The Dell PowerEdge C6220 Thread

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Oct 9, 2016
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I wish to know

1) There are any incompatibilities/problems using SSD with this board ?
2) You stated that there are 4+2 sata ports but I have only four 3,5" bays for each node. I suppose they are all not connected to the backpanel. I do I connect 2 (3Gbps) +2 (6Gbps) or 2+2 (3Gbps)
3) Is there any problem with TRIM/TEMPERATURE Sensors and so on ?
4) Could be configured to RAID using SSDs ?

Thanks in advance
 

Impire

New Member
Nov 13, 2016
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Hello everyone,

Could you please shed some lights on newbie questions on the C6220?

1) Is there a sure way to tell whether I have a C6220 of C6220 II? Beside knowing the cpu and memory can support "UP TO" a certain speed and version, I don't see a physical way to identify the two.

I was able to move the cable on the back plane to another port for one of the nodes and it can see 6 hard drives. On the BIOS, I also see the default speed set to 6.0gbps with options of 3gb and 1.5gb (picture attached). Does this mean it's a C6220 II?

2) Can someone confirm a successful update to BIOS 2.71 for the C6220? On Dell's website, it only goes up to v2.53. But via the below link, it have v2.71.

If you have successfully updated, could you please advise this will work on both C6220 and C6220 II? Also, the BMC update only go up to 2.53. Will it have problem when pushing BIOS to 2.71?

3) Beside being more reliable, is there an advantage to having SSD drives over SAS or SATA in these servers? Speed wise, it still hit a bottleneck of either 3GB or 6GB.

4) If I understand correctly, either the C6220 and C6220 II have a built-in SAS controller, but I need a cable to connect it to the backplane for it to work?

5) Has anyone been able to get this server to work with 12GB/s controllers with 12Gb/s SAS drives?

6) This video show both servers can work with a MicroSD card. Have anyone been able to successfully achieve that?


6) Has any one been able to get a USB 3.0 card installed on these server?


Thank you in advance for your help.
 

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frogtech

Well-Known Member
Jan 4, 2016
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The C6220 II mobo is slightly different from the C6220 version I. You can tell if you have II nodes if you look at the front of the PCB(opposite end of where the I/O is). There should be two SATA ports and one mini SAS HD looking port that uses a right angle connector.
 

Impire

New Member
Nov 13, 2016
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The C6220 II mobo is slightly different from the C6220 version I. You can tell if you have II nodes if you look at the front of the PCB(opposite end of where the I/O is). There should be two SATA ports and one mini SAS HD looking port that uses a right angle connector.
Thank you very much. Do you happen to have a picture sample? This video seems to show what you are describing, but it is being described as C6620:

 

frogtech

Well-Known Member
Jan 4, 2016
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Thank you very much. Do you happen to have a picture sample? This video seems to show what you are describing, but it is being described as C6620:

Look towards the midplane connectors at the bottom of the pic. Two sata ports and one SAS connector.

 

frogtech

Well-Known Member
Jan 4, 2016
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Thank you very much! Can you help with the BIOS 2.71 and 2.53 question?
Unfortunately not as I've never owned a C6220 :( reason being is my understanding is that not all of the 6220 chassis are compatible with the gen II nodes, and, how you would tell what kind of chassis you have is beyond me.
 

Impire

New Member
Nov 13, 2016
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Just a thought.

The C6220 have 4 independent nodes but shared the same backplane. What if something go wrong with the backplane? Would that not take down the entire 4 nodes.

I am planning to deploy openstack on these servers. Plan to use one of these as 4 controller nodes and the other servers as compute nodes. Would it be better to use one node from each servers as opposed to dedicate one of these servers to be the controller nodes? I keep thinking if the backplane fail for any reason, that would essentially take down the entire controller sector.

Any input would be utmost appreciated.
 

frogtech

Well-Known Member
Jan 4, 2016
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In C6220 one pair of nodes only share one backplane. However they all share same PDU like most any other server.
 

Jb boin

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May 26, 2016
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Grenoble, France
www.phpnet.org
Thank you very much! Can you help with the BIOS 2.71 and 2.53 question?
As i already told multiple times on this topic, the 2.7.1 BIOS works just fine on C6220 (not II) but it might not make a difference to 2.5.3 as the changelog is related to II specific functions.

As for the SSD, i had many issues with LSI 9265 RAID cards, SSDs were randomly dropping (especially at boot) and i didnt have any issues with SSDs without the RAID card, i removed the cards on the 8 nodes i had with them and i am now used these on other servers without any issues (but i only use those with disks, not SSDs).

The 2 first ports are working at 6Gbps while the others are limited to 3Gbps.
 

Impire

New Member
Nov 13, 2016
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In C6220 one pair of nodes only share one backplane. However they all share same PDU like most any other server.
Thank you very much. How are the sharing of backplane configured? Is it 1/2 then 3/4 or 1/3 then 2/4?
 

Impire

New Member
Nov 13, 2016
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Hello,

I have a C6220 with dual nodes, LFF, 12 3.5" hard drives. Can I get node#1 to see all 6 hard drives? I played around with the cable that connected to backplane. However, no matter what I do, it will only see drives 5 drives:

- First 3 hard drives detected fine (drive 0-2).
- Drive #3 cannot be detected.
- Drive 4-5 detected fine.

I tried the same thing with the second node. Moved the SATA cable from backplane of Node#1 to Node#2, still see only 5 drives.

When I put them back the way it was, both nodes can see up to 3 drives no problem. This mean there's nothing wrong with the port of the drives. Any help is greatly appreciated.
 

dani17

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Aug 21, 2017
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Hi.

Nevermind. I think I got it sorted out.

How did you manage to have it? (4 3.5'' HDD per node with 3 nodes)
We are trying to do it, but the C6220 HDD Zoning tools says that is only for the 2.5'' 24hdd backplane.

We have a server that has it already (3 nodes with 4 HDD per node), and 1 that only has 3 HDD per node, lossing 3 slots, but haven't found how to change it. (Cabling is connected in the same way in both)

Thanks a lot "dwright1542" or "Giuseppe Chillemi" if you could explain how to change/do it .
 
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