Dell PowerEdge R910 Technical manual

Dell PowerEdge R910 Systems

Information Update

Notes, Cautions, and Warnings

NOTE: A NOTE indicates important information that helps you make better use of

your computer.

CAUTION: A CAUTION indicates potential damage to hardware or loss of data if

instructions are not followed.

WARNING: A WARNING indicates a potential for property damage, personal

injury, or death.

____________________

Trademarks used in this text: Dell™, the DELL logo, and PowerEdge™ are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Intel

is a registered trademark of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries. Microsoft®,

Windows®, and Windows Server®are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United

States and/or other countries. Broadcom®is a registered trademark of Broadcom Corporation and/or

its subsidiaries in the United States and certain other countries. Red Hat Enterprise Linux®and

Enterprise Linux®are registered trademarks of Red Hat, Inc. in the United States and other countries.

2012 - 06 Rev. A02

Information Update 3

Power Supply Removal Updates

The I/O riser with 10G network port requires a minimum of two power

supplies to provide standby power to the system. If you remove AC power

cables from the system while DC power is on, the system may momentarily

operate below the minimum power supply requirement. The BMC SEL may

record VR2/IO riser power not good errors and/or PCIe fatal errors when the

system AC power input falls below the minimum requirement.

NOTE: These errors do not affect the system functionality.

To prevent these errors, ensure the following:

• The system operates with a minimum of two power supply units.

• Turn off the system before removing or connecting AC power cables to the

system.

System Limitations With an Optional 10 GbE I/O

Riser

The 10 GbE I/O riser provides two 10 Gb SFP+ ports using a Broadcom

57711 controller in addition to two 1 GbE ports. The following are the

limitations with the 10 GbE I/O riser:

• To ensure system power redundancy, the 10 GbE I/O riser requires all four

power supplies to be connected to the AC power source. The system power

becomes non-redundant if one of the power supplies is removed.

CAUTION: A power supply failure or removal of another power supply after the

system power becomes non-redundant can lead to a system failure and result in

loss of data.

• Wake On LAN (WOL) is not supported on the 10 Gb

SFP+

ports due to

Broadcom 57711 design limitations. However, WOL is supported on the

two 1 GbE ports available on the riser.

4Information Update

System Memory Update

The system supports 32 GB quad-rank RDIMMs for a total of up to 

2 TB. Table 1 shows the memory configurations available with 32 GB

RDIMMs in a four-processor system.

Table 1. Memory Configuration With 32 GB RDIMMs per Processor

Microsoft Updates

The following issues are documented on the Microsoft Help and Support

website at support.microsoft.com:

• Systems running Microsoft Windows Server 2003 or Windows Server 2008

cannot be set to hibernation if they have more than 4 GB of memory

installed. For more information about enabling hibernation on systems

with more than 4 GB of memory, see the knowledge base article KB888575

microsoft.com

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 cannot be installed or run on systems

with 1 TB of system memory. This issue may occur either in Unified

Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) or in legacy BIOS modes. For more

information, see the knowledge base article KB980598

microsoft.com

• Systems running Microsoft Windows Server 2008 do not support iSCSI

boot when they have an SD card installed in the internal SD module. In

addition, iSCSI boot does not work when an external USB storage device is

plugged into the system. For more information, see the knowledge base

article KB968410 at

microsoft.com

Memory

Mode

Total Memory

(per processor)

/ Total System

Memory

Riser A (memory capacity in GB) Riser B (memory capacity in GB)

1

2

3

4

1

2

3

4

Power and

performance

optimized

256 GB / 1 TB 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32

Power and

performance

optimized

512 GB / 2 TB 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32 32

Information Update 5

Flash Memory

The VFlash media provided by Dell is not partitioned to support the iDRAC6

Enterprise virtual flash feature. When you use the virtual flash feature for the

first time, you are prompted to format the media using the iDRAC GUI.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4 Address Limitation

With 1 TB (When Memory RAS Mode is Not Used)

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4 has an address limitation with 1 TB of system

memory. To install Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4, use the mem=1024G boot

time switch. The system does not boot to the operating system unless a boot

time switch mem=1024G is used. For more information, see the knowledge

base article at kbase.redhat.com/faq/docs/DOC-25412.

Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2 (x64)

Edition With SP2 Limitation With 1 TB System

Memory (When Memory RAS Mode is Not Used)

The system does not boot to the operating system with 1 TB of system

memory. To resolve this issue, set the memory RAS mode to sparing or mirror.

After installing the operating system, add a boot time switch mem=1046528

or /burnmemory=2048 in the boot.ini file before disabling the RAS mode

for subsequent boots.

MAC Address Labels

For security reasons, the embedded NIC and iDRAC6 Enterprise MAC

address labels provided with your system cannot be affixed after they have

been removed.

NOTE: The labels are located on the system identification panel on the front of the

system.

6Information Update

System Limitations With an Optional PCIe Riser

The PCIe riser expands the number of PCIe expansion slots available in the

system to 10. Due to the limitation of 64 KB I/O address space on the Intel

IA32 architecture and the I/O granularity of 4 KB set by the PCI bridge

specification, you can exceed the maximum available I/O resources if you

populate the slots with adapters which require more than 4 KB of I/O address

space. The system does not complete POST if 64 KB I/O address space is

exceeded. For more information on supported adapters, see the Dell

PowerEdge R910 Hardware Owner's Manual at support.dell.com/manuals.

Dell Update Package Information

During the Dell Update Package (DUP) installation process, you may see

messages related to the following:

• Request for system reboot before the DUP installation is complete

• Windows hardware detection

• Windows hardware configuration problem

• Re-enumeration of VFlash and momentary drive letter changes in

Windows

It is recommended that you disable the OS Watchdog Timer in the system

BIOS when running the BIOS DUP. The system may reboot in the middle of

an update and result in corrupted flash if:

•The

OS Watchdog Timer

in the system BIOS is enabled

• The timer expires (if set too short)

NIC Teaming

The system has Broadcom embedded NICs that can be teamed with other

vendors such as Intel. It is recommended that you use Broadcom teaming

driver.

Information Update 7

Dell PERC H800 Storage Adapter Slot Limitation

(With PERC H700i as the Internal Storage

Controller)

The system supports up to two PERC H800 adapters. There is no slot

limitation when only one H800 adapter is installed. However, when you install

two H800 adapters in a system with a PERC H700i internal storage adapter,

one of the H800 adapters must be installed in slot 7 (x16 Gen 2 slot). If you

run embedded system diagnostics without an H800 adapter installed in slot 7,

a software error occurs.

Under the same condition, if you enable Collect System Inventory on Restart

(CSIOR), you may not be able to boot to the operating system. You can

enable/disable CSIOR through the iDRAC Configuration Utility by pressing

<Ctrl><E> during boot up. For more information, see the iDRAC User’s

Guide at support.dell.com/manuals.

Dell Lifecycle Controller System Services

Limitations

Table 2. Lifecycle Controller System Services Issues

Issue Recommended Action

SAS6/iR or PERC H200 has virtual disks

in an inactive or non-optimal state.

Make the virtual disks active before

booting to Lifecycle Controller.

PERC H200 or 6 Gbps SAS HBA are

configured with two virtual disks.

This is a known issue. Do not create

multiple virtual disks using either PERC

H200 or 6 Gbps SAS HBA.

8Information Update

Hardware Owner’s Manual Updates

System Board Jumper Settings Update

This update supersedes the information provided in the Hardware Owner's

Manual at support.dell.com/manuals.

To locate the system board jumpers, see Figure 1.

Table 3. System Board Jumper Settings

Jumper Setting Description

PSWD_EN (default) The password feature is enabled (pins 2-4)

The password feature is disabled, and

iDRAC6 local access is unlocked at the

next AC power cycle (pins 4-6)

NVRAM_CLR (default) The configuration settings are retained at

system boot (pins 3-5)

The configuration settings are cleared at

the next system boot (pins 1-3)

Information Update 9

Figure 1. System Board Jumpers

10 Information Update

BIOS Setup Options Default Settings Update

Power Supply Redundancy Mode (With a 10 Gb I/O Card)

For a redundant system configuration with a 10 Gb I/O card and four power

supplies, the redundancy mode is 2+1.

Table 4. Default Settings for BIOS Setup Options

Screen Option Default Option

Memory Settings System Memory Testing Disabled

Power Management Power Management Active Power Controller

Integrated Devices SR-IOV Global Enable Disabled

SATA Settings Embedded SATA ATA Mode

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