[Wolves] Remote Power Management

[Adam Sweet]

Hi all

I'm looking at putting some machines (a few initially,
possibly lots eventually) into a data centre and
managing remotely. I can do everything over SSH except
shut the machines down or reboot them when they're
dead and I don't know a great deal about this kind of
thing.

Does anyone have recommendations for devices and
suppliers suitable for this kind of job. Price isn't
an enormous issue, provided it doesn't run into
thousands, but I need to know what I'm looking at and
the price/features trade offs.

I have 2 choices in mind, either a some standard
x86/x86-64 servers and something like this (from a
quick google):

http://www.kvmpartnership.co.uk/remote-power-control.htm

Or some Sun servers with a System Management Daughter
Card or "Service processor with embedded Lights Out
Management (LOM) standard". Does anyone have any
experience of using these under Linux? Are they any
good? Can you recommend any?

Would I want an IP KVM? Why? What do they do that I
couldn't do remotely over SSH, or locally using a
regular KVM (should I need to go on-site)?

I guess I'm going to have to get used to using screen
as well...

Can anyone guide me towards making the right choice,
I'm in uncharted territory?

Yours hopefully,

Ad

-- 

http://www.drinky.org.uk

http://blog.adamsweet.org


		
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