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ss r2000gz-gl programmatically reading the BMC chip

KViss1
Beginner
1,531 Views

Hi,

I'm a developer, and I've been requested to implement a way to read the status of the redundant power supply of an Intel server in our .Net 4.0 application. Specifically a server in the r2000gz-gl series.

I've tried retrieving this information using WMI, to no avail. There are WMI classes like Win32_ComputerSystem and Win32_PowerSupply which could contain such information. But when I request these on the servers they're empty.

I also found HP servers have specific WMI classes as discussed in topics like this one: https://social.technet.microsoft.com/forums/windowsserver/en-US/c9423e5c-ff9f-4519-b55a-c2ddb4054781/wmi-power-supply WMI power supply

This makes me wonder if Intel servers also have specific WMI classes, but I couldn't find anything like it in the available WMI classes on the server.

I've installed various drivers and tools that are available from the Intel website, and among them was a tool that dumps the status of the BMC chip. I've seen that this dump contains the information I need, plus a whole lot of other information that might be usefull in the future (and a whole lot more of info that is completely not relevant to me).

I could write my code to start this tool, wait for it to finish, then parse the dump file and retrieve this info. But considering this tool can reach the info, I was hoping I could reach the info from my application as well. Which hopefully is a lot quicker, a lot cleaner. And preferably, if runs with WMI, makes the info retrievable from other (similar) servers in the network as well.

So my question is:

- Can it be done with WMI (or similar)?

- If not, can it at least be done more directly (instead of a tool > dump > parse > info route) from C# .Net4

Looking forward to your help.

Kind regards,

Koen Visser

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1 Solution
Salem_W_Intel1
Employee
476 Views

Hi!

While there are utilities that retrieve component statuses such as the https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/24718/Intel-System-Information-Retrieval-Utility-SysInfo- Intel® System Information Retrieval Utility (SysInfo) and https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/24719/Intel-System-Event-Log-SEL-viewer-utility Intel® System Event Log (SEL) viewer utility, you may want to consider the use of Intelligent Platform Management Interface (http://www.intel.com/design/servers/ipmi/ipmi_tool.htm IPMI)* for the specific task you have in mind.

* IPMI is provided "as is" with no support.

Other sites of interest are the following:

https://www-ssl.intel.com/content/www/us/en/servers/ipmi/ipmi-home.html?wapkw=ipmi https://www-ssl.intel.com/content/www/us/en/servers/ipmi/ipmi-home.html?wapkw=ipmi

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/sb/CS-031911.htm?wapkw=sel+viewer Intel® Server Boards — How to Extract and Read the Server Event Log (SEL)

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/sb/CS-033710.htm?wapkw=sel+viewer Server Products — System Event Log Troubleshooting Guides

Hope this helps!

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5 Replies
Salem_W_Intel1
Employee
477 Views

Hi!

While there are utilities that retrieve component statuses such as the https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/24718/Intel-System-Information-Retrieval-Utility-SysInfo- Intel® System Information Retrieval Utility (SysInfo) and https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/24719/Intel-System-Event-Log-SEL-viewer-utility Intel® System Event Log (SEL) viewer utility, you may want to consider the use of Intelligent Platform Management Interface (http://www.intel.com/design/servers/ipmi/ipmi_tool.htm IPMI)* for the specific task you have in mind.

* IPMI is provided "as is" with no support.

Other sites of interest are the following:

https://www-ssl.intel.com/content/www/us/en/servers/ipmi/ipmi-home.html?wapkw=ipmi https://www-ssl.intel.com/content/www/us/en/servers/ipmi/ipmi-home.html?wapkw=ipmi

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/sb/CS-031911.htm?wapkw=sel+viewer Intel® Server Boards — How to Extract and Read the Server Event Log (SEL)

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/server/sb/CS-033710.htm?wapkw=sel+viewer Server Products — System Event Log Troubleshooting Guides

Hope this helps!

KViss1
Beginner
476 Views

I mark your answer as the correct one, because it appears it is indeed IPMI that came to the rescue. There was no need to install tooling though. I was able to locate IPMI Controller WMI classes which gives me the info I want/need and a whole lot more info that will certainly be useful in the (near)future.

Thanks!

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DSilv11
Valued Contributor III
476 Views

This is also a BIOS set-up option to make the BMC viable to OS as a plug and play.

Been awhile since I played in Windows, but I am thing that would let WMI see and monitor the BMC

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KViss1
Beginner
476 Views

Thank you for your replies and aplogies for the delay ... so much going on at the moment

I found the setting in the bios, but haven't been able to find any WMI class that contains the info I'm looking for. The only one that appears to work is the CIM_PowerSupply class, but there's only 1 instance which reads OK, even if only 1 of the 2 power supplies is plugged in.

Do I need to install a specific driver for the correct classes to be available?

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