Reliable way to check if a DRAC card is installed in Linux environment?

Question

I have some Dell servers which I'm not sure if there are any DRAC cards installed (shame on me), and I'm trying to find a way to check it.

Up to now, lspci and omreport reports nothing. dmesg | grep DRAC is unreliable since it gets rotated. racadm should work but I've no way to get it installed on a Debian box.

Any more ideas? Thanks.

I get a working copy of `racadm` from https://subtrac.sara.nl/oss/omsa_2_deb, and it works. (I'm a regular user of `omreport`/`omconfig`, but missed the `racadm` part of sara-omsa. Silly me.) Still wondering about the `lspci` issue, though. — 0x44, Dec 11 '09 at 15:16

score 9 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 13 '12 at 20:49

9

"ipmitool sdr elist mcloc" is probably what you're looking for; it even works with the newer iDRAC6es, which are integrated with the mainboard and thus don't show up in the FRU list:

$ sudo ipmitool sdr elist mcloc
BMC              | 00h | ok  |  7.1 | Dynamic MC @ 20h
DRAC 5           | 00h | ok  | 11.1 | Dynamic MC @ 26h

$ bash-3.00$ sudo ipmitool sdr elist mcloc
iDRAC6           | 00h | ok  |  7.1 | Dynamic MC @ 20h

answered Mar 13 '12 at 20:49

Stephen Ayotte

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This is a perfectly direct method, and worked with both DRAC and iDRAC. Thanks for the tip, saving this one! – J. M. Becker Feb 11 '13 at 18:06

score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 11 '09 at 10:41

3

This post indicates that lspci should be able to see the card:

04:04.0 Class ff00: Dell Remote Access Card 4
04:04.1 Class ff00: Dell Remote Access Card 4 Daughter Card Virtual UART
04:04.2 Class ff00: Dell Remote Access Card 4 Daughter Card SMIC

answered Dec 11 '09 at 10:41

Anders Lindahl

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My cards are all DRAC 5. Maybe it's a DRAC 5 issue? – 0x44 Dec 11 '09 at 14:00

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 11 '09 at 15:03

what about listing usb devices?

you should find at least virtual kbd / mouse, and possibly pendrive / cd.

somehost0:~# lsusb -v|less
Bus 001 Device 036: ID 413c:0000 Dell Computer Corp.
Device Descriptor:
  bLength                18
  bDescriptorType         1
  bcdUSB               1.10
  bDeviceClass            0 (Defined at Interface level)
  bDeviceSubClass         0
  bDeviceProtocol         0
  bMaxPacketSize0        64
  idVendor           0x413c Dell Computer Corp.
  idProduct          0x0000
  bcdDevice            0.00
  iManufacturer           1 Dell
  iProduct                2 DRAC5
  ....

it seems it can be narrowed down to parsing result of:

lsusb -v -d 413c:0000

`lsusb` requires root privileges to get the DRAC info. A simple `grep` against `/proc/bus/usb/devices` would be cheaper, I guess. — 0x44, Dec 11 '09 at 15:32

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Dec 11 '09 at 09:43

1

not a solution, but if it's debian the boot messages are stored in /var/log/dmesg* which is not rotated. Still you have to know what you're looking for in terms of name; perhaps it shows up on lspci with an 'unknown' name?

answered Dec 11 '09 at 09:43

lorenzog

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Good catch. /var/log/dmesg is NOT rotated. I was wrong. – 0x44 Dec 11 '09 at 14:19
/var/log/dmesg CAN be rotated if it's specified in /etc/logrotate.d/syslog (or one of the other files in /etc/logrotate.d) – Michael Martinez Dec 12 '14 at 21:48

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered May 23 '13 at 01:18

0

There is an easier way to check the iDRAC version:

server# omreport chassis info |grep DRAC
iDRAC6 Version                           : 1.50

answered May 23 '13 at 01:18

Transistor

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score 0 · Answer 6 · edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:14

As lorenzog noted, /var/log/dmesg is not rotated as I thought, so let's grep it:

$ grep -i 'dell\|drac' /var/log/dmesg
ACPI: RSDP (v002 DELL                                  ) @ 0x00000000000f2a00
ACPI: XSDT (v001 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 DELL 0x00000001) @ 0x00000000000f2a80
ACPI: FADT (v003 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 DELL 0x00000001) @ 0x00000000000f2b88
ACPI: MADT (v001 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 DELL 0x00000001) @ 0x00000000000f2c7c
ACPI: SPCR (v001 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 DELL 0x00000001) @ 0x00000000000f2d5d
ACPI: HPET (v001 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 DELL 0x00000001) @ 0x00000000000f2dad
ACPI: MCFG (v001 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 DELL 0x00000001) @ 0x00000000000f2de5
ACPI: DSDT (v001 DELL   PE_SC3   0x00000001 MSFT 0x0100000e) @ 0x0000000000000000
input: Dell DRAC5 as /class/input/input0
input: USB HID v1.10 Keyboard [Dell DRAC5] on usb-0000:00:1d.7-1.1
input: Dell DRAC5 as /class/input/input1
input: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Dell DRAC5] on usb-0000:00:1d.7-1.1
  Vendor: Dell      Model: Virtual  CDROM    Rev: 123
  Vendor: Dell<7>usb-storage: device scan complete

There are two USB devices attributed to DRAC. However, I still have no way to get it listed under lspci. DRAC should be connected to a PCI bus, right?

I'd be cautious of parsing `/var/log/dmesg`. It should work, but it's a static file created at boot and not necessarily indicative of the running state. Likewise the output from `dmesg` can sometimes be filled past it's buffer. Much safer to use procfs or sysfs where possible. — Dan Carley, Dec 11 '09 at 14:54

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Dec 11 '09 at 15:57

0

If you have a DRAC installed, does it supercede the Baseboard Mananagment Controller's IPMI interface? If so, you can query through IPMI to see what the settings are.

answered Dec 11 '09 at 15:57

David Mackintosh

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Reliable way to check if a DRAC card is installed in Linux environment?

7 Answers7