IBM blade center HS20 server) with Redhat Enterprise Linux 4

[Craig White]

On Fri, 2006-03-31 at 16:01 -0700, Dan Lund wrote:
> Has anyone ever ran an IBM blade server (HS20 model) with Redhat
> Enterprise Linux 4 or CentOS 4.2?
> 
> I've been tasked with getting RHEL4 on our new blade server, and it
> doesn't want to cooperate.  I've already installed Gentoo on it, so I
> know it works with Linux.
> The problem I'm having is during the hardware probing, it blacks the
> screen.  I'm using the remote control java console which works really
> nicely.
> I've used the following commands:
> linux
> linux text
> linux text noprobe  (this one actually got the console but the
> keyboard was not functional)
> 
> I have a sneaky suspicion that since the cdrom is USB, the probing is
> reinitializing the cdrom subsystem.  I know Gentoo has a feature
> during boot where you send the parameter "bladecenter" or something
> like that at boot and it slows down the USB transfer a little due to a
> slow cdrom. (or something along those lines)
> 
> Anyway, I'd appreciate any experiences anyone has had with this
> hardware.  Worst case, I'll install RHEL4 through Gentoo by throwing a
> tarball down, but I'd really rather have a clean install straight from
> CD.
----
I've never fooled with a blade system (not that I wouldn't love to try)
but I am quite certain that the methodology would be to do a kickstart
install and probably have an nfs server hosting the install images as
that would make sense because we aren't really talking about 1 install
on a blade system, but a series of installs.

there is a redhat mail list for RHEL 4 nahant-list
https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/nahant-list

CentOS 4 Documentation
http://www.centos.org/docs/4/

where you're likely to get better help

additional boot options...
http://www.centos.org/docs/4/html/rhel-ig-x8664-multi-en-4/ap-bootopts.html

(you might be able to use a vnc server)

Craig