topic Bad video card in ProLiant Servers (ML,DL,SL)

Bad video card

Russel Olinger — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 01:45:07 GMT

Hello, I have an HP DL380 and the built in VGA graphics card has gone bad. Of the RGB values it seems that only the B value is working. I get blue screens with black menus - it makes the BIOS and the ORCA for the the 5300 controller virtually impossible to read. Can I get an external video card??? I don't need anything spectacular, just a standard 16/32 bit graphics card so I can see what the heck is going on.

In the mean time, I am having to blindly navigate through the prompts and gui's but am uncertain if I am hitting the write options. Using ORCA I am trying to configuration a raid 5 + plus 1 spare using 6 drives. So 4+1 (+ spare). But because I can't see the darn menu prompts (just the text at the top/bottom I have no idea if I am tabbing and selecting the right options. The only way I can tell if I have created the right thing is by deleting it...the confirm delete "logical drive" window is black (I think it supposed to be red) and simply says "#1 RAID 5, 271.3GB with 5 physical drives" - if I had selected the "plus spare" correctly would I see a message in the delete screen referring to it. Until I get another video card this is the only way I can manage through these screens.

Thanks

Re: Bad video card

James ~ Happy Dude — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 06:13:03 GMT

Hello Russell,

1) Which Generation of DL380 are you talking about ?
2) There are no "HP tested" Graphics card available for DL380s.
3) However you may use any COMPATIBLE 3rd party graphics Card.

http://www.google.com/search?q=hp+DL380+Graphics+Card&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B2DVFA_enIN226IN226
(you may search with the generation, for precise results)

4) If you cant see what you are doing in OCRA or BIOS... then PLEASE DO NOT attempt anything, in order to cause further Damage.

5) Best would be to get the System board replaced, Of course !

Regards,
James.

Re: Bad video card

e4services — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 09:46:21 GMT

It is hard to find a PCI video card these days, but you can find them. We run them on our test servers so we can display a higher resolution desktop.
We run GeForce MX4000 PCI cards. Search for that and see if you can still find them.

Re: Bad video card

Russel Olinger — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 10:33:31 GMT

Thanks for the comments everyone. I have resolved this issue. It was the monitor cable - but its a strange issue with the cable. The cable I was using works fine on a regular desktop/monitor, but on the server only "blue" was coming through. I changed the cable and it works just fine. But the supposed 'bad' cable works just fine on other systems and monitors.

*shrug* - really bizarre and the tech in me wants to figure it out but simply I don't have time.