DL380 G3 high fan noise w/ RHEL 5

[qwkhyena]

Howdy,

Installed RHEL 5 w/ health drivers. Can query fans via hpasmcli -s "show fan" & hpasmcli -s "show temp". Fans never drop lower in noise level even when I insert SmartStart CD for testing. Buddy of mine has 2 of these running ESX 3.5 and his fans are barely noticeable. Running HP BIOS P29 9/15/2004. Looks like my next step should be to reflash the firmware and clear the NVRAM if that makes sense to any1. Cooling also isn't an issue as the server room stays at 70F.

[root@vmhost1 ~]# hpasmcli -s "show fan"

Fan Location Present Speed of max Redundant Partner Hot-pluggable
--- -------- ------- ----- ------ --------- ------- -------------
#1 PROCESSOR_ZONE No - - No N/A -
#2 PROCESSOR_ZONE Yes NORMAL 8% No N/A Yes
#3 I/O_ZONE No - - No N/A -
#4 I/O_ZONE Yes NORMAL 15% No N/A Yes
#5 PROCESSOR_ZONE Yes NORMAL 8% No N/A Yes
#6 PROCESSOR_ZONE Yes NORMAL 8% No N/A Yes
#7 POWERSUPPLY_BAY Yes NORMAL 20% No N/A Yes
#8 POWERSUPPLY_BAY No - - No N/A -

(Can't be correct if you ask me & the values NEVER change.These value DO change if you take a fan out but immediate go back to normal & %)

[root@vmhost1 ~]# hpasmcli -s "show temp"

Sensor Location Temp Threshold
------ -------- ---- ---------
#0 SYSTEM_BD - -
#1 PROCESSOR_ZONE 34C/93F 62C/143F
#2 CPU#1 34C/93F 73C/163F
#3 I/O_ZONE 44C/111F 68C/154F
#4 - - -
#5 POWER_SUPPLY_BAY 32C/89F 55C/131F


(Fans remain the same even when the server temps are in the 70s to 80s from a 2 hour cool down to being on for 2 days. And these temps are nothing! I wish my gaming systems ran this cool.)

Also installed hpsmh-2.1.10-186 so I can login via port 2381 but don't see anything that will let me manually throttle them down. I've done a ton of searches and lots of folks say the BIOS starts the fans off at low speed already but I can't hold a conversation in the server room whereas my buddies fans are much lower but still running.

Any help would be appreciated!

[qwkhyena]

Okay, did more searching. Found reference to HP article c01214901 which specifically talks about the DL380 G3 starting at low speed AT BOOT which is the opposite of how DL380s & DL380 G2s operate at. I'll go home this evening and put a CD, piece of paper or small cat in front of the fans and use hpasmcli to watch the temps increase and see if the fans kick it up a notch. I wonder if the cat will stay still long enough for this. SPCA doesn't monitor these forums do they?

[qwkhyena]

Yep, verified. I stuffed paper in front of the fans and pulled one fan out. Temps slowly inched upwards and as they got closer to the threshold settings the fans got louder and louder. I finally had 1 fan maxxed out at 100% and the rest at 54%. As soon as I removed the paper the fans came down again to their nominal rotation. I didn't realize these puppies pumped out so much noise. =(

[root@vmhost1 ~]# hpasmcli -s "show fan"

Fan Location Present Speed of max Redundant Partner Hot-pluggable
--- -------- ------- ----- ------ --------- ------- -------------
#1 PROCESSOR_ZONE No - - No N/A -
#2 PROCESSOR_ZONE Yes NORMAL 54% No N/A Yes
#3 I/O_ZONE No - - No N/A -
#4 I/O_ZONE Yes HIGH 100% No N/A Yes
#5 PROCESSOR_ZONE Yes NORMAL 54% No N/A Yes
#6 PROCESSOR_ZONE Yes NORMAL 54% No N/A Yes
#7 POWERSUPPLY_BAY No - - No N/A Yes
#8 POWERSUPPLY_BAY No - - No N/A -

(Fans still say 'NORMAL' all the way up to 89% then when the fan hit 100% it finally said 'HIGH'.)


[root@vmhost1 ~]# hpasmcli -s "show temp"

Sensor Location Temp Threshold
------ -------- ---- ---------
#0 SYSTEM_BD - -
#1 PROCESSOR_ZONE 38C/100F 62C/143F
#2 CPU#1 69C/156F 73C/163F
#3 I/O_ZONE 50C/122F 68C/154F
#4 - - -
#5 POWER_SUPPLY_BAY 40C/104F 55C/131F

(Nothing hit the threshold temps but they came close!)

Hope this helps any1 else.