No video display in RHEL5 Linux installation on HS21 Blades
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Working on IBM Blades is not very fun, things get harder day by day when you start noticing one issues after another. I spend several days just to update the firmware on all IBM HS21 blades. I remember 6-7 years ago working on IBM Blades, the administrative console now called Advanced management module for managing blades is just a piece of crap. Do you really want me to get started ok I can mention only mention few things.
In AMM web console when you first power-on the blade right half corner of the display is chopped, you don’t get full video display on the console. This issue was there 6-7 years and still exists. Next I remember updating firmware on blades is pain, then there are issues like your keyboard control doesn’t work some time , you can find it here if your keyboard doesn’t work on IBM HS21 blades you can find the fix here.
Finally when i start installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (RHEL 5) on IBM HS21 blade I ran into other issues. I put the CD into the blade center and powered on the HS21 blade after booting RHEL 5 installer I didn’t see anything on screen –it was just went blank on video display , it was like as HS21 blade hanged there but keyboard controls were working fine, so I used the CTRL+ALT+DEL shortcut to reboot the blade. After noticing some scrolling Linux installer text I noticed message for ATI 1000 driver load right after my screen went black. I realized this sounds like a video driver issue so I tried another reboot and typed linux text to start the RHEL 5 installation in text mode. Sure enough my installation went fine and this confirmed that my video display didn’t work because of video driver issue. I searched on IBM site for help and find Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 4 update 3 (RHEL 4 - U3) installation instructions in BladeCenter section. I find some notes that Modifications are needed to run X window System (Graphical mode) during installation but wasn’t clear why? I have answer for you that there is not video driver for HS21 IBM blades on RHEL 4 and RHEL 5 Linux. Here is some good news that once you finish the RHEL 5 installation you can do changes in X server to get your RHEL 5 GUI session back but bad enough that you can only do your Linux installation on IBM HS21 blades in text mode only. Here is what I did to get my Linux X windows Graphical desktop back on RHEL 5 :
1. First Log in as root and using vi (or any other editor like nano ), edit the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file. Before making any changes in video configuration file make sure you create a backup file. The in xorg.conf file search for the following driver line in the Device section:
Driver “ati”
Replace “ati” with “vesa” The final section looks similar to this:
Section “Device”
Identifier “Videocard0?
Driver “vesa”
VendorName “Videocard vendor”
BoardName “ATI ES1000?
EndSection
2. Turn off dpms. While still editing the xorg.conf file, search for the following dpms option line:
Option “dpms”
Change the option line to:
Option “dpms” “off”
This step is needed if you want to run the X-Windows in RHEL 4/ RHEL 5 Linux on HS21 blades. Unfortunately RHEL 5 installtion can be only done in text mode. After I was done with these changes, I edited my /etc/inittab file to boot to runlevel 5 (graphical level). Running “init 6? forced a reboot and from there, I was able to see my RHEL 5 desktop in the IBM blade management center. I am not sure whom to blame for this issue – IBM, ATI or Red Hat for not providing the ATI drivers on HS21 IBM Blades.
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