Using UCS-Server Configuration Utility
This chapter provides information on using the UCS-Server Configuration Utility and contains the following sections:
UCS-SCU Interface
UCS-SCU is a bootable application that can be used to perform operations such as update server firmware, setup BIOS and CIMC, configure RAID logical volume, install operating systems, and perform diagnostics on Cisco Rack servers. It is designed to run on one server at a time. You can launch the application through physical or virtual media.
This section contains the following topics:
License Agreement
After UCS-SCU boots up, the first interface is the End User License Agreement. Select I Accept and click Next to agree to this license, or click Cancel to exit the application.
Home Page
The UCS-SCU home page consists of the following:
•
Navigation Pane—The navigation pane on the left hand provides a tree for easy navigation.
•Content Pane—The content pane is the primary area for information and interaction.
•Tests Summary Pane (for Diagnostic Tools)—Provides details of tests passed, tests in queue and tests failed.
•Toolbar—The toolbar on the left hand top corner has a set of icons that allow you to access the following:
–Network Configuration—Configures the IP address, DNS and Subnet mask and Cisco.com credentials. This configuration will be used to connect to Cisco.com or other network share locations to access the OS installation drivers or firmware for firmware update. Click the icon to enter details of the network configuration and click Configure.
–Probe Server—Performs a server health check. Once complete, you can select the Server Health and check for the changes/faults.
–Save Logs—Logs can be saved to a USB with this option.
–Refresh—This will refresh the content area, if supported.
–Reboot—Reboots the server.
Accessing Help
To access the Cisco UCS-SCU online help, click the Help tab in the right hand corner.
Server Inventory
You can use the server inventory functionality to perform an inventory of your server. You can view details like server summary, server properties and an inventory of subsystems on your server like CPU, memory, power supplies, fans, IO devices, storage, BIOS and CIMC.
To view the inventory of your server, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click the Server Inventory tab on the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click the Server Information tab on the left navigation pane. The server properties and server summary appear.
Step 3 Click the Inventory tab to view an inventory of your server's subsystems, like CPU, memory, power supplies, fans, IO devices, storage, BIOS, and CIMC.
Table 3-1 explains the various subsystem details you can view.
Server Health
Using this functionality you can view the health of all the subsystems of your server (like memory, processor, power supply, hard disk, fans, chipset and CIMC) along with the status and message of a specific subsystem.
To view the health of your server, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click the Server health tab in the left navigation pane. The server health displays in the right hand content pane, along with the status and message for a specific subsystem.
Step 2 To view the latest status of the subsystem, click Probe Server from the toolbar. Click on server health again to refresh the page after clicking on probe server
Step 3 Click the line corresponding to a subsystem to view details of your server health in the Server Health Details pane.
Note The message column in the server health pane displays the first issue corresponding to the subsystem. In case the subsystem has multiple issues, they will show up below in the Server Health Details.
Server Configuration
You can configure your server's BIOS boot order settings and perform RAID configuration using the Server Configuration function. To enter this function area, from the left navigation pane, click Server Configuration.
This section contains the following topics:
Boot Order Configuration
SCU displays a list of all bootable devices on the server. To set the BIOS boot order of your server, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Server Configuration in the left navigation pane, and then click Boot order Configuration. You will be able to choose the devices you want to participate in the boot order configuration using the arrow keys between the Device Types and Boot Order column.
Step 2 Highlight a device in the Boot Order column, click the up or down arrow keys to arrange the server boot order you prefer, and click Apply.
Step 3 Click Apply.
Step 4 The Boot Order is saved on this server.
Step 5 To reset the boot order click Reset.
Note If the system has multiple boot devices under each component, for example, if the system has multiple bootable hard disks under the same controller or CD drives, SCU will not display this information. You will have to enter the BIOS and configure the order of these subcomponents manually.
RAID Configuration
You can use RAID Configuration to configure your systems' on-board or SAS add-in RAID.
If your system has multiple RAID controllers, UCS-SCU displays a list of all available RAID cards on the RAID Configurations page. The RAID levels supported by SCU are RAID 0, 1, 5 and 6.
Supported RAID Devices
The RAID devices supported by UCS-SCU are the following:
•Intel I/O Controller Hub 10 RAID (ICH10R)/Embedded MegaRAID
•LSI MegaRAID SAS 8708EM2
•LSI 1064E Controller Based Mezzanine Adapter
•LSI MegaRAID 9261-8i PCIe RAID Controller
•LSI SAS3081E-R PCIe RAID Controller
•LSI 9260-8i RAID Controller
•LSI MegaRAID SAS 9260-4i
•LSI MegaRAID SAS 9240-8i
Note The UCS-SCU RAID configuration utility detects the physical drivers only once when you enter this function area. Do not remove or add hard disk drivers while navigating within this function area.
Note On C200 servers, ICH10R should be configured in SWRAID mode for RAID configuration to function. If ICH10R is configured in enhanced mode, the controller is not be visible for RAID configuration.
Note Some LSI RAID controllers take time to complete the operation during RAID configuration. SCU does not have any control over this issue. As a workaround, you can either recreate the RAID or wait for the operation to complete.
UCS-SCU RAID Configurations
This section contains the following topics:
Automatic Setup With Redundancy
Automatic Setup Without Redundancy
Create Custom or Multiple RAID Arrays
UCS-SCU supports three types of RAID configurations:
Automatic Setup With Redundancy
Automatic setup with redundancy requires at least two hardware drives. If your server has two drives, UCS-SCU creates RAID 1. If it has more than two drives, UCS-SCU recommends creating RAID 5. If the controller does not support RAID 5, RAID 1 is created.
Note The common parameters, except for total size, are the default values for the controller.
Automatic Setup Without Redundancy
Automatic setup without redundancy requires one or more hard drives. UCS-SCU creates RAID 0 with this option. To configure RAID using the automatic setup with or without redundancy, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Server Configuration in the left navigation pane and then click RAID configuration. The RAID Configuration page displays.
Step 2 Click the Configure button displayed next to the device. The RAID Configuration page displays. You can also view properties of the device by clicking Show Details.
Step 3 On the RAID Configuration page, the following options appear:
•Automatic Setup with Redundancy
•Automatic Setup without Redundancy
•Create Custom or multiple RAID arrays
Step 4 Select either the first or second option and click Create Array. A pop-up displays upon completion of this task.
Create Custom or Multiple RAID Arrays
When you select Create Custom or Multiple RAID arrays, UCS-SCU displays a window in which you can select physical hard disks. Only unconfigured good disks can be used for RAID configuration. Disks that are already part of RAID will not be available for RAID configuration. Clear the configuration to make all the disks' statuses Unconfigured Good. You can use the Clear configuration option to remove these disks from existing RAID, but be extra careful here as the data on the existing RAID will be lost if you clear the configuration.
To create custom or multiple RAID arrays, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Server Configuration in the left navigation pane and then click RAID configuration. The RAID Configuration page displays.
Step 2 Click the Configure button displayed next to the device. The RAID Configuration page appears. You can also view properties of the device by clicking Show Details.
Step 3 On the RAID Configuration page, the following options appear:
•Automatic Setup with Redundancy
•Automatic Setup without Redundancy
•Create Custom or multiple RAID arrays
Step 4 Select the third option (Create Custom or multiple RAID arrays) and click Create Array. The Select Drives for Logical Drive page appears.
Step 5 Select the Unconfigured Good physical drives that you want to include in the RAID array.
Note If you choose to clear configuration, all the old configurations applied to the list are lost.
Step 6 Check the Status column to verify that the drive is Unconfigured Good.
Step 7 Click Next. The Select Hotspare Drives page appears.
Step 8 Select the required physical drives to be used as global hot spare drives and click Next. The Define Array Attributes page displays.
Step 9 Select the required array attributes from the drop-down list and click Next. The summary page displays.
Step 10 Click Create Array.
Note UCS-SCU does not support the creation of nested RAID levels (RAID 10, 50, 60). However, you can configure these RAID levels by logging in to the LSI controller BIOS. We do not currently certify this method.
Table 3-2 explains the various disk status conditions.
Table 3-3 explains the RAID array attributes.
Firmware Update
The Firmware Update functionality allows you to locate and download the most recent BIOS and CIMC firmware update packages. This feature is supported on the C200, C210, C460 and C250 systems.
To get started with the Get System Updates feature, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Firmware Update in the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Select from the following options from the firmware update toolbar:
•From www.cisco.com (recommended)—To get the most recent update package from the Cisco support website.
•From boot media—To get the most recent update package from the boot media.
•From USB disk on key—To browse a USB key for the update package.
Note LOM (LAN on motherboard), Intel, P81E Virtual Interface Card and and Broadcom cards are supported while using the first option (www.cisco.com).
This section contains the following topics:
Minimum Requirements for Firmware Update
Scenario 1: Updating firmware when your server has an Internet connection
Scenario 2: Updating firmware from SCU boot media
Scenario 3: Updating firmware From USB disk on key
Scenario 4: Updating firmware From Network
Minimum Requirements for Firmware Update
In order to support the BIOS and CIMC update, the following minimum requirements should be met:
•BIOS/CIMC version should be 1.1.1 on C200/C210.
•BIOS/CIMC version should be 1.1.1d on C250.
•CIMC 1.2.1a and BIOS 1.2.1.0 on C460.
The Get System Updates functionality is disabled if the above-mentioned criteria are not met.
Scenario 1: Updating firmware when your server has an Internet connection
If your server has an Internet connection, UCS-SCU helps you locate and download the current server system firmware package from the Cisco support website. To update the firmware on your system, follow these steps:
Step 1 Make sure your server has Internet connectivity.
Step 2 Boot the server with UCS-SCU, and accept the end user license.
Step 3 Click Firmware Update in the left navigation pane.
Step 4 Click Select From cisco.com (recommended) on the Firmware Update page. The Network Configuration page displays.
Step 5 Select the appropriate options on the Network Connection page for your server, and click Configure. A pop-up window displays a confirmation message.
Step 6 Click the Select All checkbox.
Step 7 Click Apply to start the firmware update process.
Note UCS-SCU can detect all available system firmware update packages. The most recent version is recommended.
Note Do not power off or reboot server during firmware update. After the firmware update process completes, click Reboot to restart your server.
Scenario 2: Updating firmware from SCU boot media
If your server does not have an Internet connection, you can download firmware update packages from the SCU CD. To update server firmware from the SCU boot media, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Firmware Update in the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click From SCU boot media on the Firmware Update page.
Step 3 Click the Select All checkbox.
Step 4 Click Apply to start the firmware update process.
Scenario 3: Updating firmware From USB disk on key
In this scenario, you can use a USB key or USB hard disk drive. You must manually download the most recent drivers from http://www.cisco.com and copy them to a USB key. To update firmware using this method, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Firmware Update in the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click From USB disk on key on the Firmware Update page.
Step 3 Click the Select All checkbox.
Step 4 Click Apply to start the firmware update process.
Scenario 4: Updating firmware From Network
In this scenario, you can update firmware from a network location. To update firmware using this method, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Firmware Update in the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click From Network on the Firmware Update page. The Network Configuration page appears.
Step 3 Enter the network configuration details and click Configure. If the network is configured, a confirmation message displays.
OS Install
The unattended operating system installation function helps you install the Microsoft Windows, SuSE Linux, and RedHat Linux operating system families. UCS-SCU has integrated device drivers including RAID drivers to seamlessly install operating systems on supported RAID logical arrays without additional load driver steps or devices such as the USB. All UCS-SCU supported operating systems are organized into three groups: Windows, RHEL, and SUSE.
This section contains the following topics:
Windows Server 2003 and 2008 Operating System Installation
Linux Server Series Operating System Installation
Windows Server 2003 and 2008 Operating System Installation
For unattended Windows Server 2003 and 2008 OS installation, follow these steps:
Step 1 To enter the unattended OS installation function area, click OS Install in the left navigation pane. The OS Install page appears.
Step 2 Click the Windows radio button and choose an operating system from the drop-down list. For Windows 2008 operating system, an additional edition drop-down list displays.
Step 3 Click Next.
Step 4 On the Set Installation Partition page, select a disk from the Select Disk drop-down list to create a partition.
Step 5 If your server has more disk controllers such as SATA, SAS, or RAID, click Select Disk to choose an active disk. UCS-SCU switches to the corresponding disk that is under the selected disk controller.
•To create a new partition on disk free space, click New.
•To remove a partition, click Delete.
•To change a partition size, click Edit.
Step 6 If you have multiple arrays created under the same controller, UCS-SCU marks the array chosen for OS installation as the primary bootable array.
Step 7 Click Next.
Step 8 Enter the following information in the subsequent screens:
•Region and Location
–Windows 2003 server series—UCS-SCU prompts you to select Time Zone, Windows Language and additional language
–Windows 2008—You can select the Time Zone.
•Personalization
–Enter server owner name, organization, license information and license type.
•Name and password
–On Windows 2003 server series you must set the server computer name and administrator password.
–On Windows 2008 server series you must set the server computer name. Because administrator password is reset when Windows 2008 installation completes, UCS-SCU does not request a Windows administrator password.
•Network Settings—Enter the network configuration settings for the onboard network adapters that will be detected by the operating system during installation.
Note These settings will not affect the network settings for the CIMC. We recommend that you set different IP addresses for the OS and CIMC. The "network interface" column lists each network adapter detected by the UCS-SCU. Your operating system may have a different name after you install the operating system.
•Get Update Drivers—This section allows you to select the source from where UCS-SCU can download server driver packages. The selected drivers are installed to the operating system by UCS-SCU.
Choose one of the following options:
–From www.cisco.com—To get the most recent drivers from the Cisco support website, select this option. Ensure that the server is only connected to one network during the download.
–From SCU boot media—Directly use the driver packages that are stored in the Tools and Drivers CD. UCS-SCU selects this option as default.
–From my network—UCS-SCU can download a driver package stored on a network share folder. You must manually download the most recent drivers from http://www.cisco.com and copy them to your network share.
–From USB Disk on Key or Hard Drive—UCS-SCU can get the drivers stored on a USB key or USB hard disk drive. You must manually download the most recent drivers from http://www.cisco.com and copy them to a USB key.
•Choose Drivers to Install—UCS-SCU displays all available drivers downloaded from the driver source. Uncheck the drivers that you do not want to install. If you want to install an operating system on a RAID volume, you can deselect the driver for the appropriate RAID controller. The path to the selected drivers will be stored and will then be used to download and install the drivers during the operating system installation.
UCS-SCU can load third-party drivers by selecting the checkbox—Please select if you want to add additional drivers from a different location.
Step 9 Remove the UCS-SCU CD and insert the required operating system CD.
Windows 2003 Server Series
For unattended installation of the Windows 2003 operating system, follow these steps:
Step 1 Insert the Windows 2003 operating system CD, and click Next for UCS-SCU to apply all settings.
Step 2 After completing this process, UCS-SCU prompts you to reboot the server.
Step 3 Leave the operating system CD in the CD-ROM, while the system completes the OS installation after this reboot.
Windows 2008
For unattended installation of the Windows 2008 operating system, follow these steps:
Step 1 Insert the Windows 2008 OS DVD and a USB key with at least 10 MB free space on which UCS-SCU can store server drivers temporarily. The answer file unattended.xml is also stored in the USB during installation.
Step 2 Click Next to apply all settings.
Step 3 Click Restart to reboot the server.
Step 4 During server POST, press F2 to enter the server BIOS configuration interface.
Note You can use only virtual USB drives for OS installation on the C460 M1. Both physical and virtual are supported on all other platforms.
Linux Server Series Operating System Installation
For unattended Linux operating system installation, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click OS Install in the left navigation pane. The OS Install page appears.
Step 2 Click either the RHEL or SLES radio button, choose an operating system from the drop-down list and click Next.
Step 3 On the Set Installation Partition page, select a disk from the Select Disk drop-down list to create a partition.
Step 4 If the server has more disk controllers such as SATA, SAS, or RAID controller, click Select disk to choose active disk controller. UCS-SCU switches to the corresponding disk that is under the selected disk controller and displays a recommended default partition.
Step 5 Click New to create a new partition on disk free space. Click Delete to remove a partition, or click Edit to change partition size. Partition Root and Swap are necessary. If you miss them, SCU generates an alert message. SCU displays a suggested partition solution. Accept it if you are not familiar with Linux partition.
Step 6 If you have multiple arrays created under the same controller, UCS-SCU marks the array that is chosen for OS installation as primary bootable array.
Step 7 Enter the following information in the subsequent screens:
•Basic configuration—Edit the following items on the Basic Configuration page:
–Root Password
–Default language
–Keyboard
–Time Zone
–Additional Languages
•Package Selection—Select all Linux packages that you want to install on your server.
•Network Settings—Enter the network configuration settings for the onboard network adapters that will be detected by the operating system during installation.
Note These settings do not affect the network settings for the CIMC. We recommend that you set different IP addresses for the operating system and CIMC.
The network interface column lists each network adapter detected by the UCS-SCU. Your operating system may have a different name after you install the operating system.
•Get Update Drivers—This section allows you to select the source from which the UCS-SCU can download server driver packages. Those drivers are installed to the operating system by UCS-SCU.
Choose one of the following options:
–From www.cisco.com—You can get the most recent drivers from the Cisco support website by selecting this option. Please check that the server is only connected to one network during the download.
–From SCU boot media—Directly use the driver packages stored in the Tools and Drivers CD. Although this CD may not contain the most recent driver packages, this option is the fastest. UCS-SCU selects this as a default option.
–From my network—UCS-SCU can download a driver package stored on a network share folder. You must manually download the most recent drivers from http://www.cisco.com and copy it to your network share.
–From USB stick on Key—UCS-SCU can get the drivers stored on a USB key or USB hard disk drive. You must manually download the most recent drivers from http://www.cisco.com and copy them to the USB key.
•Network Location—Enter the login and location information for the network share where the update packages are located.
•Choose Drivers to Install—UCS-SCU displays all available drivers that downloaded from the driver source. Uncheck the drivers that you do not want to install. If you want to install an operating system on a RAID volume, you can select the driver for the appropriate RAID controller. The path to the selected drivers will be stored and will then be used to download and install the drivers during the operating system installation.
Step 8 Insert OS CD—Insert the Linux Server OS CD and click Next. UCS-SCU starts to apply all settings. Reboot the server after the process completes. You should leave the OS CD in the CD-ROM. The server will complete all the operating system installation steps after this reboot.
Diagnostic Tools
You can use diagnostics tools to diagnose hardware problems with your Cisco servers. The user interface displays the status of the test run and examines log files for troubleshooting hardware issues.
This section contains the following topics:
Quick Test
You can run these tests quickly to determine any hardware issue. These tests usually take 20-30 minutes to run and test limited functionality for a few subsystems like memory, CPU and disks. The comprehensive test provides more exhaustive diagnostics.
To run the quick test follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Diagnostic Tools from the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click Tests.
Step 3 Click the Quick Test collapsible button to view the types of quick tests available for you to run.
Step 4 Click a subsystem (like memory, video, or network).
Step 5 On the content pane, click Run Tests.
Step 6 If you click Run Tests, the test is run and the status displays in the Tests Status area.
Comprehensive Test
The Comprehensive test can run for hours and usually runs when quick tests cannot diagnose the issue with your server. They are designed to test multiple hardware components and find issues that may be caused due to multiple components on your server.
The individual tests run can be customized to test some user-defined conditions. You can also select a group of tests to be run.
To run the comprehensive test, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Diagnostic Tools from the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click Tests.
Step 3 Click the Comprehensive Test collapsible button to view the types of comprehensive tests available for you to run.
Step 4 Click a subsystem (like processor, memory, or network).
Step 5 On the content pane, click Run Tests.
Step 6 If you click Run Tests, the test is run and the status displays in the Tests Status area.
Quick Tasks
Quick Tasks allow you to get started with diagnostic tools immediately. You can run all the tests (Quick/Comprehensive) from here and report the details to Cisco to troubleshoot the logs and provide information about problems with your system. To use this feature, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Diagnostic Tools from the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click Quick Tasks.
Step 3 Click either Run Quick Tests or Run Comprehensive Test from the toolbar. The status appears in the Test Status pane. You can also view detailed test results under Tests log summary.
Tests Suite
Use the Test Suite functionality to run a specific set of tests you added. To run the tests suite, you should have added specific tests you want to run in advance:
To run the test suite, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Tests Suite from the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Select the tests you want to run by clicking the required checkboxes.
Step 3 Click Run Tests Suite to run the tests you added to the test suite. The status appears in the Tests Status pane along with the name, suite ID, Result, start time and end time.
Tests Log Summary
Use the Tests Log Summary functionality to examine the test logs for troubleshooting. To view the Tests Log summary, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Diagnostic Tools on the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click Tests Log Summary on the left navigation pane.
Step 3 Select a filter from the filter drop-down and click Go. The status, result, start time, and end time of the test displays.
Step 4 For more details, click a specific log entry (for example, click memory test). The Log, Error Log (if the test failed) and the analysis of the specific test displays in the content pane.
Logs
The Logs functionality allows you to take corrective action by examining your server's logs. UCS-SCU provides three types of logs:
•System logs
•System event logs
This section contains the following topics:
System Logs
The system log file displays events that are logged by the operating system components. These events are often predetermined by the operating system itself. System log files display information about device changes, device drivers, system changes, events, operations, and more.
To view the system logs, follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Logs on the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click System Logs.
Step 3 Select a filter from the filter drop-down list.
Step 4 Click Go. The system log displays.
System Event Log
The system event log file displays events that are logged by your server.
To view the system event logs follow these steps:
Step 1 Click Logs on the left navigation pane.
Step 2 Click System Event Logs.
Step 3 Select a filter from the filter drop-down list.
Step 4 Click Go. The system event log displays.
Feedback