Dell PowerEdge 1855

[Doug White]

On Wed, 16 Mar 2005, Robert Blayzor wrote:

> I'd like to know if anyone has experience with the Dell PowerEdge 1855
> blade servers running on either FreeBSD_4 or FreeBSD_5.
>
> I'm looking to deploy several servers and I know that the 1850's will
> run just fine.
>
> I have concerns over the PERC4/im and the ethernet controllers on the
> 1855's.  I assume since the 1855's have Intel Gig-E controllers they use
> the em driver, which I've had good luck with in the past.

Dell generally used Broadcom Ethernet chips, but the support is good for
those as well.

> Apparently the 1855's integrated RAID uses the LSI (mpt) driver.  I've
> heard mixed results on this with earlier versions of 4.x and 5.x, but
> nothing in the latest releases, 4.10+ and 5.3.
>
> Can anyone share their experiences with performance and stability on
> these machines?

I haven't had problems with the mpt-based machine I have, but reportedly
the driver doesn't handle certain error conditions.  I believe a new
driver or fixes are working their way thorugh the legalitites.

I had problems with an IBM machine a while back and IM just Not Working,
but I haven't tried it recently.

-- 
Doug White                    |  FreeBSD: The Power to Serve
dwhite at gumbysoft.com          |  www.FreeBSD.org