Filter
Top Products
SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT
www.
d
e
ll
.com
/p
owerso
l
ut
i
on
s
R
e
p
rinted from
D
ell Power Solutions
,
August 2005. Copyright © 2005 Dell Inc. All rights reserve
d
.
D
ELL POWER SOLUTIONS
5
7
O
ffline updates
T
o per
f
orm an o
ff
line update, administrators must schedule server
downtime. Most o
ff
line u
p
date utilities boot into a
p
re-OS environ
-
ment such as DOS to perform the update. These update utilities may
also re
q
uire multi
p
le s
y
stem reboots to com
p
lete the u
p
date
p
rocess.
Although the offline update
p
rocess is time-consumin
g
an
d
requires severa
l
manua
l
ste
p
s, this is a sa
f
e method
t
o update system software on
v
irtually any server because
th
e networ
k
is not invo
l
ve
d
.
In contrast
,
network traffic
,
T
rivial FTP
(
TFTP
)
server
r
esponse time, pac
k
et
l
oss,
and link loss can a
ff
ect
f
irm
-
w
are up
d
ates t
h
at are per
-
fo
rm
ed
o
v
e
r
a
n
et
w
o
rk
.
O
n a PowerE
d
ge 1855
server blade
,
administrator
s
can u
p
date BIOS, BMC
f
irmware, RAID
f
irmware, SCSI hard disk
drive firmware
,
SCSI controller firmware
,
and OS-level drivers
u
sing DOS-based update utilities
f
ound on the Dell support Web
site (support.dell.com).
Note:
T
h
e PERC 4/IM is integrate
d
into
t
he PowerEd
g
e 1855 server blade motherboard, so PERC 4/IM
f
irmware is included as part of the system BIOS update package.
O
nline update
s
U
nlike an o
ff
line u
p
date, the online u
p
date
p
rocess minimizes server
d
owntime
b
y a
ll
owing t
h
e process to run in a norma
l
OS environ
-
ment. The
g
reatest advanta
g
e of the online approach is its capability
t
o automate the update process. Online updates enable organiza
-
t
ions to update multiple server blades from a central console usin
g
Dell OpenMana
g
e chan
g
e-mana
g
ement tools or third-party chan
g
e
-
management frameworks.
D
ell OpenMana
g
e chan
g
e-mana
g
ement tools
f
or the PowerEd
g
e
1
855 blade server comprise the following
:
•
D
e
ll
Up
d
ate Pac
k
ages
•
D
ell OpenMana
g
e Server Update Utility (SUU
)
•
D
ell OpenManage IT Assistant
(
ITA
)
7
Dell Update Packages
.
Dell Update Packa
g
es are sel
f
-contained,
easy-to-use programs; each package updates a single system software
com
p
onent on the server on which it is executed. Each Dell U
p
date
P
ackage contains the logic to verify that the update will work on a
g
iven system. Dell Update Packa
g
es support both a
g
raphical user
inter
f
ace
(
GUI
)
and a command-line inter
f
ace
(
CLI
)
. BIOS and BMC
f
irmware Dell Update Packa
g
es are available for PowerEd
g
e 1855
server blades. Dell Update Packages are supported on Microso
ft
®
Win
do
w
s
Se
rv
er
™
2003 and Red Hat
™
®
Enterpr
i
se L
i
nux
®
operat
i
ng
systems. In addition, Dell Update Packa
g
es can be inte
g
rated into
third-party or custom software distribution application frameworks
such as Microso
f
t Systems Mana
g
ement Server
(
SMS
)
2003, Altiri
s
®
D
ep
l
oyment So
l
ution, an
d
ot
h
ers
.
1
D
ell OpenMana
g
e Server Update Utility
.
SUU is a comprehen-
sive s
y
stem u
pd
ate uti
l
it
y
t
h
at
p
rovi
d
es a mec
h
anism to u
pd
ate severa
l
system software components at once. It is a CD-based application that
can identi
fy
s
y
stems and a
pp
l
y
the a
pp
ro
p
riate u
p
dates. For exam
p
le,
on a PowerE
d
ge 1855
bl
a
d
e server, a
d
ministrators can use t
h
e SUU CD
to u
p
date all s
y
stem so
f
tware on a server blade. The SUU u
p
date
p
ro-
cess requires a
d
ministrators to up
d
ate one server
bl
a
d
e at a time.
D
ell OpenManage IT Assistant
.
ITA 7
p
rovides centralized so
f
t-
ware update capability for Dell servers. IT Assistant allows admin-
istrators to load Dell Update Packa
g
es and Dell System Update Sets
into a centra
l
repository an
d
t
h
en compare t
h
e pac
k
ages to t
h
e
software versions currently runnin
g
on PowerEd
g
e systems. Admin-
istrators can then decide whether to u
p
date s
y
stems that are not in
comp
l
iance, eit
h
er imme
d
iate
l
y or accor
d
ing to an a
d
ministrator-
de
f
ined schedule.
B
MC flash u
p
date
s
The BMC does not disable the power button on the front of an
f
individual PowerEd
g
e 1855 server blade durin
g
a
f
lash update. I
f
an administrator presses the power button during a
f
lash update,
the server blade will power off and leave the BMC in an unknown
state. To recover the server blade
,
an administrator should remove
the server blade from the PowerEd
g
e blade server chassis, wait five
seconds
,
reinsert the server blade
,
and allow the server blade to
b
oot. Then the flash update can be performed again
.
Note:
Ke
y
board, video, mouse
(
KVM
)
hot-ke
y
ke
y
board
sequences are not supported during a BMC flash update. If an
administrator attempts a hot-key sequence
f
rom a server blade
that is per
f
orming a BMC
f
lash update, the
f
lash update may
f
ail.
To recover, the administrator must execute the flash update a
g
ain
.
Upd
at
i
ng c
h
ass
i
s com
p
onents
Because individual server blades in the PowerEd
g
e 1855 blade server
share common chassis infrastructure components, keeping the syste
m
so
f
tware o
f
the chassis com
p
onents u
p
-to-date can
p
la
y
a critical role in
1
For more information about how Dell Update Packages are designed to work in third-party software distribution applications, see “Scripting Dell Update Packages on Windows and Linux” by Manoj Gujarathi, Pritesh Prabhu, and
S
ubbu
G
anesan in Dell Power
S
olutions
,
O
ctober 2004, www.dell.com/downloads/global/power/ps4q04-20040125-
G
ujarathi.pdf; and “Deploying Dell Update Packages Using Microsoft
S
ystems Management
S
erver 2003” by
S
and
-
eep Karandikar and Mano
j
G
u
j
arathi in Dell Power
S
olutions
,
February 2005, www.dell.com/downloads/
g
lobal/power/ps1q05-20040111-
G
u
j
arathi.pdf.
Although the offline update
process is time-consuming
and requires several manual
steps, this is a safe method
to update system software on
virtually any server because
the network is not involved.