Dell C6100 XS23-TY3 2U 4-Node (8 CPU) Cloud Server

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Krazos

New Member
Jun 6, 2013
10
5
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Sweden
From what we have seen, many of the folks in Europe have bought from the US sellers and had them shipped.
Yes I have, and it got delivered about 1½ week after order.

Btw, Where can I find any hard drive bays for SSD's? I bought an intel 520 and it doesnt fit in my c6100.
 

Jaknell1011

New Member
May 14, 2013
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0
I have the M1015 on order and it should be in this week. I am trying to determine the best way to connect the drives all to one node. I found the jumper you referenced and have it enabled. Now I am trying to determine the best way to go about connecting all drives to the motherboard SATA ports and the M1015. I am thinking connect 6 drives from the backplane directly to the SATA ports on the motherboard, then using 8087 cables to connect the other 6 (3 per cable) to the M1015 ports.

"Backplane Column 1" - 3 drives connected to M1015 port 1 using 8087 breakout cable
"Backplane Column 2" - 3 drives connected to M1015 port 2 using 8087 breakout cable
"Backplane Column 3" - 3 drives connected to SATA ports 1,2,3 on node motherboard using SATA cables (recommendations...?)
"Backplane Column 4" - 3 drives connected to SATA ports 4,5,6 on node motherboard using SATA cables (recommendations...?)

Does anyone know of a good cable similar to the stock light blue Dell SATA cables that I can use to connect the 6 SATA ports on the backplane directly to the ports on the node motherboard? I measured it out and it seems they will need to be ~32 inches. I can find SATA cables but none of which are bundled nicely to fit easily. These cables look great but I don't think it's long enough.

6J3R2 DELL CABLE SATA ASSEMBLY FOR DELL C6100

Any other ideas or thoughts? Does this setup checkout OK as long as I get the 6 port SATA cable figured out? Thanks for the help. Trying to get into production in the next week or so.

*EDIT* Also this should mean that the activity LEDs will be functional for all drives, correct? And do I lose anything by not using the SGPIO cables?
**BUMP ON THIS**

I need to get these cables ordered this week if possible. Any advice would be awesome!
 

tiporaro

New Member
Jul 7, 2013
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1
If I read you right, you're trying to connect all 12 drives directly from the backplane to both 1) the 6 SATA ports on the MB and 2) the M1015. Can I ask why you wouldn't want to use the interposer setup for the standard 6 SATA ports and then be able to use the stock dell 6 SATA bundle that you listed? That just leaves running 2 SAS breakouts from the M1015 in a frankensteined manner, instead of all 12 drives direct-wired. Also would mean that if you wanted to remove the sled, you'd just unclip 2 SAS cables from the easy to get to M1015 at the rear of the sled instead of all the MB SATA ports as well.

If I'm reading your question wrong, I apologize in advance.

One other thought in case you didn't see it discussed earlier in this thread: if you do use the interposer board/midplane setup, do realize that its not an even 3/3 split from the SAS channels on the midplane, but rather a 4/2 - That means you will need to change out 1 of the 3 channel SAS cables from the backplane to midplane with a standard SAS 4 channel, and then wire that appropriately to 4 SATA ports on the backplane. I made this mistake myself when wiring 6 drives to a sled and sat there scratching my head why I had an inactive drive bay.
 
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Triggerhappy

Member
Nov 18, 2012
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Any chance someone can measure the exact dimensions of the individual node trays? Thinking of trying to make an enclosure that would hold a single tray and hacking out a workstation out of it.
 

gtallan

New Member
Apr 25, 2013
12
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Minnesota
Wow your server will get baked before noon with that enclosure. I'm actually surprised to see people buy these servers to be used at home.

I really think you should buy portable quarter rack and hookup your servers to it as for the noise, you may switch the fans or simply find a place to host it. Your server will not last with this kind setup.
I think you missed the fact that there is a fan panel in the side. there's plenty of airflow through the box.
 

gtallan

New Member
Apr 25, 2013
12
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1
Minnesota
I very much appreciate the need to quiet these c6100s, and good on you for building your own cabinetry - which is no easy task. That said, the cabinet has me worried. I see two small fans that are likely exhausting air, but I don't see a set of vents to let air in. Even if you do add another vent, the intake air for the server will be mixed with some of the output air, raising the intake temperature significantly. On a ninety degree day, the interior of the cabinet could easily reach 110-120 degrees.
Thanks for the input - it's definitely not clear from the quickie photo, I did put some thought into it (though it's far from perfect, it was a quick hack). When the doors close there is a 2" slot left at the bottom for air intake or outflow, depending which way the fans run. At present the fans are blowing air in, and warm air exits through the slot at the bottom of the doors, which is admittedly fighting basic thermodynamics but was better at fighting the sonic din :)

It's in a conditioned basement so the overall environment isn't that hot. The fans are pretty decent 120v ones, don't remember the power but loosely speaking they seem to move enough air - I do check the server temperatures via the BMC...

Having said that, the fans can still kick up too high and sound can get too loud, even through the BMC sensor temps are not at a worrying level - still need to try the SanAce fans...
 

gtallan

New Member
Apr 25, 2013
12
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Minnesota
Switch looks like 1800-24G to me.
Yes it's an 1800-24G.

It seems ok, and if you need something fanless then it's about the only choice.

At work we still have a lot of old Procurve 2824 and 2848, which are an infinitely better switch, and probably cost less than the 1800 on ebay. But they do have annoying fans and use more power.
 

MiniKnight

Well-Known Member
Mar 30, 2012
3,072
973
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NYC
At home I use fairly basic switching. So power and noise are important to me.

Here's a better question -> when is the last time you've had a switch fail? To me that's what makes them great.
 

s0lid

Active Member
Feb 25, 2013
259
35
28
Tampere, Finland
Yes it's an 1800-24G.

It seems ok, and if you need something fanless then it's about the only choice.

At work we still have a lot of old Procurve 2824 and 2848, which are an infinitely better switch, and probably cost less than the 1800 on ebay. But they do have annoying fans and use more power.
I did a fix for the noise in the past...

Worked well long as i had the switch.
 

idea

Member
May 19, 2011
86
5
8
Can someone tell me where I can find the chassis intrusion switch on the c6100? While I am working on it, I want to run mine with the cover slightly off, and I don't want the fans to run at full speed
 

PigLover

Moderator
Jan 26, 2011
3,184
1,545
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As far as I've been able to tell there is no chassis intrusion switch. With the top cover off you lose all pressure and airflow over the top trays. Without airflow everything starts to heat up very quickly and the fans ramp to full speed to try and compensate - which they can never succeed at no matter how fast they run.

If you want to run it with the cover off try getting a household fan and blow into the top of the chassis. I've done this and the fans slow back down nicely as things cool down.
 

ascareg

New Member
Jul 10, 2013
13
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Portland, OR
My problem was that it wouldn't ever slow the fans down. It would start at a high speed and stay there. Very loud. :| I tried all the different power management settings to no avail. Another problem was that it was not displaying anything for fan rpm under the server health section of IPMI. I talked to my ebay seller (pdneiman - Amazing guy! Loads of help) and he sent me a new enclosure (no nodes or power supply) with the PIC18 board in it. That has solved all my problems. Now the fans go to full power at boot and then cycle down to about 3600rpm. I still have the old enclosure (need to ship soon) and can document the changes between the two if you like. The only obvious differences are the PDBs and FCB.

I'm also looking at the San Ace fans but for now the sound level is acceptable to me. Might do it in the near future anyways to cut down on the sound some more.

I've had my C6100 for about a few days and I've been poking around, reading a lot on these forums. The one thing that has been truly disappointing has been the noise.

I saw people flashing the FCB firmware as part of the "calm down the fans" process, but then ran into the issues with PIC16. When I first read OrangesOfCourse's comment about a problem with the PIC16, I was really hopeful mine were having that "problem" :) so I could maybe talk to my seller about it, but now it seems my PIC16 FCB is probably doing what it does, and that is simply run fans faster than the PIC18.

amlife commented about the different behaviors of the different models:
FCB PCI16 oprate at 7700 RPM (that takes about extra 1 AMP).

FCB PCI18 oprate at 4800 RPM. (Good Power savings).

So, is this pretty much the deal? If I have a PIC16 the fans are going to run fast (loud) and if I want it quieter, I could swap out fans, but really I need the PIC18?
 

ascareg

New Member
Jul 10, 2013
13
2
3
Portland, OR
**BUMP ON THIS**

I need to get these cables ordered this week if possible. Any advice would be awesome!
Dragon posted a while back ( http://forums.servethehome.com/f18/...ode-8-cpu-cloud-server-1247-11.html#post12284 ) about slimline SATA cables, 5 of them being equal in thickness to a standard cable... from the pics, they look very much like the cables that comprise the 3 or 6 sata bundles made for the C6100 blades.

I decided to buy a 6J3R2, but I hadn't seen those before. That said, at $8 each, you can probably get the 6J3R2 for less than 6 of them, or 3 of the slims for less than a 6J3R2 if you alread have the Dell 3-sata bundle cable.
 

idea

Member
May 19, 2011
86
5
8
As far as I've been able to tell there is no chassis intrusion switch. With the top cover off you lose all pressure and airflow over the top trays. Without airflow everything starts to heat up very quickly and the fans ramp to full speed to try and compensate - which they can never succeed at no matter how fast they run.

If you want to run it with the cover off try getting a household fan and blow into the top of the chassis. I've done this and the fans slow back down nicely as things cool down.
Something must be wrong. I put the cover back on and they still run at full speed. Gonna have to fix that cause it's really annoying. I haven't seen any ideas on google yet
 

idea

Member
May 19, 2011
86
5
8
Has anyone posted a guide on how to upgrade firmware on these boxes? I see there is BIOS, BMC, and FCB firmware to be loaded