Subj : What to do with a gia To : Ky Moffet From : Barry Martin Date : Sun Sep 13 2020 09:54:00 Hi Ky! > KM> I've inherited a PowerEdge R510 server! great whopping rackmount > KM> type monster, dual Xeon, 64GB RAM, 12 drive bays, all full (8 3TB > KM> SAS, 4 480GB SATA SSDs which will be used to upgrade other > KM> stuff). No OS, cuz it was using some cloud OS from which it's now > KM> disconnected. KM> And what I ended up doing was cannibalizing it... had a loose KM> newer Xeon CPU, had a Lenovo S30 workstation motherboard that KM> uses this very CPU fall on my head; it supports both SAS hard KM> drives and 64GB ECC RAM... and uses about a third the electricity KM> for the same net horsepower. And since it's a Xeon and I've KM> already used Xorro as a name, it became Fireball, as in XL-5 KM> (it's fast, it has an X, isn't logic wonderful? :) But Zorro on TV spelt his name with a 'Z'! Much fancier to go slash- slash-slash than swoosh-swoosh!! KM> And then we had a HUGE argument getting any Windows before Win10 KM> to install. It hasn't learned 'new and improved' isn't always so. KM> The Lenovo board has an embedded Win10 license. (It shipped with KM> Win7; how it acquired this is a mystery. Maybe that "free" KM> upgrade.) It LOVES Win10. I do not. Win10 is what sent me KM> screaming off to linux. Win10 ate my old external HD. Win10 is on KM> my $#!+ List. Yes, that does seem a bit odd: has a license for Windows 10 though using and running Windows 7. I'd probably wipe Windows all together and install Linux (here Ubuntu), though probably try for dual booting as some things do need Windows. (Wonder how one can keep Win 7 from upgrading?) KM> Win8.1 Enterprise would not install. Win8 Embedded installs, but KM> runs very poorly, and is very annoying. (Enterprise, which came KM> to me on a freebie laptop, evidently has had considerable KM> behavior modification, as it is much more polite than the KM> consumer edition.) 8.1 may have been tweaked for business before being released -- "we can piddle off the consumer but better not the business customer!". KM> Win7 would not install, tho a portable Win7 install runs fine. KM> (Not sure why this Win7Ultimate of uncertain provenance is KM> portable, but it is. Just stick it in anything, and it runs.) So a permanent Windows 7 won't work but a temporary one will! Wonder of the 'permanent' version is designed for a specific brand such as HP and so is missing anything Acer needs whereas the portable version has or can get all manufacturers. KM> Better than on Silver, actually, where it's decided NVMes are not KM> in its future. I haven't played with them yet. SSDs, yes. KM> I really wanted Fireball to run XP64, because its intended job is KM> Poor Man's NAS, for which it needs to network gracefully and KM> without argument. XP64 does that, and is 100% stable. But oh KM> lordy, the ways the install found to fail.. got some help from KM> Lenovo support but turns out if you slipstream the I/O driver, KM> XP64 then rejects its own embedded serial number. After numerous KM> fails I finally gave up and switched SATA to from UEFI to KM> Legacy... and then we had a different set of fails, until one KM> attempt became confused and used the previous failed install as KM> its starting point -- and THEN it installed. And runs fine. I am KM> now terrified of having to repeat this arcane procedure which no KM> one understands, and have made three copies of the relevant hard KM> drive. Reminds be of the headaches I had with the install of Ubuntu 18.04 on this system because of a faulty memory module! And didn't help this was my first time trying to use UEFI so didn't know also needed a 'special' partition. And speaking of NAS, probably going to build one here as the pre-built device I'm using is no longer supported, plus was running short on storage -- deleted some old-old stuff and took care of that problem! FreeNAS, Amahi, etc. are considerations for the new NAS. KM> BUT... still looking for the relevant SAS driver.. the XP driver KM> on Lenovo's site is the wrong one (tho their Win7 driver works). KM> Meanwhile, could not get Win7 on Silver to play nice with the KM> NVMe (the driver made Win7 throw up all over itself) but the NVMe KM> works fine with XP64. WTF. It's just toying with your mind! Unfortunately I haven't played with the NVMe's yet so I can't help there. KM> Well, I guess I just swap their OSs. And get to use my preferred KM> XP for everyday. When life gives you lemons.... KM> Unless someone can show me how to get linux to gracefully allow KM> network access to its precious hard drives... PCLOS runs lovely KM> on both of 'em, but it's very annoying to be stuck with only ONE KM> network drive that it will access (I don't know how I did that, KM> either) and refusing to let anyone else see its own naughty bits. I'm using VNC here but limited experience. Have been going from this system to a couple of the Raspberry Pi's. Have been able to do read/write of their SDcards, which I suppose is similar to a hard drive over a network. ....Right_click, Properties, Local Network Share tab. More for a specific directory than the hard drive in total. KM> Oh... and never ever not EVER change the "use optimized defaults" KM> setting on a Lenovo. If it ain't broke, don't touch it. You Have KM> Been Warned. If you change it (hoping to fool the desired OS into KM> installing, because Lenovo Support suggested looking at this KM> setting) and if your vidcard is not BRAND FREAKIN' NEW, you will KM> experience an apparently-bricked system, until you try a BRAND KM> FREAKIN' NEW vidcard out of sheer desperation. (Well, new enough KM> to know newfangled BIOS stuff, anyway.) Per Lenovo Support, the KM> function comes factory-preset to Do Certain Settings, and if it KM> disagrees with any bit of hardware, the result Does Not Work. "Optimized" seems to mean "best results with the original way we shipped it". KM> And how was YOUR day? :D Apparently better than yours! ¯ BarryMartin3@ ® ¯ @MyMetronet.NET ® .... To be, or not to be. *BOOM!* Not to be. --- MultiMail/Win32 v0.47 þ wcECHO 4.2 ÷ ILink: The Safe BBS þ Bettendorf, IA --- QScan/PCB v1.20a / 01-0462 * Origin: ILink: CFBBS | cfbbs.no-ip.com | 856-933-7096 (454:1/1) .