Hardware

uniPHARM purchased a pair of Lenovo x3650 M5 servers in March of 2018 from Anisoft to act as hosts for VMware. The machine type of both servers is 8871-16A and the serial numbers are J121W8C and J121W8D. Both servers do have identical hardware components and as of March 2018, they also have identical and current firmware. Both servers have an Intel Xeon E5-2620 v4 processor populating the first socket. The second socket for both servers is empty. The Xeon has 8 cores and 16 threads. Both machines came with an initial 16GB stick of memory in the first slot. An additional 6 sticks of 8GB were installed into each server so that each has 64GBs of memory. Be aware that the motherboard has specific requirements for where additional memory can be inserted. The numerical order for which memory slots can be used is clearly displayed on the top side lid of the server. If more memory is purchased and installed for these servers, the instructions on the top lid must be followed, or the memory will not be recognized correctly. The memory slots labeled from 13 to 24 on the motherboard cannot be used until the second CPU socket has a processor.

Each server has an ServeRAID M5210 controller that is attached to the motherboard. For each M5210, there is also a RAID5 daughter card that is attached which provides additional capabilities. The M5210 can control up to 24 drives for each server. The initial purchase included 5 drives for each server that are 960GB SSDs. Both of the M5210 controllers are configured with a RAID6 set containing the 5 SSDs. The RAID6 volume can survive the failure of 2 drives before there is data loss. There are no warm or cold spare drives available as of March 2018. The total amount of storage space on each server is 2679GB. The strip size is 256KB. All parameters of the RAID6 set were set to default for the M5210 controller. Each server also has a USB thumb drive that is plugged into the motherboard where the hypervisor software is installed.

Each server has 4 network ports that use the Broadcom NetXtreme chip. Each server has an additional network port that is for dedicated IMM2 access. More on the IMM2 is below. Each server has 2 USB and a VGA port on the front side and the back side. The purchased configuration of each server did not include any riser cards for PCIe expansion cards so if there is a need for extra abilities, the riser cards are also required. Each server has 2 power supplies which can share the load as well as take the entire electrical load should 1 fail.

Both servers are located in the Power8 rack and are 2U in size. The top server is at rack unit 18 and the bottom server is at rack unit 16. Both servers can be pulled out on the rack rails and serviced while powered on. The hard drives and power supplies are hot swappable but the memory is not. Neither server has a CD-ROM drive so if a disc needs to be used, the only option is to plug in a USB optical drive.

Hardware Purchase Details

The purchase order number for this project is 8226136 (dated Feb 13, 2018) with a vendor number of 20145 and invoices numbers 19253, 19254, 19256 dated March 14, 2018.

Hardware Support

uniPHARM has a hardware maintenance contract with Lenovo to provide 24x7x365 onsite parts and labour with a 4 hour response time for the period of March 6, 2018 to March 5, 2021. A renewal of this maintenance contract is expected in February of 2021 because the expected life span of these servers is 5 to 6 years. Note that "maintenance" is not a good descriptor of the service. If a hardware component fails, then the replacement of that part is provided by Lenovo at no cost and is installed by a Lenovo technician at no cost. If uniPHARM adds in non-Lenovo parts they are not covered by the existing contract. Additional Lenovo branded parts that are installed after initial purchase are covered under the existing contract. If a non-Lenovo part is installed and causes damage to the server, the agreement becomes null and void. The phone number for parts replacement and technical support under this contract is 1-800-426-7378. This contract does not cover any VMware software.

IMM2

The Integrated Management Module II is an out of band service used to control the x3650 server hardware. It is comparable to the HMC for the Power8. The IMM2 is on and active and accessible as long as the server has power feeding into the power supplies. If both power supplies are unplugged, the IMM2 is not active and accessible. The IMM2 resides on a small "SystemOnChip" on the motherboard and is served by a webserver within a small Linux OS within the SOC. The IMM2 also has a dedicated network port that is only used by that function. On smaller 1U servers the IMM2 shares the first Broadcom network port.

The IP addresses assigned to each of the 2 IMM2's are 172.30.18.54 and 172.30.18.55. The host names are bmvmhost01.unipharm.local and bmvmhost02.unipharm.local. BM is a hold over from a previous IBM product called "Baseboard Management" and this naming convention is a continuation of that. The username for both IMM2's is adminit and the password is visionit. The IMM2's are not accessible from the public side of the firewall and need VPN access if logging in from outside the local network.

The IMM2 web interface is primarily used to control the hardware, alert for hardware failures and to provide a screen console for the server when no physical screen-keyboard-mouse is attached. This is a critical function for troubleshooting or diagnosing software crashes no matter what OS or hypervisor is installed. The IMM2 can power on or off the server and show very detailed information on temperatures, fan speeds, voltages and firmware levels of all components. The IMM2 is also setup to email alerts to I.S. staff when hardware events occur such as a failed hard drive or power supply. The IMM2 is also configured to call home to Lenovo when a hardware component fails in the same manner that the HMC connects to IBM when a Power8 hardware failure occurs.

As of March 2018, the x3650 servers do have the latest available firmware and should not need any firmware updates unless Lenovo requires it for replacement parts. If updated firmware is needed, it can be installed from within the IMM2 web interface.

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