[LinuxBIOS] AMD Geode LX support for LinuxBIOS

[Uwe Hermann]

On Thu, May 03, 2007 at 03:01:29PM -0400, Ward Vandewege wrote:
> > Thanks for the pointer! However, the paper suggests that an extra
> > controller/processor is needed for IPMI. Do we have such a thing
> > on recent x86 mainboards?
> 
> Some do. It's usually an optional component for server boards.
> 
> I have had fairly extensive dealing with IPMI on Supermicro and Tyan boards,
> and to be honest, these things are pathetic. There are IPMI 'standards' (v1,
> v1.5, v2), which never seem to be implemented properly. In my experience, the
> IPMI cards lock up, crash, become unresponsive, and are so poorly implemented
> that they often require the use of - even buggier - proprietary tools to even
> talk to the things; the free software ipmitool is a great piece of software,
> but it's hard having to work around IPMI implemenations that are broken in
> undocumented and unpredictable ways. Hence, getting ipmitool to work with a
> particular IPMI card is very much a game of hit and miss.
> 
> And don't get me started on IPMI cards sharing physical network connections
> with the mainboard - in some implementations they piggyback on the onboard
> ethernet controller and just pick up whatever traffic they need from the
> wire, whereas on other boards they actually have a separate ethernet
> controller on the same socket (!). Of course one can configure the mac and ip
> address for the IPMI card in *all* the implementations I've seen, leading to
> interesting situations where sometimes the mac address for the IPMI card
> *has* to be the same as the one for the onboard ethernet interface, and
> sometimes it *may not* be the same.
> 
> Best of all - the whole point of IPMI is out of band management of machines.
> Get this: I've seen machines crash *and take the IPMI daughterboard with
> them*. IPMI daugtherboards obviously rely on some parts of the host system to
> remain in a non-locked up state, which kind of goes against the whole point
> of having IPMI in the first place...
> 
> On paper, IPMI is a great idea. The implementations I've seen suck royally.
> Proprietary software...

This text looks suspiciously well-suited for the wiki, hint hint ;)


Uwe.
-- 
http://www.hermann-uwe.de  | http://www.holsham-traders.de
http://www.crazy-hacks.org | http://www.unmaintained-free-software.org
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