Server Hardware - Chathura Ariyadasa (He/Him/His)

Category: Server Hardware

What is SUM and SUT

When working with HPE server systems, we come across terms like SUM and SUT.

So, today we will go through the basics and differences among those two. Most of us know SUM, which stands for Smart Update Manager. HP Smart Update Manager is a product which updates firmware and software on HPE Synergy Compute Modules, HPE ProLiant servers, and firmware on HPE Integrity and HPE ProLiant Moonshot servers. HP SUM has a browser-based GUI; as well as a scriptable interface using legacy command line interface, input file, and interactive command line interface modes. Typically this ISO is burned into a DVD or flash drive. Once the media has been created we typically boot from that media and carry out the installation as required.

Now lets look at SUT (Smart Update Tools)

Continue reading “What is SUM and SUT”

Integrated Smart Update Tools (iSUT) is the smart update solution for performing online firmware and driver updates. iSUT is used with iLO 4, iLO 5, and with update solutions (management appliances such as iLO Amplifier Pack or HPEOneView and Smart Update Manager (SUM) to stage, install, and activate firmware and driver updates.

This solution basically reduces the downtime and manual work which is required by the IT support personnel. In order to SUT work, the toolkit should be installed on the host  Operating System (ex: esxi, windows, linux). SUT is really useful if your environment is having multiple servers. Unlike in SUM, the SUT configuration requires additional steps and some knowledge on FIPS security levels. HPE provides a great guide on SUT configuration, if need to learn more about FIPS, you may have a quick look on that as well.

How to check the RAID configuration on Linux/Unix systems

Linux based systems support both Hardware and Software based RAID systems. So there are times that we want to check the RAID configuration through the operating system. With Linux this is possible to analyze the configuration with the help of mdstat file.

So, to check the RAID configuration you can simply cat the following files;

 

  • cat /etc/mdadm.conf
  • cat /proc/mdstat

Once the above configuration is analyzed, you will end up with the following specific results;

  • md125 – RAID device file name
  • active raid10 – RAID type
  • sde3[3] sdb3[2] sdc3[1] sdd3[4] sda3[0] – RAID device named /dev/md125 made of five partitions (also known as “component device”)
  • [UUUUU] – Shows status of each device of raid member disk/partition. The “U” means the device is healthy and up/running. The “_” means the device is down or damaged

If you want to determine whether a specific device is a RAID device or a component device, you may execute below;

  • mdadm –query /dev/DEVICE
  • mdadm –query /dev/md125
  • mdadm –query /dev/md12{5,6,7}

If you want to see info about component device named /dev/sdd3, run:
Example: # mdadm –examine /dev/sdd3