase the disk space on a server.

In this article, let us review how to add new physical disks and create a virtual disk with a RAID configuration on an DELL PowerEdge Server using PERC 6/i Integrated BIOS Configuration Utility.

The new DELL Servers has the ability to create RAID 0, 1, 5, 6 and 10 using the hardware controller.

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Overview Of PoE – Power Over Ethernet Concepts and Devices List

by Ramesh Natarajan on January 23, 2009

Photo courtesy of Olivander

1. What is PoE – Power Over Ethernet?

Power over Ethernet (PoE) does exactly what it says — it carries power over ethernet cables. So, an ethernet cables caries both data and current together to operate devices like wi-fi access points. This is very helpful to install wi-fi access points in ceilings, where it is hard to find power outlets. Only smaller devices can be powered using the PoE, as it carries limited power over the ethernet.
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How To Get Hardware Specs of Your System Using lshw Hardware Lister

by Ramesh Natarajan on December 22, 2008

Photo courtesy of viagallery.com

This is a guest post written by SathiyaMoorthy.

lshw (Hardware Lister) command gives a comprehensive report about all hardware in your system. This displays detailed information about manufacturer, serial number of the system, motherboard, CPU, RAM, PCI cards, disks, network card etc.,

Using lshw, you can get information about the hardware without touching a screwdriver to open the server chassis. This is also very helpful when the server is located in a remote data center, where you don’t have physical access to the server.

In our previous article, we discussed about how to display hardware information on linux using dmidecode command. In this article, let us review how to view the hardware specifications using lshw command.
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WOL Wakeonlan Guide: Turn On Servers Remotely Without Physical Access

by Ramesh Natarajan on November 27, 2008

Photo courtesy of Jamison Judd

This is a guest post written by SathiyaMoorthy.

Wakeonlan (wol) enables you to switch ON remote servers without physically accessing it. Wakeonlan sends magic packets to wake-on-LAN enabled ethernet adapters and motherboards to switch on remote computers.

By mistake, when you shutdown a system instead of rebooting, you can use Wakeonlan to power on the server remotely. Also, If you have a server that don’t need to be up and running 24×7, you can turn off and turn on the server remotely anytime you want.

This article gives a brief overview of Wake-On-LAN and instructions to set up Wakeonlan feature.
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How To Manage Dell Servers using OMSA – OpenManage Server Administrator On Linux

by Ramesh Natarajan on November 17, 2008

[Dell Server] OMSA is a web based application to manage DELL PowerEdge Servers. Using OMSA you can perform proactive system monitoring, system diagnosis, troubleshoot hardware issues and configure RAID etc., You can also view and manage hardware’s embedded system management (ESM) log using OMSA.

This is an jumpstart guide that explains how to install Dell OMSA on Linux. I have also provided few screenshots of DELL OMSA web application.
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How To Get Hardware Information On Linux Using dmidecode Command

by Ramesh Natarajan on November 10, 2008

Photo courtesy of B Naveen Kumar

dmidecode command reads the system DMI table to display hardware and BIOS information of the server. Apart from getting current configuration of the system, you can also get information about maximum supported configuration of the system using dmidecode. For example, dmidecode gives both the current RAM on the system and the maximum RAM supported by the system.

This article provides an overview of the dmidecode and few practical examples on how to use dmidecode command.
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View DELL Service Tag and Express Service Code From Linux and Windows

by Ramesh Natarajan on October 24, 2008

[Dell Server] When you call DELL customer support for any help, they will ask for either Service Tag or Express Service Code. You also need service tag to download drivers and documentations from DELL support website.

When you have physical access to the system, you can easily identify the service tag affixed on the body of the server. DELL support site shows the exactly location of the service tag and express code stickers for various DELL equipments.

When you don’t have physical access to the server, you can get the same information remotely from the OS level. Using Windows or Linux command line you can easily get DELL service tag as explained below.
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10 Tips to Use Your Hardware and Software Vendor Support Effectively

by Ramesh Natarajan on September 29, 2008

Photo courtesy of wraithtdk

Companies purchase support for most of their enterprise hardwares (servers, switches, routers, firewalls etc.,) and softwares (databases, OS, applications, frameworks etc.,). They spend lot of cash on support mainly for two reasons: 1) To get help from vendors to fix critical production issues 2) To keep up-to-date with the latest version of the software and security patches released by the vendors. In this article, I’ve given 10 practical tips for DBAs, sysadmins and developers to use their hardware and software support effectively.
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