DL380 G6 SFF disks are at 45 C is it safe?

[lightman]

Hello

I am new here, i wrote this because i am concern.

It is a DL380G6 with SFF bays, I have 3x 10K SAS drives and 3x 15K SAS drives, the 15K ones are between 43 and 45 degrees C with a 21C ambient temperature.

fans are at only 13% and almost never goes higher, except on boot for a couple of seconds.

the only way i could find to increase speed is to change to "increased cooling" in bios, but this will put the fans at 60% and the noise is very significant, not to mention fan wearing.

I don't need that much, only 10% more speed will do, but I spend hours researching this and so far, found no way to do it.

I am runing ESXi 4.1 with all the drivers (including bundle, nmi and smart array drivers).

I can see all the info in the vsphere client (configuration -> health status) (drives, psu, fans, temps (except for temp drives that are not there!) in order to know drive temps. I installed hpacucli.

In the power management section of vsphere shows: active in balanced mode.

system rom: P62  06/20/2009

iLO2 fw version: 1.78   06/10/2009

(seems the original one)

could it be firmware issue?, i have read that iLO2 is the one that controls the fans.

thanks!

[Torsten.]

It is a good value, what's wrong with it?

But the firmware is very old, consider to update!

[lightman]

Thank you for reply!

So 45 is good then, I get used to desktop drives to avoid go above 40C :) so I assumed server drives where the same.

I will update fw, should I update bios first o iLO2 first?, both are old as hell indeed :)

I noticed PSU temperature quite high,not burning hot, but hotter than I would like, fan is running but slow, as the entire server.

I have a DL180G6 and it is always cool, also drives are usually in the 35 degrees C range, even the 15K ones, but fans are usually at 40%.

i ordered another psu for redundancy, just in case.

thank you.

L.

[waaronb]

If you look in ILO at the temperature status or at the systems management homepage, it shows the warning and critical thresholds for each of the temp sensors. That should give you an idea of what HP considers normal operating temps and at what level it thinks it's getting dangerous.

You can also check your power management settings. It's possible to configure the server for different cooling levels and maybe yours is set to something non-default.

15K drives do run hot... 10K not as hot, and your average desktop 7200 RPM drive is cooler still, with the 5400 and 4200 RPM drives running the coolest. Yes, the higher the RPM the hotter they tend to be. Basic thermodynamics at work there. :)

[lightman]

Hello waaronb, thank you for your reply.

What bugs me is that ILO2 doesn't show drive temperatures!!.

I can see temperatures for everything but NOT for disks!, i don't understand why, since this server has p410i (integrated) it should be able to read drive temperatures, or at the very least, SFF bay temperature.

Everything else is way below the threshold parameters that's why this server does not increase fan speeds, because obviously does not read drive temperatures :(

In this bios version I have only two settings, efficient and increased cooling, if I select increased cooling fans stay at 60% and the noise is VERY significant, also the power consumption increases by 15W, in efficient mode, it stays at 13%, there is no intermediate option, only a 10% more, would be enough, but it seems that there is no way to doit.

will try to update firmware (I have never done that in a server, so I am a little concern hehe).

thank you

[waaronb]

Although drive temps aren't part of the equation used by the system to change fan speeds, there are sensors in and around the drive bays.

If you're worried about the drives themselves running too hot, my suggestion would be to go directly to the drive manufacturer (Seagate or whomever) and check their tech specs. I have a feeling that 45C is probably within their normal operating temps.

Like I mentioned desktop drives generally run cooler because a SATA drive at 7200 RPM just won't be as hot as a SAS drive at 15K RPM.

This URL is a link to some of Seagate's latest enterprise drives, and you can see the operating temp is listed as 55C:
http://www.seagate.com/internal-hard-drives/enterprise-hard-drives/hdd/enterprise-performance-15k-hdd/#specs

Those aren't quite the drives you're probably talking about, but it gives you an idea of what Seagate enterprise drives consider normal.

[mcfly5]

I WOULD DO THE 10.10 FIRMWARE UPDATE, COULD FIX ALL YOUR TEMP ISSUES

[Torsten.]

>> I WOULD DO THE 10.10 FIRMWARE UPDATE ...

The old smartstart firmware DVD?

Better use the current SPP 2014.06 or pull the components for BIOS, ILO, etc from web.

[lightman]

Thank you!

What whould be the proper order for flashing?, i assume:

- Rompaq Bios

- iLO2

- Smart Array

am I right?

thank you!

[Torsten.]

Consider to boot from the latest SPP and update all at once.

http://www.hp.com/go/spp