Server Build Checklist
Revision as of 18:15, 7 December 2011 by Owenja (talk | contribs) (→Diagnostics & Databases: more printme notes, write down ram config on sticker during build)
Preliminaries
- Check the motherboard for blown caps,
- Confirm that the battery (CMOS) is at least 3 volts,
- Check that it boots without keyboard. "Keyboard failure" error is ok. Just be sure you're not prompted to "press key X to continue..."
- Check that it boots from CD,
- Check that it automatically boots after power loss,
- Build Only: Boot to network and install Debian Squeeze to local disks,
- Debian Wiki Guide to Software RAIDs: http://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/SoftwareRaidRoot
- 2-3 disks
- small (400-500M) raid1 with number of devices equal to number of disks
- large raid1 with number of devices equal to number of disks
- 4+ disks
- small raid1 (400-500M) with number of devices equal to number of disks
- large raid6 with number of devices equal to number of disks
- LVM (configure larger raid1 or raid6 array as LVM volume)
- volume (4G) named root (mounted at /, ext3 filesystem)
- volume (1G) named swap (use as swap)
- volume (remaining) named srv (mounted at /srv, ext3 filesystem)
- Wikipedia RAID article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID
Diagnostics & Databases
- Confirm that the server can boot from the local disk(s),
- Test any USB ports (front and back),
- Test the video ports (front and back),
- Test network ports (at terminal:
ifconfig eth0 up
,ifconfig eth1 up
, thentail -f /var/log/syslog
, and when you plug and unplug the ethernet cable, you should see reasonable printouts. Ctrl-C to stop thetail
command.), - QC Only: Remove any SATA/SAS drives and give them to your Instructor,
- Run printme:
- Boot from network,
- Select printme from the network boot menu,
- Log in as guest,
- Open a terminal,
- Run printme,
- Record whether it's Tower or Rackmount and its size (1U, 2U, 3U, etc.), multiple power supplies, if it's using hardware raid, and anything else noteworthy.
- Fill out the Server Specs sticker based on whether you are doing Build or QC:
- BUILD:
- Put System ID on server specs sticker,
- Processor speed (GHz) and type (Xeon, Opteron),
- Number of physical processors and number of cores per processor,
- Number and type (DDR, DDR2) of RAM slots,
- Number of RAM sticks with their type, speed, and size,
- Number of hard drive bays and their interfaces (IDE, SCSI, SATA),
- Do not print! Instead, put your Volunteer ID on a piece of tape on the system.
- QC:
- Confirm the accuracy of information already on the Specs sticker,
- The total amount of installed RAM,
- The number, type, and size of installed hard drives (IDE & SCSI only),
- Print the printme, and tape it to the top of the system.
- BUILD:
- Have your Instructor look over the printme,
- Move the system to the Server Build KVM and run Memtest, if it hasn't already been done.
- Consult your Instructor for a new project!