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Selecting shared BladeCenter resources

Some BladeCenter® resources are selectable for use by a single blade server at a time, such as the media tray or the keyboard-video-mouse (KVM).

BladeCenter resources such as power modules, cooling, system management, and network I/O modules are available to most blade servers at all times; no user intervention is required. You can select the resources for a blade server in the following ways.

Attention
Do not switch ownership of the media tray to another blade server while a transaction is taking place on the DVD drive or an attached USB device. The data might become corrupted. Make sure that activity lights on the DVD drive are not lit.
  • Most blade servers have two selection buttons on the front of the blade server Media tray selection button and KVM selection button.
  • You can use the advanced management module Web interface to enable or disable the selection on the blade servers and change ownership of the media tray or the KVM ( Blade Tasks > Remote Control ).

    The monitor that is attached to the advanced management module shows the video output from the blade server that is the current owner of the KVM.

    • To switch the KVM to a specific blade server, press the KVM selection button button on that blade server.
    • To switch ownership of the media tray to a specific blade server, press the Media tray selection button button on that blade server.

    The BladeCenter S Types 7779 and 8886 assigns the resource to the blade server that is requesting it.

  • On a keyboard that is directly attached to the advanced management module, you can press keyboard keys in the following sequence to switch KVM control between blade servers:
    • NumLock NumLock blade_server_number Enter

    Where blade_server_number is the two-digit number for the blade bay in which the blade server is installed. When you use some keyboards, such as the 28L3644 (37L0888) keyboard, you must hold down the Shift key while you enter this key sequence.

It can take up to 20 seconds for the operating system in the switched-to blade server to recognize the media tray or the KVM. If you install Microsoft Windows 2000 on a blade server while it is not the current owner of the media tray or the KVM, the first time the blade server requests ownership after the operating system has been installed, it can take up to 1 minute for the operating system to recognize the devices (this is a one-time-only occurrence).
Note
The operating system on the blade server must provide USB support for the blade server to recognize and use the media tray. The BladeCenter S system uses USB for internal communication with these devices.
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