Dell M600 Blade Server

[abjordaan]

Hi,

I am trying to install FreeBDS 7 64 bit on a Dell M600 blade server but the installation halts at the ISA bus phase and the last message I see is:

isab0: <PCI-ISA bridge> at device 31.0 on pci0
isa0: <ISA bus> on isab0

I cannot complete the installation but the 32 bit OS works. I have logged it with Dell but they say I need to escalate this with BSD.

Any one experienced the same thing or have a work around?

Andre

[ronan]

Hi,

I have the same problem with M600 and FreeBSD 64 bit.
I have tried with FreeBSD 7/7.1/8

We need to run FreeBSD on these news Servers. How can we fix it ?

Cheers,
ronan

[nyogtha]

Hi!

Did you figure this out?

I encountered this problem recently after installing FreeBSD 7.1 (AMD64) on one of our M600-blades.

After reading up on it, I ended up installing the i386-version, which did indeed seem to work.

I then decided to configure the kernel to use PAE-extensions to utilise the 8GB of ram in the blade. After compiling the custom kernel, a reboot produced the same error as with the AMD64-build of FreeBSD. The server is completely stuck on/after ISA-bus initialisation.

[mk]

try to boot the system in verbose mode it may help troubleshoot the problem

[msright1981]

As it seems you guys here have a good experience with Dell, I was wondering help me make a decision on which blades to buy Dell or SUN. I have seen a nice comparison earlier on SUN BladeSystem vs Dell Blades (http://itcomparison.com/Blades/Bladesdellvssun/Bladesdellvssun.htm)

It seems Dell is a better option after reading the comparison, but I still would like to hear more opinion on this. I hope I am not posting to the wrong forum.

Thanks for your help in advance.

[ooglek]

I'm having the same problem -- can't successfully run any of the bootonly ISOs on a Dell M600 Blade. Am I screwed here?

The blade is a quad-core Xeon, tried 7.2 amd64, 7.2 i386, 8.0-RC3 amd64, and 8.0-RC3 i386, all failed to get past a certain point in the boot process.

[ooglek]

Interesting: FreeBSD 6.4 Bootonly ISO works! What the heck?

[mk]

Interesting: FreeBSD 6.4 Bootonly ISO works! What the heck?
then make network installation!

[jb_fvwm2]

I'm having the same problem -- can't successfully run any of the bootonly ISOs on a Dell M600 Blade. Am I screwed here?

The blade is a quad-core Xeon, tried 7.2 amd64, 7.2 i386, 8.0-RC3 amd64, and 8.0-RC3 i386, all failed to get past a certain point in the boot process.
if you can load geom_bsd.ko, geom_mbr.ko,
and geom_label.ko "before the boot process" i.e.
at the boot prompt (I've never done it
but I suspect some have, ) it *may* fix it
(Guessing, from those 3 modules "fixing"
some errors using _8 in partitioning, fdisk,
particularly obtaining /dev entries where
there were none.)
Then you can put them in /boot/loader.conf if the
install succeeds...

[ooglek]

MK -- I forgot I could specify what release I wanted to install, that I wasn't stuck with installing the release of the ISO. I should try that. I do all my installs via the network to make sure I'm the most up to date I can be.

A friend suggested binary updates, and I've successfully updated the 6.4 install to 7.0-RELEASE, and am in the process of updating to 8.0-RC3. I'll report back.

Still frustrating that the 7.x and 8.x bootonly, both amd64 and i386, do not boot on the M600.

[ooglek]

So I was able to binary update from 6.4 to 7.0, but trying to go to 8.0 failed again.

I ended up installing VMware ESXi and then FreeBSD on that. Sucks, but such is life when you don't have time to figure out why it isn't working.

[ProServ]

Hi,

I have the same problem with M600 and FreeBSD 64 bit.
I have tried with FreeBSD 7/7.1/8

We need to run FreeBSD on these news Servers. How can we fix it ?

Cheers,
ronan

This might read like spam but its really not. And yes, it's too late. I know for a *fact* that if you would have tried out Servaris Blade Server (http://www.servaris.com/blade_servers.php) you would not be in this predicament.

Honestly, I wish I could offer you the help you need to get it all working.

[DutchDaemon]

This might read like spam but its really not.

That's really not up to you. I'll allow it because it is in context (only just). Don't overdo it, though, your signature is quite enough. These forums are about lending assistance, not pushing products.

[ooglek]

Server hardware wasn't my call -- was stuck with what they had.