Server Build

Server Build Program at Free Geek

The Program

Server Build evaluates and builds, well, servers. Servers are computers that tend to have higher quality parts, hot-swappable power supplies, hot swappable hard drives, or fit into server racks.

Class Times

• Wednesdays 10AM - 1:45PM

Steps

The Server Build program requires a great deal of PC hardware experience, so it is expected that all students have gone through the Build program before moving into the Server Build program.

Server Evaluation: Determine basic specs such as processor(s) type and speed, hard drive bays, RAM type, etc.

Server Build: Build out systems that meet criteria for use in infrastructure, hardware grants or the thrift store.

Server Quality Control: Ensure that systems already built can read CDs, USB ports work, boot fine, etc.

In addition, there are some tasks that can be done throughout your time in the project:

• RAM Sorting
• Shelf Organizing

Server Evaluation

Boot Without Keyboard

Just make sure it attempts to boot; no need to install a hard drive during Eval.

Auto-Reboot After Power-Loss

Will the system reboot all by itself after a power-loss when the system was running before the power-loss (required)? Will the system stay off after a power-loss when the system was not running before the power-loss (optional)?

Server Build Checklist

Preliminaries

Check for blown caps - Examine all of the capacitors
Check battery - Confirm that the CMOS battery is at least 3 volts
Boot Process - Ensure that the server boots properly in the following ways:

• Boots from CD - use an Ubuntu Live CD, leave Ubuntu running for next step
  
• Boots automatically after power loss - while still in Ubuntu from the previous step, unplug all power cords (and the keyboard for the next step) from the server to simulate a sudden power loss. It should reboot automatically - if not, check BIOS settings.
  
• Boots without keyboard - the server may report a "Keyboard failure" error - this is okay as long it boots successfully without human intervention, such as "press key X to continue..."
  

RAID & LVM Setup (Build ONLY)

Install Debian Wheezy - Boot to network and install Debian Wheezy to local disks, choose hostname, leave domain name as “fglan”

Setup Software RAID

Partition Disks:

• Create small partition (400-500M) on each device
  • primary partition at the beginning of the drive
  • use as “physical volume for RAID”
  • set as bootable
• Create large partition (all remaining space) on each device
  • primary, not bootable

Setup RAID for small partitions: RAID1 (bootable) with the number of devices equal to number of disks
Setup RAID for large partitions:

• For 2-3 disks:Setup RAID1, with number of devices equal to number of disks
• For 4+ disks:Setup RAID6, with number of devices equal to number of disks

Configure LVM - configure larger RAID1 or RAID6 array as LVM volume

• Create Logical Volume Group with same name as hostname
• Select Large RAID array as LVM Volume
  • create volume (4G) named root (mounted at /, ext4 filesystem)
  • create volume (1G) named swap (use as swap)
  • create volume (remaining) named srv (mounted at /srv, ext4 filesystem)
    
    
• Debian Wiki Guide to Software RAIDs: http://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstaller/SoftwareRaidRoot
• Wikipedia RAID article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

Diagnostics & Databases

• Boot from local disk(s)
• Test USB ports (front and back),
• Test video ports (front and back),
• Test network ports - at terminal: ifconfig eth0 up, ifconfig eth1 up, then tail -f /var/log/syslog, and when you plug and unplug the ethernet cable, you should see reasonable printouts. Ctrl-C to stop the tail 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
  • Answer all questions and record anything else noteworthy in the notes section
    
    

Fill out the Server Specs sticker based on whether you are doing Build or QC:

• For BUILD:
  • Put System ID on server specs sticker
  • Number of physical processors and number of cores per processor
  • Processor speed (GHz)
  • Circle processor type (Xeon, Opteron, Core 2, Other)
  • Total amount of included RAM
  • Total number of RAM slots on board
  • Number of included RAM sticks with their speed and size
  • Circle type of RAM (DDR, DDR2, DDR3)
  • Circle type of DIMM (ECC, FB-DIMM, etc.)
  • Number of hard drive bays
  • Circle hard drive bay type (IDE, SCSI, SATA, SAS)
  • Number and size of included hard drives
  • Record anything notable, like Hardware RAID support, in the notes section
  • Do not print! Instead, put your Volunteer ID on a piece of tape on the system
    
    
• For QC:
  • Confirm the accuracy of information already on the Server Specs sticker
  • Number and size of included hard drives
  • Circle whether an OS is installed (none if hard drives removed!)
  • Write the System ID# on a Server Tag sticker (small labels marked S1, S2, etc.) and stick it to the front of the chassis.
  • Print the printme - Write the number from the Server Tag in the upper right-hand corner of the printme, and give it to your instructor.
    
    

• 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!

Documentation

Labels we use in the build and QC process:

• Server Spec Labels
• Server Build/QC Checklist sheets
• Server Tags S1 - S80
• Server Tags S81 - S160

Info

Here are the HOW-TOs and information we need to accomplish our tasks.

• Entering BIOS
• Server System Disassembly
• Server Hard Drive Removal
• Server Service Manuals
• Server Memory
• CD DVD & External drives
• Hp J4XXX Managed Switches

Links

These are mostly pages full of links to other place:

• OS X86 Links
• http://www.networkdictionary.com/hardware/server.php
• http://ultimatebootcd.com/
• http://www.streambench.org/
• http://www.freebench.org/
• http://www.tux.org/˜mayer/linux/bmark.html
• http://www.acnc.com/benchmarks.html
• http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/hpl/
• http://lbs.sourceforge.net/ - Linux Benchmark Suite Homepage

ToDo:

• syllabus, repair howto(s) & triage charts, wiki, RAID howto,