This TechTuesday chat is open-topic discussion format. Bring your questions, comments, ideas, and expertise on any enterprise technology or data center subject you'd like to discuss with the group.




Technical Community - Background Reading

Chat Transcript



erson Any news regarding Dell PowerEdge 6300 and Dell PowerEdge with Intel Xeon 5500? I'm dying to know the port configuration.
Dell-Jeff_S We don't have anything yet... I did ping the network team today to see if they'd be up for a chat in the near future.
erson Can you guys say anything about the major firmware update for EqualLogic in a couple of months?
Dell-Jeff_S Erson, I've actually been working with the PowerConnect Product group guys quite a bit as of late for the Interop conference. I could probably find out anything you want to know.
erson Jeff, I primarily want to know about the port configuration -- fixed ports and module slots and how many 10GbE ports on those modules.
Dell-Jeff_S Ok, I'll see what I can find out.
shanfont We are ordering about 80 Dell desktops soon and I'm debating whether to get them with vPro. Do I need a central console to manage them?
erson If you're getting Dell OptiPlex with DQ57 you have KVM over IP, which is pretty awesome.
Dell-Jeff_S Scott is the systems management expert.
don I was wondering if anyone can provide a good white paper, or other documentation, that provides a good overview of Dell Management Console (DMC). I am brand new to Dell Management Console (DMC) and just installed the server.
erson The latest business Intel chipset for Intel Core i3, i5, i7 socket 1156 processors.
Dell-ScottH Here's the main place to get information or ask questions on DMC. It’s monitored by all the engineers. http://en.community.dell.com/dell-groups/dell-management-console/default.aspx
erson Any schedule for DMC on Win2008?
Dell-ScottH All the files, papers and demos are here. http://en.community.dell.com/dell-groups/dell-management-console/m/dell_management_console-mediagallery/default.aspx
Dell-ScottH Coming next point release. Let me pull up the spreadsheet.
erson So maybe in a couple of months?
erson Does that include support for Win2008 R2?
erson Hoosiercab, it doesn't seem to lessen the amount of questions, though :)
erson Internal question round-robin engine is a bit buggy. Not a single question for kongy so far.
Dell-Jeff_S What chat topics would you guys like to see?
erson Dell-kongy, Whatever happend to the update to these Dell Hyper-V best practices? http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/software/hyperv/en/index.htm
Dell-ScottH And we just announced our Caption Contest to win trip to VMWorld . Kong just posted a blog on that, too.
Dell-KongY Erson, the Dell VSE team is updating their Hyper-V BRCs. There should be some documentation releases soon
Dell-Jeff_S http://en.community.dell.com/dell-blogs/b/tech-center/archive/2010/04/20/dell-kicks-it-to-10gbe-at-interop-2010.aspx
erson http://www.delltechcenter.com/page/win+a+trip+to+vmworld+2010
Dell-KongY Win the Dell Techcenter Caption Contest and get a trip to Vmworld 2010! http://bit.ly/d2lxlh
Dell-ScottH Here's Kong's blog on the VMWorld Caption Contest. http://en.community.dell.com/dell-blogs/b/tech-center/archive/2010/04/20/hello-vmworld-2010.aspx
Dell-ScottH And kris10dell is looking for some people to highlight with a case study.
HoosierCAB The newest stuff I haveare Dell PowerEdge R710s, so I guess I'm out.
Dell-ScottH If you have deployed new servers with the The Nehalem EX Xeon 7500's, give her a shout.
Dell-ScottH Did you guys get some of the new boxes?
Don_Wake_-_Emulex I was reading the DMC Wiki page. Good stuff.
Dell-ScottH http://en.community.dell.com/dell-groups/dell-management-console/default.aspx
mwdt73 Scott, how much does it cost to replace the physical RAID Controllers?
Dell-ScottH What server?
Dell-ScottH Which adapter?
erson $22,000 SEK with SAS. It must be quite a lot cheaper if I shop around.
mwdt73 Dell PowerEdge 2950.
Don_Wake_-_Emulex I've updated our Dell PowerEdge M1000s at Emulex Labs doing lab geek methods for updating CMC code and BIOS. I'd like to learn how to use the iDRAC tools the way you are supposed to do it in the field.
Dell-ScottH Is it a Dell PowerEdge Expandable RAID Controller (PERC) 5/i or 5/e, the onboard one or a card ?
mwdt73 How about as a gift to make up for the Dell OptiPlex GX520 headaches? lol
Dell-DennisS Mwdt72, Scott, probably a PERC 5i. You can get those on Ebay for around $200 -$250.
shanfont Scott, on our Dell PowerEdge M1000e's, we will probably never fill up the whole chassis so should I start going with full height blades?
Dell-DennisS Michael, how many more of those are causing you problems?
erson Shanfont, you gain more memory slots, 4 LAN on motherboard (LOM) instead of 2, and 4 mezzanine slots if you go with the Dell PowerEdge M710 instead of the Dell PowerEdge M610.
Dell-ScottH Shane, if you need the I/O, that's what you'll get going full height -- more I/O slots and more memory slots.
erson And 4 HDDs instead of two. I went with the Dell PowerEdge M710.
shanfont I can use more mezzanine slots. Thanks.
Dell-ScottH Get you some Dell PowerEdge M910’s.
Dell-ScottH Then get Kris10dell to do another case study :-)
Dell-KongY Shanfont, what's your I/O Modules (IOM) on your Dell PowerEdge M1000e's?
mwdt73 Scott, so if I didn’t go with a new RAID Controller, I can still see 4 of the 6 drives. Can I break the virtual disk, reimage the server and not run a RAID configuration? Or can I run RAID 0?
Dell-ScottH It doesn't see 2 of the drives?
mwdt73 Yes, only 2 of the 6 are shown as missing.
Dell-ScottH What troubleshooting have you done so far ?
Dell-ScottH I'm assuming no Os and we are at bare metal at this point?
HoosierCAB That's usually a backplane or cable issue, not a failed card.
mwdt73 Not much. I rebooted and reseated the cables I could get to. I didn’t want to tear it all apart.
Dell-KongY Mwdt73, are you sure the backplane HDD slots of the Dell PowerEdge 2950 are not bad?
mwdt73 I should tear it apart, put it together and see if reseating the cables fixes it?
Dell-ScottH You can find the backplane through Google search. http://www.txcesssurplus.com/servlet/the-2722/dell-dy037-poweredge-2950/detail
HoosierCAB mwdt73, it might also be worth it to swap the backplane board if you have another Dell PowerEdge 2950 to spare.
mwdt73 I don't have a spare; this is the only Dell PowerEdge 2950 we have. I think it was a sample given to us from Dell.
Dell-ScottH Erson, DMC W2008 and R2 come out in the third quarter.
erson When are you getting that Dell PowerEdge R910 in the lab?And with what configuration?
Dell-ScottH The Dell PowerEdge R910 ships to us in about 2 weeks.
erson What tests have you lined up?
Dell-ScottH 512GB - 4 x Intel Xeon X7560 processor.
shanfont For the Dell PowerEdge M910, should I go with the 10GbE for future growth even though I don't have the network for it?
Don_Wake_-_Emulex I'm all about using the Emulex CNA. www.emulex.com/dellblog
erson Dell PowerEdge M910, or just get the mezzanines later.
erson Dell PowerEdge S/M910.
Dell-ScottH Erson, we haven't done our usual "how many VMs can I cram on a box and how much power does it draw" paper. We will likely do this test first, respin of these two papers. http://www.dell.com/downloads/global/power/20070201-muirhead_preprint_new.pdf http://www.delltechcenter.com/page/power+savings+through+consolidation
erson IBM published a killer VMmark for 32-core. It more than doubled the previous rating and tiles of the previous leader. I'm assuming Dell is working on a VMmark as well?
Don_Wake_-_Emulex I would love to see a Dell study of the Emulex OneConnect Mezzanine card doing FCoE and NIC in a Dell PowerEdge M910 with VMWare 4.0.
Dell-KongY Erson, the Dell Storage Performance Analysis (SPA) team is also working on a VMmark result. I don’t know the ETA though it should be out soon.
erson I wonder what HP is up to with the Intel Xeon Nehalem EX?. I thought the register that you posted had some interesting ideas
Dell-ScottH The lone comment on that article was insightful.