FreeBSD 32bit/64bit OS Support for DELL R300

I

immunesecurity

Currently,I am using FreeBSD as my Server for my product.

I am buying one DELL Server and thinking to install FreeBSD in DELL R300.

I don't see any OS Support list mentioned for FreeBSD for DELL servers.

I need to know if DELL R300 or any DELL Servers will support FreeBSD7.0 and Later 32bit/64bit or not.

Your help is highly appreciated.

Regards,
Sagar
 
32 or 64 bit depends on the processor, nothing more. For everything else try to find out what specific hardware is in there and look if it's supported. And don't use 7.0, it's not supported anymore.

http://www.freebsd.org/security/#sup
 
The biggest gotcha with new Dell servers is that some use by default a RAID card that is not (yet) supported on FreeBSD. You just need to check this against the hardware compatibility list and make sure when you order that you choose a RAID card that is on the list...

ta Andy.
 
immunesecurity said:
I am buying one DELL Server and thinking to install FreeBSD in DELL R300.

I don't see any OS Support list mentioned for FreeBSD for DELL servers.

I need to know if DELL R300 or any DELL Servers will support FreeBSD7.0 and Later 32bit/64bit or not.
Click to expand...
Dell doesn't provide their own support for FreeBSD on their products. On their servers, they support the Microsoft OS's and various flavors of Linux.

However, the R300 works fine with FreeBSD - I'm running 8-STABLE on 3 of them. 2 are using the on-board SATA ports, and the 3rd uses the SAS 6/iR RAID card (which FreeBSD sees as a mpt device.

Here are the issues I've encountered:

  • The various firmware updaters available from Dell run under Windows and (sometimes) MS-DOS. Thus, it is handy to have a Windows 7 CD handy. I put the Dell updater on a USB stick and boot the Windows CD. I go into Recover Mode, select the command prompt, and run the Dell updater.
  • The SAS 6/iR RAID driver and utility don't decode event notifications from the controller, so you'll see occasional things like:
    Code: 
    mpt0: mpt_cam_event: 0x21
  • The built-in Ethernet ports are Broadcom BCM5722's which don't support Jumbo frames. If that is important, you'll need to use an add-in network card.
  • The DRAC (remote access card) is a bit twitchy when trying to remote-console into FreeBSD. Since the hardware supports serial console redirection, that isn't a big problem.
 
Actually, that reminds me! From my experience I wouldn't recommend you buy any server using the broadcom "Broadcom BCM5722" as we have an R300 and we have issues with this hardware and the current FreeBSD driver. I have raised the issue on the freebsd lists and I have been told the driver is undergoing development to reach a more stable level, but currently you may experience problems with FreeBSD running on this hardware.

Servers we use that run ok are: older Dell 1850s, run fine no issues, and also a Dell R610 also runs fine. These use different network chipsets...

thanks Andy.
 
Thanks all for sharing your experience and expertise. Actually, we are already using DellR300 in our environment and it is using FreeBSD7.0 now and is 32bit. I know 32bit/64bit is a processor specific. But still, I was asking if any issues found with later versions like FreeBSD8.0 and all that. Ethernet Broadcom 'BCM5722' problem andy pointed is for older one or new FreeBSD.Similar hardware specific issues that may appear will help me to change before I actually buy.

Regards Sagar.
 
FYI The BCM5722 issue I have is seen when using FreeBSD 7.3 (also 8.1 I believe). My system did not have the errors when running 7.2. When 7.4 is released I will try this to see if things are better...
 
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