Blade server question

darktiger

[H]ard|DCer of the Month - April 2007
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Okay my friend has this off brand blade server with no input devices (no floppy, no cd/dvd, etc). How does this person install a OS onto it?
 
On the HP blades ive worked with they came with some special cable that plugs in and outputs a usb slot, a VGA and a serial port.

Slot the server into the enclosure and use the supplied cables and connect up a external DVD drive using that weird looking cable. That is the simplest way.

This may be different on some models i have only worked with a limited number of blade based servers.

If you dont have an enclosure im not sure what you can do lol, im sure someone can help you with more experience with blades than me
 
you need the blade enclosure, usually they have a web interface with a kvm console built in to manage the servers
 
IBM has a web interface where you can mount an ISO or disk drive remotely.
 
IBMs blade servers also have a switch on each blade to select that blade for Keyboard+mouse+monitor output to their LCMs. Each BladeCenter chassis also has an optical disk drive and floppy that can be "attached" to the blade in need of the resources. This is done by merely pushing a button underneath a flip-down cover on the front of the blade.

IBMs bladecenter chassis also have USB ports on the front for attaching external devices. And, as mentioned by MorfiusX, you can also go into the AMM's management network interface from a web browser, which offers many additional features (such as reboot, shutdown, IPMI-type information, reporting, logging, device information, hardware configuration, and local resource attachment/detachment).

If all you've got is the blade, and no chassis, it's pretty useless. Strip it down to CPU/RAM/drives (if it has any) and build a new box.
 
IBMs blade servers also have a switch on each blade to select that blade for Keyboard+mouse+monitor output to their LCMs. Each BladeCenter chassis also has an optical disk drive and floppy that can be "attached" to the blade in need of the resources. This is done by merely pushing a button underneath a flip-down cover on the front of the blade.

IBMs bladecenter chassis also have USB ports on the front for attaching external devices. And, as mentioned by MorfiusX, you can also go into the AMM's management network interface from a web browser, which offers many additional features (such as reboot, shutdown, IPMI-type information, reporting, logging, device information, hardware configuration, and local resource attachment/detachment).

If all you've got is the blade, and no chassis, it's pretty useless. Strip it down to CPU/RAM/drives (if it has any) and build a new box.

The newer BladeCenter H's don't have a floppy. Also, if you try to use a USB floppy to load drivers (F6) during a Windows install, that will fail as for some reason the initial phase of the installer will dismount the drive.
 
On the HP blades ive worked with they came with some special cable that plugs in and outputs a usb slot, a VGA and a serial port.

Slot the server into the enclosure and use the supplied cables and connect up a external DVD drive using that weird looking cable. That is the simplest way.

This may be different on some models i have only worked with a limited number of blade based servers.

If you dont have an enclosure im not sure what you can do lol, im sure someone can help you with more experience with blades than me

lmao. That is ghetto. If you're using HP blades, use the rapid install utility!! You can install a whole 42" rack full of blades in a couple of hours using rapid install, once you've built an OS image.

Of course, yes, the pigtail is always an option.

So anyways, back on topic, I would suggest for the OP to read the documentation. One of the methods of gaining console access has to work, whether it's via pigtail, hooking into the enclosure, or via the Web. There should be some documentation that clues you in.
 
The newer BladeCenter H's don't have a floppy. Also, if you try to use a USB floppy to load drivers (F6) during a Windows install, that will fail as for some reason the initial phase of the installer will dismount the drive.

windows XP and Server 2003 do this with most USB floppies during the installation, but I have had it not happen before as well, leading me to believe it has more to do with the USB controller, and the way the installer will initialize it.
 
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