Good support they apologized and promptly replaced all the sleds today. Now on to updating the BMC, BIOS, AND FCB.
Dell C6100 XS23-TY3 2U 4-Node (8 CPU) Cloud Server
- Thread starter Patrick
- Start date
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Good guide for upgrading c6100 BCM, BIOS, and FCB.
Thanks to Tom Heiber @ Upgrading Dell C6100 BIOS | Altered Realms
Thanks to Tom Heiber @ Upgrading Dell C6100 BIOS | Altered Realms
Another successful mod!
I was able to mod the BIOS for the C6100 to replace the on-board Intel iSCSI/PXE bootloader with iPXE.
It's a bit of work but works like a charm.
iPXE on Dell C6100 (BIOS Mod) | Altered Realms
I was able to mod the BIOS for the C6100 to replace the on-board Intel iSCSI/PXE bootloader with iPXE.
It's a bit of work but works like a charm.
iPXE on Dell C6100 (BIOS Mod) | Altered Realms
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iPXE is a PXE/iSCSI replacement with tons of features like scripting, TFTP, NFS and HTTP support among other things. The neat thing about it is that the ROM can be burned to the firmware of a NIC card (or in my case the BIOS) to completely replace the stock PXE boot loader. Moreover, it can add iSCSI boot capability to network cards that only have PXE boot support. It can also be injected into VMs so you can test your scripts in a virtual environment before pushing stuff into production.
iPXE - open source boot firmware [start]
You can even configure iPXE to boot from official web sites like FreeDOS or WinPE so that it'll always boot the latest version. This can be done via a menu system so in theory every machine on the network can have a bootable Recovery mode via the network. The possibilities are endless. Hell, you can even add iSCSI boot support to WiFi cards.
iPXE - open source boot firmware [start]
You can even configure iPXE to boot from official web sites like FreeDOS or WinPE so that it'll always boot the latest version. This can be done via a menu system so in theory every machine on the network can have a bootable Recovery mode via the network. The possibilities are endless. Hell, you can even add iSCSI boot support to WiFi cards.
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The motherboard ports are 3G maximum. 6G requires the LSISAS2008 SAS/SATA mezzanine board or a PCIe HBA or RAID card.
The ICH9R and ICH10R only support SATA II (3.0gbps) speeds. This, of course, only applies to the 6x on-motherboard ports as one can always add an add-in controller that runs at a higher speed.
"Hey All,
I just purchased my HP DL series drive caddies for the C6100..super stoked.
Now I am looking into the 2.5"" SAS hdds, ...
I am aware that dell drives have a few tweaks to the firmware that makes it play nicer with the rest of the system (MB, mezz, LSI, etc) however, for cost sake there has to be a cheaper alternative to drives on this system without having to pay hundreds for ""dell specific"" drives.
When I do a google shopping search for the 2.5"" sas hdds i get decent prices like This IBM 2.5"" SAS HDD for $75ish
However trying to find Dell HDDs that were made ""specifically"" for this server ends up being in the hundreds of $ when i need enough to run a decent raid setup.
If I understand correctly it shouldn't matter whether I am doing the onboard software raid or if I am using a mezz card for raiding while using something like those hdds listed above...correct?
Or would it involve needing to tweak the mezz firmware?
Thanks
--
Jared"
I just purchased my HP DL series drive caddies for the C6100..super stoked.
Now I am looking into the 2.5"" SAS hdds, ...
I am aware that dell drives have a few tweaks to the firmware that makes it play nicer with the rest of the system (MB, mezz, LSI, etc) however, for cost sake there has to be a cheaper alternative to drives on this system without having to pay hundreds for ""dell specific"" drives.
When I do a google shopping search for the 2.5"" sas hdds i get decent prices like This IBM 2.5"" SAS HDD for $75ish
However trying to find Dell HDDs that were made ""specifically"" for this server ends up being in the hundreds of $ when i need enough to run a decent raid setup.
If I understand correctly it shouldn't matter whether I am doing the onboard software raid or if I am using a mezz card for raiding while using something like those hdds listed above...correct?
Or would it involve needing to tweak the mezz firmware?
Thanks
--
Jared"
Ok, so I'm new to the Infiniband technology.
What copper cables should I get for the MCQH29-XDR? Would any Infiniband QSFP cables work for this card? I'm guessing QSFP the connector type?
I want to uses this setup for Ethernet without an infiniband switch so let me know if I'm going the in the wrong direction here.
Cheers!
What copper cables should I get for the MCQH29-XDR? Would any Infiniband QSFP cables work for this card? I'm guessing QSFP the connector type?
I want to uses this setup for Ethernet without an infiniband switch so let me know if I'm going the in the wrong direction here.
Cheers!
I've tried many different brands of QSFP cable and have had not problems with any of them.
Thanks. I picked these up New MC2206130-003 QSFP x5 for $150 not bad.
Mellanox MC2206130 003 QSFP 40GBS Infiniband Network 3 Meters LOT OF 5 | eBay
Hi Patrick and dba
I am curious as to what HDD choices you guys used for your 2.5" SAS configs?
Read through about 95% of this thread and haven't found anything that you guys claim to be usable....I hope that 5% i skipped wasn't where you state your HDD prefs =)
Thanks
--
jared
I am curious as to what HDD choices you guys used for your 2.5" SAS configs?
Read through about 95% of this thread and haven't found anything that you guys claim to be usable....I hope that 5% i skipped wasn't where you state your HDD prefs =)
Thanks
--
jared
I have a mix of drives. For speed, I use Samsung 830 and 840 pro SATA SSD drives. For cheap capacity, I use Samsung SpinPoint M8 1TB SATA drives. For lab experiments, I have around 100 Seagate Savvio 10K.2 SAS drives that I bought for around $9 each. I have also used a few Intel, Hitachi, HP re-label, and WD SAS or SATA drives in the c6100.
Lately I have been using mostly Samsung 830 and 840 Pro SSDs in the C6100. In the colocation most of the drives are Intel 320 160GB drives. I also have WD Red 3TB drives that I am using for backup targets. Certainly nothing fancy and I do want to get an iSCSI boot setup working for the home lab.