The vios does not show any cd0 at all or just show it as “configured”?can you see it on IVM (web interface)?

tks

Altino

thank you.

tks

Altino

How are things going??…any problems with throughput??…I assume things have settled down….:-)

Ed

Ed

Backup is a problem that i have as-of-yet unsolved. I do have a TS3100 unit in the rack, but it is not attached to the BCS yet, because of a missing cable. That should arrive this or next week.

I have a general on how tape backup using VIOS will work, and i’ve already allocated space for a media library on the rootvg on the internal 147GB drives that are on the blade itself (where VIOS is already installed).

The problem here is that driving a backup from VIOS to the TS3100 is going to be shitty at best regarding media management. If i had to deploy production solution today, i’d just attach the TS3100 to a Intel blade, and use savefiles for everything. This would give me full media management and restore, and just require space on the IBM i disks themselves. Of course, this would not cover disaster recovery – a quarterly Save 21 to VIOS optical media and then moved over to Windows would fit the bill here.

IMHO, IBM needs to address this. We *need* full tape passthrough so i can manage the library using BRMS.

VIOS was installed on a mirrored pair of disks internal to the Blade itself. The disks/capacity where VIOS is installed can’t be used for an i Partition, but you can use them for a media library (Backup/Restore), and you could use them for an AIX or Linux partition.

How long the initial BCS setup took, i cannot answer. The rack shipped physically assembled. All i had to was plug in the network to the management port and updates all firmwares – a task that required around 1-2 hours, but can be done much faster with the proper experience.

Installing VIOS is not difficult, but takes ages (i think around 5 hours). All you have to do is logon to the BladeCenter AMM, start a Serial-Over-LAN Console session to the blade, insert the VIOS DVD, and boot from it (which is simple as attaching the media tray to the proper blade and powering the blade on). Next, you chose the disk VIOS is installed to and let it run. After 3 hours or so, the install will be complete.

You can now logon through the serial console, configure basic networking, download 5GB worth of VIOS patches, install them, enable mirroring of VIOS across the two internal disks and you’re already done.

Regards,

Lukas

Based on some of the things I’ve heard, 24 hours may be a record. I did have a few questions:

Did you have additional disks available to allocate to VIOS to serve as back-up space? Or, were you planning another back-up method (network, etc.)

Did you load VIOS on the internal drive on the blade or one of the BCS drives?

How long did the initial BCS set-up, including the VIOS install take?

I think the idea is that the installation should have been easier, instead of being more difficult to transition to the next big thing. The adoption rate of the blades will be much slower when IT managers realize they have a big headache to get the new technology running, and then for what gain? There would need to be budgets that demand less power consumption and so forth before managers will decide to put up with this type of process for conversion – especially those that are used to the much easier swap-and-go scenario that has been their experience for the past 20 years.

Thanks for your post. It would be great to see more from yourself and others.

James

Where do you see the main problem? I’ll agree that using VIOS is rather cumbersome, but i’m sure that this will improve with further revisions and as we gain more skills on the VIOS/AIX side.

I don’t really think that i on Blade is a bad idea – it’s just a Version 1.0 product that needs further improvement.

Regards,

Lukas

I have the job of setting up small datacentres around the world to run our hosted products. It makes sense to distribute them into our overseas offices. The BladeCenter S with i5 blades alongside other blades is rational – but not with the kind of weirdness Lukas Beeler’s had to put up with. I hate to moan, but this is such a disappointment after all the hype surrounding the launch of i5 blades.