# Dell M600 Blade Server



## abjordaan (Nov 24, 2008)

Hi,

I am trying to install FreeBDS 7 64 bit on a Dell M600 blade server but the installation halts at the ISA bus phase and the last message I see is:

isab0: <PCI-ISA bridge> at device 31.0 on pci0
isa0: <ISA bus> on isab0

I cannot complete the installation but the 32 bit OS works. I have logged it with Dell but they say I need to escalate this with BSD. 

Any one experienced the same thing or have a work around?

Andre


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## ronan (Dec 1, 2008)

Hi,

I have the same problem with M600 and FreeBSD 64 bit.
I have tried with FreeBSD 7/7.1/8

We need to run FreeBSD on these news Servers. How can we fix it ?

Cheers,
ronan


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## nyogtha (Mar 2, 2009)

Hi!

Did you figure this out?

I encountered this problem recently after installing FreeBSD 7.1 (AMD64) on one of our M600-blades.

After reading up on it, I ended up installing the i386-version, which did indeed seem to work.

I then decided to configure the kernel to use PAE-extensions to utilise the 8GB of ram in the blade. After compiling the custom kernel, a reboot produced the same error as with the AMD64-build of FreeBSD. The server is completely stuck on/after ISA-bus initialisation.


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## mk (Mar 2, 2009)

try to boot the system in verbose mode it may help troubleshoot the problem


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## msright1981 (Jul 24, 2009)

*Dell Blades vs SUN Blades*

As it seems you guys here have a good experience with Dell, I was wondering help me make a decision on which blades to buy Dell or SUN. I have seen a nice comparison earlier on SUN BladeSystem vs Dell Blades

It seems Dell is a better option after reading the comparison, but I still would like to hear more opinion on this. I hope I am not posting to the wrong forum.

Thanks for your help in advance.


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## ooglek (Nov 13, 2009)

I'm having the same problem -- can't successfully run any of the bootonly ISOs on a Dell M600 Blade.  Am I screwed here?

The blade is a quad-core Xeon, tried 7.2 amd64, 7.2 i386, 8.0-RC3 amd64, and 8.0-RC3 i386, all failed to get past a certain point in the boot process.


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## ooglek (Nov 13, 2009)

Interesting: FreeBSD 6.4 Bootonly ISO works!  What the heck?


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## mk (Nov 13, 2009)

ooglek said:
			
		

> Interesting: FreeBSD 6.4 Bootonly ISO works!  What the heck?


then make network installation!


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## jb_fvwm2 (Nov 14, 2009)

ooglek said:
			
		

> I'm having the same problem -- can't successfully run any of the bootonly ISOs on a Dell M600 Blade.  Am I screwed here?
> 
> The blade is a quad-core Xeon, tried 7.2 amd64, 7.2 i386, 8.0-RC3 amd64, and 8.0-RC3 i386, all failed to get past a certain point in the boot process.


if you can load geom_bsd.ko, geom_mbr.ko,
and geom_label.ko "before the boot process" i.e.
at the boot prompt (I've never done it 
but I suspect some have, ) it *may* fix it
(Guessing, from those 3 modules "fixing" 
some errors using _8 in partitioning, fdisk,
particularly obtaining /dev entries where
there were none.)
Then you can put them in /boot/loader.conf if the
install succeeds...


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## ooglek (Nov 14, 2009)

MK -- I forgot I could specify what release I wanted to install, that I wasn't stuck with installing the release of the ISO.  I should try that.  I do all my installs via the network to make sure I'm the most up to date I can be.

A friend suggested binary updates, and I've successfully updated the 6.4 install to 7.0-RELEASE, and am in the process of updating to 8.0-RC3.  I'll report back.

Still frustrating that the 7.x and 8.x bootonly, both amd64 and i386, do not boot on the M600.


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## ooglek (Nov 23, 2009)

So I was able to binary update from 6.4 to 7.0, but trying to go to 8.0 failed again. 

I ended up installing VMware ESXi and then FreeBSD on that.  Sucks, but such is life when you don't have time to figure out why it isn't working.


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## ProServ (Nov 24, 2009)

*Problems that could easily be avoided installing FreeBSD*



			
				ronan said:
			
		

> Hi,
> 
> I have the same problem with M600 and FreeBSD 64 bit.
> I have tried with FreeBSD 7/7.1/8
> ...



This might read like spam but its really not. And yes, it's too late. I know for a *fact* that if you would have tried out Servaris Blade Server you would not be in this predicament.

Honestly, I wish I could offer you the help you need to get it all working.


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## DutchDaemon (Nov 24, 2009)

ProServ said:
			
		

> This might read like spam but its really not.



That's really not up to you. I'll allow it because it is in context (only _just_). Don't overdo it, though, your signature is quite enough. These forums are about lending assistance, not pushing products.


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## ooglek (Dec 4, 2009)

Server hardware wasn't my call -- was stuck with what they had.


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