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Recovering and Troubleshooting the Managed System

Dell™ Remote Access Controller 5 Firmware Version 1.40 User's Guide

  First Steps to Troubleshoot a Remote System

  Managing Power on a Remote System

  Viewing System Information

  Using the System Event Log (SEL)

  Using the POST and Operating System Boot Logs

  Viewing the Last System Crash Screen

This section explains how to perform tasks related to recovering and troubleshooting a crashed remote system using the DRAC 5 Web-based interface.

• "First Steps to Troubleshoot a Remote System"
  
  
• "Managing Power on a Remote System"
  
  
• "Using the System Event Log (SEL)"
  
  
• "Viewing the Last System Crash Screen"
  
  

First Steps to Troubleshoot a Remote System

The following questions are commonly used to troubleshoot high-level problems in the managed system:

1. Is the system powered on or off?
   
   
2. If powered on, is the operating system functioning, crashed, or just frozen?
   
   
3. If powered off, did the power turn off unexpectedly?
   
   

For crashed systems, check the last crash screen (see "Viewing the Last System Crash Screen"), and use console redirection (see "Supported Screen Resolutions Refresh Rates on the Managed System") and remote power management (see "Managing Power on a Remote System") to restart the system and watch the reboot process.

Managing Power on a Remote System

The DRAC 5 enables you to remotely perform several power management actions on the managed system so you can recover after a system crash or other system event.

Use the Power Management page to do the following:

• Perform an orderly shutdown through the operating system when rebooting, and power the system on or off.
  
  
• View the system's current Power Status—either ON or OFF.
  
  

To access the Power Management page from the System tree, click System and then click the Power Management tab.

NOTE: You must have Execute Server Action Commands permission to perform power management actions.

Selecting Power Control Actions from the DRAC 5 GUI

1. Select one of the following Power Control Actions.
   
   
   • Power On System— Turns on the system power (equivalent to pressing the power button when the system power is off).
     
     
   • Power Off System— Turns off the system power (equivalent to pressing the power button when the system power is on).
     
     
   • Reset System— Resets the system (equivalent to pressing the reset button); the power is not turned off by using this function.
     
     
   • Power Cycle System— Power off, then reboot (cold boot) the system.
     
     
2. Click Apply to perform the power management action (for example, cause the system to power cycle).
   
   
3. Click the appropriate Power Management page button to continue (see Table 15-1).
   
   

Table 15-1. Power Management Page Buttons (Top Right)

Selecting Power Control Actions from the DRAC 5 CLI

Use the racadm serveraction command to perform power management operations on the host system.

racadm serveraction <action>

The options for the <action> string are:

• powerdown — Powers down the managed system.
  
  
• powerup — Powers up the managed system.
  
  
• powercycle — Issues a power-cycle operation on the managed system. This action is similar to pressing the power button on the system's front panel to power down and then power up the system.
  
  
• powerstatus — Displays the current power status of the server ("ON", or "OFF")
  
  
• hardreset — Performs a reset (reboot) operation on the managed system.
  
  

Viewing System Information

The System Summary page displays information about the following system components:

• Main System Chassis
  
  
• Remote Access Controller
  
  
• Baseboard Management Controller
  
  

To access the system information, expand the System tree and click Properties.

Main System Chassis

Table 15-2 and Table 15-3 describes the main system chassis properties.

NOTE: To receive Host Name and OS Name information, you must have DRAC 5 services installed on the managed system.

Table 15-2. System Information Fields

Table 15-3. Auto Recovery Fields 

Remote Access Controller

Table 15-4 describes the Remote Access Controller properties.

Table 15-4. RAC Information Fields

Baseboard Management Controller

Table 15-5 describes the Baseboard Management Controller properties.

Table 15-5. BMC Information Fields 

Using the System Event Log (SEL)

The SEL Log page displays system-critical events that occur on the managed system.

To view the System Event Log:

1. In the System tree, click System.
   
   
2. Click the Logs tab and then click System Event Log.
   
   

The System Event Log page displays the event severity and provides other information as shown in Table 15-6.

3. Click the appropriate System Event Log page button to continue (see Table 15-7).
   
   

Table 15-6. Status Indicator Icons 

Table 15-7. SEL Page Buttons 

Using the Command Line to View System Log

racadm getsel -i

The getsel -i command displays the number of entries in the SEL.

racadm getsel <options>

NOTE: If no arguments are specified, the entire log is displayed.

NOTE: See "getsel" for more information on the options you can use.

The clrsel command removes all existing records from the SEL.

racadm clrsel

Using the POST and Operating System Boot Logs

This feature of the DRAC 5 allows you to play back a stop motion video of the last three instances of the BIOS POST and operating system boot.

To view the POST and operating system boot capture logs:

1. In the System tree, click System.
   
   
2. Click the Logs tab and then click BOOT Capture tab.
   
   
3. Select the log number of the POST or operating system boot capture log.
   
   

The video of the logs is played on a new screen.

4. Click STOP to stop the video.
   
   

Viewing the Last System Crash Screen

NOTICE: The last crash screen feature requires the managed system with the Auto Recovery feature configured in Server Administrator. In addition, ensure that the Automated System Recovery feature is enabled using the DRAC. Navigate to the Services page under the Configuration tab in the Remote Access section to enable this feature.

The Last Crash Screen page displays the most recent crash screen, which includes information about the events that occurred before the system crash. The last system crash information is saved in DRAC 5 memory and is remotely accessible.

To view the Last Crash Screen page:

1. In the System tree, click System.
   
   
2. Click the Logs tab and then click Last Crash.
   
   

The Last Crash Screen page provides the following buttons (see Table 15-8) in the top-right corner of the screen:

Table 15-8. Last Crash Screen Page Buttons

NOTE: Due to fluctuations in the Auto Recovery timer, the Last Crash Screen may not be captured when the System Reset Timer is set to a value less than 30 seconds. Use Server Administrator or IT Assistant to set the System Reset Timer to at least 30 seconds and ensure that the Last Crash Screen functions properly. See "Configuring the Managed System to Capture the Last Crash Screen" for additional information.

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