documentation/hardware.md

Preparing hardware for the GlobalOS

• CPU:
  • CPU control on frequency should be given to the OS
  • Enable all settings to performance, avoid "power saving" , "efficient" or "balanced"
• Memory:
  • Make sure memory sticks propagated properly per-CPU and to utilize channels properly. Check server or motherboard manual for more information.
  • DIMM frequency should be set to the maximum supported by the RAM. We can verify that by running dmidecode -t memory and checking the frequency of the DIMMs.
  • Make sure to disable "Memory Interleaving" in the BIOS for NUMA systems.
• Boot settings:
  • Disable "Secure Boot"
  • Enable "EFI" boot mode (CSM supported, but not stable)
  • Make USB stick or your boot media boot first. Install will be done from USB stick
  • Disable PXE boot and PXE options from the BIOS
• Network:
  • Preferable to disable NIC you are not planning to use
• iLOM/DRAC/BMC/IPMI
  • Make sure to configure it to be accessible from the network, it is very useful for recovery and monitoring
• Network cards
  • Make sure you have enough lanes in your slot. Some PCIe risers have 8x lane slot, but only 4x are propagated on the motherboard. Motherboard manual will have the information, but we can also check that on boot.
  • If you are installing multiple network cards, and you have dual CPU, make sure to install them in different NUMA nodes.
  • Make sure you have spare SFP/DAC, preferable different brands if you didn't tested them with your network cards.
• Boot storage/media
  • If you are using USB stick, make sure it is geniune/not fake. You can check that by: ValiDrive https://www.grc.com/validrive.htm , best one is H2testw https://h2testw.org/

How to verify PCIe slot

If you install card in 4x lane PCIe slot, while card designed for 8x PCIe, most likely your card wont be able to reach max bandwidth and will drop packets due PCIe bus bandwidth limit.

pppoe01 ~ # cat /sys/class/net/eth3/device/current_link_width 
8
pppoe01 ~ # cat /sys/class/net/eth3/device/max_link_width 
8

This means card working on maximum PCI lanes

pppoe04 ~ # cat /sys/class/net/eth5/device/current_link_width 
4
pppoe04 ~ # cat /sys/class/net/eth5/device/max_link_width 
8

And here you can see card working in PCIe 4x lanes slot, while it supports 8x.

HP Proliant Gen9 CPU dynamic frequency settings

1. Access the System Utilities:

   • Power on or reboot the server.
   • During the boot process, when prompted, press the F9 key to launch the System Utilities.

2. Navigate to the Power Profile Setting:

   • Within the System Utilities, select "System Configuration."
   • Choose "BIOS/Platform Configuration (RBSU)."
   • Navigate to "Power Management."
   • Select "Power Profile" and press Enter.

3. Select the Desired Power Profile:

   • You'll see a list of available power profiles.
   • Choose the profile: Custom.
   • Press Enter to confirm your selection.

4. Go back to the main menu

5. From the System Utilities screen:

   • select System Configuration, then BIOS/Platform Configuration (RBSU) > Power Management > Power Regulator and press Enter.
   • Select: "OS Control Mode" —Processors run in their maximum power and performance state at all times, unless the OS enables a power management policy.
   • Press Enter to confirm your selection.

6. Press F10 to save your changes and exit.