Clearing System Event Log in ESM on PE2650

Question

Hello

OK, I need to be able to clear the SEL without using OMSA because the OMSA clients are linked to the RedHat 2.4.7-10 kernel and we are running production on 2.4.20 for various reasons. Also it is convenient to be able to clear the event log offline on the workbench rather than in the racks.

The ability to clear the logs are especially important when addressing the E0CF5 "LOG DISABLE SBE" situation because although the log calls out a DIMM, there have been cases where that wasn't the failed DIMM so I need to be able to run the MP diagnostics to isolate the failed DIMM and it won't run if the log is full.

So far, I've gotten my grubby hands on a sel2txt executable for ESM4 and x600's that will output the log to a text file on the floppy but it won't accept the usual "/w" or "/e" flags to erase the logs, in fact it just takes whatever arguments given to it as the output file for a *.out file. If I open the executable with notepad to see any embedded strings in the binary, I see that it has interactive menus including some options to enable/disable the SMI logging but I can't seem to get the program to run interactively.

Has anyone found a way to clear the system event logs outside of OMSA / IT assistant yet? Does anyone have the command arguments to the ESM4 sel2txt? Is there a log2txt for ESM4? Can we get the build tree for OMSA's clients so that we can relink it to our customized kernels?

The text of the sel2txt executable says that it's an unsupported product of the ESM group in DELL, any way of contacting someone from that group? Surely they have some sort of initial configuration procedure to at least set the service tag in the ESM and hopefully clear the logs before shipping...

I've got 400 of these PowerEdge 2650's and I would estimate that there's about 15 that need their logs cleared even if it's just so that the diags would run clean through the IPMI section and we may be getting another 256 PowerEdge 1750's soon. I'm afraid I can't accept any more Dell's until I find a way to address memory failures on the workbench. for the 2650's, 6650's and 1750's.

Also, in the past we have been calling in the Dell Unisys techs to address the memory failures (this takes way too long unless I corner them and refuse to let them out of the building until they look at several machines) and what they've been doing is bringing in spare PCI risers because the system event log is stored on the riser as is the system tag so now I have various machines with the wrong system tag's or system tags that read as "SERV" because they have been swapping them around. Is there anyway to reset the system tags back to what they should be?

Note the spare PCI riser option is not a good one because after diagnosing the DIMM, the new PCI riser now has errors in it's log so the IPMI section of the diagnostics will fail.

Regards,

John

P.S.

I do have a workaround but it involves downgrading the kernel to 2.4.7-10, reconfiguring for the bcm5700 driver, loading the Dell OMSA clients and trying to clear with IT assistant running on a Sony notebook which prompt claims to have failed to do so but the end result is that the SEL is cleared. Then I reconfigure to the tg3 driver and back to the desired kernel after uninstalling the OMSA clients manually (the GUI uninstall freezes at 33% complete).

DELL-Mark A · Answer

Hi John,

I have made inquiries as to the possibility of clearing the SEL from DOS, but have not got a response yet. I do have a solution for replacing the Service Tag Number when you change the Riser Card:

Directions for entering a Service Tag Number:

1. Create the Asset Tag utility diskette from ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/utility/assetA00.exe - or from the Dell OpenManage Server Assistant CD (DOSA).
2. After making the diskette, perform a safe reboot to the diskette created in step #1.
3. After booting to the diskette, enter the following command (substitute the actual 5-7 digit system Service Tag for the X's); asset /s XXXXXXX
4. Once this action has completed, the system can be rebooted.

Thanks for using the Dell Community Forums!

jwclb · Answer

Thanks,

That worked for the Service Tag and also allows me to assign an Asset Tag as well. Now if I can just clear the SEL...

Note if I can get a procedure to relink the OMSA clients to my custom kernels, that might be acceptable though it means that we would be addressing issues in the rack rather than just swapping failed servers out and addressing them offline. It would also mean establishing IT Assistant management consoles for each of our sites, the main site in Houston won't be a problem but our client VLAN's and our remote Mexico cluster would be.

Regards,

John

DELL-Mark A · Answer

Hi John, I sent you an email with some information which may help to resolve the issue.

DELL-Mark A · Answer

Hi,

The PowerEdge 2600 does not have the same LCD on the front like the PowerEdge 2650. The System Event Log can be cleared on the PowerEdge 2600 using the Dell OpenManage Server Administrator.

Dell OpenManage Server Administrator, 2000, 2003, v.1.4, A03
FileName: om34_win_managed_system_A03.exe [137 MB]
Release Date: 6/2/2003
http://support.dell.com/FileLib/Format.aspx?ReleaseID=R61476

Server Administrator Documentation:

<ADMIN NOTE: Broken link has been removed from this post by Dell>

allenuk1 · Answer

Thankyou for your prompt reply but I really need a way to clear the log in Dos. On other PE range I use Log2Txt, is there an equivelant for this model? Regards

allenuk1 · Answer

I have exactly the same problem on a PE 2600. Could Dell_Mark A send me the same info in order that I may clear the IPMI System Event Log ? Regards,

DELL-Mark A · Answer

Hi, Unfortunately, the Log2Txt utility only worked on the x3xx series of PowerEdge Servers. We do not have a DOS based utility to clear the ESM logs for any of the newer systems.

jwclb · Answer

I wound up taking a laptop and plugging a crossover cable to the RAC's maintenance port which we do not have connected to a network. The default ip address of the RAC is 192.168.0.120 so I would configure the notebook's interface with the ipaddress of say 192.168.0.1/24 and then use Internet Explorer to log into the RAC (the account is root, I had to call support to get the default password and there are often long delays because the borwser is trying to check the security certificates), usually the RAC will be messed up so I would go into debug and restart the RAC, login again, go to hardware logs and select clear.

Fairly round about way of doing things but it works and without having to load OMSA on the OS.

Regards,

John

Machosker · Answer

Hi there,

On a similar vain, we would like to clear the SEL on our PE 2650. We had a drive fail in the array early last week. We have now since fixed the problem and the array is checking out at 100% again. The LCD on the front of the server is still displaying the message "Drive fail".

We used Sel2TXT to get the log off the server. We are going to install OMSA to clear it,

How do we go about clearing the log, will this bring the LCD display back to the nice blue and white.

Cheers

MH

PowerEdge Hardware General

Clearing System Event Log in ESM on PE2650

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