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I Need A Remote KVM Switch With Power Managment For My Data Center

I have 9 Dell PowerEdge servers in my data center all of which have DRAC cards in them. I have found them to be extremely slow and un-reliable.

I am looking for a rack mount hardware KVM switch with solid reliable remote access technology. I would also like it to have Power Control such that if I need to do a hard reboot on a server because its unresponsive I can instruct this switch to do so. My goal here is not to have to depend on the Data Center tech's for this functionality.

I would also like it to support mounting remove virtual media so that I can install an OS (Usling a Network Install CD of course) - but also to be able to mount any ISO or CD image from my office computer such that it will be accessible to whatever server I am connected to.

All of my servers are Linux running CentOS 4 and CentOS 5.

Can any expert recommend me a good solid piece of hardware that meets all the above requirements?

memo_tnt

Hi
there are many products, this depends on ur Data center size, and ur needs ::

check the following links for recommended KVMs:

http://www.provantage.com/cables-go-0su21023a~7CBT93VC.htm

http://www.provantage.com/avocent-dsr1031-g01~7AVOE020.htm

http://www.rackmountlcdpro.com/aten-kvm-remote-reboot-management--8-port-pn9108u.html

BR

purestealth

ASKER

Hi thanks for the links....

Those units seem to be a bit pricey but they did however get me on the right track. I am looking at getting 2 separate devices, one to handle power, the second to handle the KVM/IP functionality.

My only stipulation is they need to support Linux and Firefox, I found a Belkin one that supported just IE with Active X, a terrible design choice on behalf of Belkin, so none the less I am hunting for something platform independent.

Do you have any personal recommendations from past purchases / experience?

Thanks

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memo_tnt

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purestealth

ASKER

I did not end up getting the ones you suggested but I did take a 2 tier approach as I was recommended to keep the 2 functionalities separate by doing so, and in the event of a hardware failure, I don't loose both functionalities (KVM + Reboot).