Does this deployment plan sound like the way to go?

[Dana Swanson]

Hi Everyone,

We have a large number (150-200) of Proliant class servers running Windows Server 2000 and Windows 2003 with several configurations and versions of the insight agents installed. We have older DL360's up to some of the newer model Proliants.

Our environment isn't really set to use all of HP SIM's features. I am planning to choose a base install for each OS (Win2k,Win3k,NT) of the PSP and start using the Initial Proliant Pack Install to upgrade the PSP and configure the insight agents to point to the new HPSIM server.

Does using the Deploy Initial Proliant Support Pack make sense to get the servers at the same PSP rev and the new settings to point to the new HP PSP 5.1 server?

I know I may have older bios revs preventing some of the PSP software to be current but can hopefully deploy the bios updates and another install of the PSP if needed latter on.

Does this sound like the way to go, try to upgrade as much as I can to one base PSP?

Thanks,

Dana

[Daniel Leblanc · Accepted solution]

Only thing is WATCH out for NETWORK DRIVERS UPDATE and TEAMING UPDATE, they can kill you very fast!!

[Dana Swanson]

Thanks for the tip.

When manually upgrading our domain controllers we did run into teaming issues after a new PSP was installed. I wasn't aware there can be general network driver issues as well.

Is there a way to tell what network drivers will be a problem and what teamed nic's will have issues or is it a deploy to one model server/OS and see what happens?

Thanks!

[Daniel Leblanc]

No Sorry Dana there Isn't a way of finding out witch one will be a problem, what we do is deploy al other item(HP agent,bios update,..) with HP sim deploy and we do VCA deploy driver for driver and teaming.

What you look is in the forum for messages for error in drivers for network.

Dan

[James Kennedy_5]

Teaming driver issues seem to occur mostly on Windows 2000 servers, 2003 Servers should not have any issues. It has to do with the way Windows 2000 reloades device drivers back into the stack.

[Cindy Osborn]

Dana,

One thing I would add is how old of agents do you have installed in your environment? Our field servers were not being updated like our data center servers. They had agents going back to 4.9. For anything older than 7.0 we have found that we needed to remove everything off or we were going to have to step them up in order to get them to the 7.60 agents. So the step up path would have been 4.9 to 5.4 to 6.4 to 7.0 to 7.6. We decided that was too much so we're manually removing it off the servers that aren't scheduled for refresh. And this isn't a small task as it is several hundred servers.

[Dana Swanson]

Thanks Everyone,

We have a big mix and match of Proliant Support Packs / hp Insight Agents. I would guess from version 5 to 7. I think this is going to be a giant task but worth it in the end. We have enough people to help with the task.

An FYI: After speaking to someone that ran into this issue they called hp Support and was advised to install the next major release of the PSP.

For example if you were running 5, upgrade to 6, then to 7. This did help in a small number of servers (30 or so).

Maybe that could be tried. Keeping the automated pushes of the insight agents to few servers at first and slowly increase the number.

I was going to match Server models with OS type and Proliant level and try to base the pushes only to servers that are configured similar.

Thanks!

[Daniel Leblanc]

For network watch out for jumping from vers 2 or 3 or 4...to 8,9 or 10 it will corupt for sur!!

[Daniel Leblanc]

For network driver, watch out for jumping from vers 2 or 3 or 4...to 8,9 or 10 it will corupt for sur!!

[Dana Swanson]

Thanks,

I'll note the version numbers when doing the pushes of the PSP.

See ya,

Dana

[Rob Buxton]

Just a note, different OSes stop at different PSPs.
For NT4 you'll be restricted to 6.31.
There's also an issue with NT4 regarding the System Management Driver and you need to remain at v3.36 rather that the 4.50 in the PSP. I can't recall the exact reason now.

W2K PSPs stop at 7.60.

[Dana Swanson]

Thanks for the heads up,

I hope not to run into any Windows NT but I have a feeling I will. We still run
Wins to support old PC clients so that's two servers I know of we should be monitoring.

I'm still learning, dazed and confused. :) I'm wondering why some components are based on the old way the insight agents used to work.

Not a good example but when I looked at the Survey Utility it's using Administrator, Operator and User. I thought I saw these referenced someplace else as well but can't recall now.

Are these still there for backward compatibility for older versions of HPSIM?

The new HPSIM5 version seems to make the survey utility no longer needed.

Thanks,

Dana

[Daniel Leblanc]

Well in HOme Page management you have 3 group Admin,Oper,USer ..groupe, is this what you mean?

Sorry for my english i am french.

Dan

[Dana Swanson]

Hello,

The older insight server management web page used to have you use a general account called "Administrator", "Operator" and "User" and assign them a password. The names were not changable.

Now the new way to connect is like you say by creating your own groups called what you would like.

I still see the older way to communicate here and there and was wondering why this is. I wanted to make sure it was for backwards compatibily like I'm guessing. If not I'll have to get a grasp on how to setup the old accounts somehow.

Thanks!