Intel MPCBL0001 manual Theory of Operation, Front Panel Serial Port, Serial Over LAN

Serial Over Lan (SOL)

From the table above, the serial over LAN can only be activated if a user configures the BIOS correctly. By default, the console redirection setting is enabled and the SOL support is set to “Disabled”.

If a user has a serial session active via the front panel and a user initiates a SOL session on this blade, the serial data on the front panel will be deactivated automatically. The serial data will be sent via the LAN interface to the SOL client system. On the serial console connected to the front panel, the BIOS will send the message “Serial Over LAN session is active” to inform the active user that the serial data has been switched.

11.3Theory of Operation

11.3.1Front Panel Serial Port

By default, the serial console data will be connected to the front panel.

11.3.2Serial Over LAN

The SOL feature is disabled by default at manufacturing time. A user needs to configure the relevant SOL settings using the reference_cfg script supplied in the IPMC Firmware 1.17 release package (downloadable from this website under “Software Downloads”: http://support.intel.com/ support/network/computeboards/mpcbl0001).

With the reference_cfg file, a user can use this script to configure the serial port settings (baud rate, parity bits, data bits, stop bits, flow control), user name and password for RMCP+ sessions. Refer to Section 11.6.1, “SOL Configuration Reference Script (reference_cfg)” on page 157 for further details on this script

The IP address to be used by IPMC can be configured at initial setup of the blade in the system.

The IP address, once configured, is stored in a non-volatile memory and is persistent across IPMC update and payload resets. IP addresses are assigned to the IPMC independently of the host (OS) IP addresses and they need not match. IP addresses used by the OS are not visible to the IPMC.

To start SOL communication, the user invokes the SOL client utility with the IP address of the blade and a series of authentication parameters (username, password, privilege level, cipher suite, etc). The IPMI v2.0 specification allows for AES encryption algorithms for encryption of payload data sent over the network, including AES-128, which uses 128-bit cipher keys.

The SOL client utility initializes a RMCP+ session with the blade and activates SOL. When authentication is successfully completed, IPMC firmware collects serial port data from the blade’s serial port, formats it into network packets, and forwards it to the SOL client utility over the SOL session. The SMBus TCO port between the IPMC and base interface Ethernet controller is used for this purpose. The SOL client utility receives the packets, extracts the serial port data, and displays it on the screen. The IPMC extracts the serial port data received from the SOL client utility and writes it to the serial port of the blade. This allows network redirection of blade’s serial port data stream independent of the host OS or BIOS. The Ethernet controller plays a critical role in redirecting the packets meant for the IPMC, based on receive filters.

154 Intel NetStructure® MPCBL0001 Technical Product Specification