Re: Proper Break entry for Ctrl-Alt-Del

On Tue, 22 Mar 2005 15:32:01 -0500 (EST), nathan r. hruby
<nhruby@uga.edu> wrote:
> On Tue, 22 Mar 2005, Zonker Harris wrote:
> >  There *are* a few BIOS makers who have incorporated
> > some console redirection to the console...but I cannot
> > name them today. (HP? Compaq? Award? Version(s)?)
> 
> Dell and HP/Compaq do, we have both.  This machine in question is
> actually a HP DL360 G4.  The first thing I do with these machines is:
> - Boot with head from crash-cart
> - Disable Menus in BIOS
> - Enable Serial Console redirection
> - Power off
> - Connect serial console
> - Disconnect crash cart
> - Reboot
> 
> >From there about the only time I touch that machine is to replace disks.
> 
> This machine also has iLo, we just tend to not use it because we need real
> serial consoles for the Sun gear and burning yet another IP/port/cable run
> on management stuff I rarely use seems silly, especially when I have a
> staffed data center and serial consoles already.

iLO on the DL360G4 has some really nice features, even if you're just
using a serial console.  You can (through iLO's ROM Configuration
menu) enable iLO Serial CLI on the serial port.  Then type ESC-Shift-9
on the serial console to get an iLO CLI> prompt.  From there, you can
power on & off, and also enable/disable the blue UID LED.  There's
another key that disconnects you from the iLO CLI.

iLO for the DL360G4 can also be configured to "piggy-back" the main
NIC port, so that it doesn't require an additional switch port.  It
would still use its own MAC address, however, and would attempt to
DHCP its own IP address.  iLO also supports SSH if you're paranoid
about security.

iLO also has a Virtual Serial Port capability, that can "hijack" your
COM1 interface and provide access to it over the LAN (so you don't
need a terminal server).  One nice side-effect is that it runs
*really* fast -- you're not limited to any actual BAUD rate -- it runs
as fast as the LAN can carry the traffic.  The iLO Virtual Serial Port
connections can then be managed by conserver, using either Telnet or
SSH connections to each server.

> >  The main downside was when the BIOS handed over the
> > Power-On Self-Test to 'smart' drive and network adapters,
> > which would then write directly to the screen again,
> > versus reporting through the BIOS.
> 
> The recent HP/Compaq gear we've gotten is very very nice.  You can see and
> interact with all of the BIOS, RAID, PXE, and SCSI loaders.  It's about as
> close one can get to a console.
> 
> The older Dell gear we have has no Serial redirection.  The semi-newer
> Dell gear we have does this ok, but it's a little fussy.  We're EOL'ing
> our Dell gear, so the newer IMPI based machines (x8yy series ) I have no
> experience with.
> 
> >  I haven't heard of BIOS makers watching for BREAK when
> > they are in this console-redirection mode. It may not have
> > been intuitive, since most of these "Lights-Out Management"
> > BIOS hacks *ALL* seem to presume that you're attaching
> > a modem to the port (requiring DCD to be invoked, before
> > the port will talk/listen), so they may have actively
> > decided to IGNORE a BREAK signal on the data leads, so
> > that a modem reset wouldn't crash the box. (This is my
> > own supposition, based on limited experiences. I don't
> > have access to a PC with BIOS that supports this feature.)
> >
> 
> I tested this on a lark.  BREAK doesn't seem to do anything.

I *think* the IPMI standard for Ctrl-Alt-Del is something like:

<ESC> r <ESC> R <ESC> r

Regards,
John