Im wondering if anyone has used or is using a good solution to remote boot (from complete power down) servers and equiptment?
This i have done in the past by having the bios on the server set to reboot after power fail and that takes care of the rest along with good load UPS's and backup power. But what if you acually had to shut down a server for some reason out-there (backup power fails)?
Most vendors have some kind of module available as standard, or as an option. IBM: "Remote Supervisor Adapter" HP: "Lights-Out" Dell: "DRAC" (Dell Remote Access Controller) Obviously, blade chassis, etc. have these built in.. There are also cards that go home made PCs, I believe. APC and others also make remote power switches, which are a power distribution board that let you switch ports on and off individually. This may solve part of your problem for cheaper than lightsout cards in all your servers. I believe the interface is some kind of network thing (ie. web, SNMP or telnet), or maybe RS-232. -- Nathan Ward