Ubuntu-Certification

Feedback on the Dell EMC Poweredge M830

Asked by Pablo Sendín

Good day,

We have a PowerEdge M1000e blade with a Dell PowerEdge M830 server. We installed (using Life Cycle Controller) the SO Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS 64-bit, but when we reboot the system the server says that there is not an operative system installed (even more, the BIOS doesn't see the hard drive, only NIC, floppy or CD as boot devices).

Dell support said that is not a Dell issue, so maybe Ubuntu can help.

Thanks

Question information

Language:
English Edit question
Status:
Answered
For:
Ubuntu-Certification Edit question
Assignee:
No assignee Edit question
Last query:
Last reply:
Revision history for this message
Jeff Lane  (bladernr) said : 		#1

Please see the attached FAQ for information on where/how to get support for this issue.

That said, please try installing using a USB stick. Alternatively, install using MAAS (http://maas.io), Metal-as-a-Service, which is our recommended way to deploy hardware with Ubuntu and other Operating Systems.

Also, you mentioned that you're using 14.04.2. That is no longer a supported stream, you should be using 14.04.5 with the 4.4 kernel. Finally, I don't understand what you mean by "You have an M1000e with an R830 server". the M1000e is a blade (as you said) and doesn't mount inside an R830, it mounts to its own chassis.

The M1000e blades are NOT certified at all, so there's no guarantee at all that it will work. The R830 has only ever been tested and certified with 16.04, so it's very likely that 14.04.2 simply does not have the support for that hardware which could cause all manner of issues.

So I suggest reading the attached FAQ and seeking support through Ubuntu Advantage, and I suggest trying 16.04 on those systems and installing from USB stick to verify it works before you add in the complexity of Dell's Lifecycle Controller.
FAQ #1945: “Where can I get help or technical support?”.

Revision history for this message
Pablo Sendín (pablocud) said : 		#2

Thank you for your response.

I'm talking about the M830 server, not the R830. We try the Ubuntu 14.04.2 because Ubuntu certifies it works on Dell M830 server:
https://certification.ubuntu.com/hardware/201506-18365/

Our first try was the 16.04, but the installation collapses at some point.

But maybe the BIOS is not the same, or because of the M1000e blade this server is not compatible, we don't know.

Thanks,

Revision history for this message
Jeff Lane  (bladernr) said : 		#3

Thanks for that update. So yeah, the M830 blade was tested, and it was probably in an M1000e chassis... but unfortunately, I'm not entirely sure of that, because the testing was done at Dell by someone who is no longer with the company.

Please refer to the FAQ, however, on places to get some support with the issues you're seeing. This isn't a technical support channel, and there's not too much I can do to help.

"The bios doesn't see the hard drive" is a problem. If the bios doesn't address the hard disk, you're never going to boot anything. If you are in EFI mode, I'd suggest changing it to Legacy and see if you can get an install that way.

Additionally, I have no idea how Dell's Lifecycle Controller works when installing operating systems remotely. Our certification deployments are done using MAAS (Metal as a Service) to do the OS deployments over network following a PXE boot of the installation media.

Any number of things could be wrong here, from BIOS issues to quirks with Lifecycle Controller to bad HDD to some bug in the installer and then some.

Good Luck!

Can you help with this problem?

Provide an answer of your own, or ask Pablo Sendín for more information if necessary.

To post a message you must log in.