Dell POWEREDGE 840 User manual

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Dell™ PowerEdge™ 840 Systems
Hardware Owner’s Manual

Notes, Notices, and Cautions
NOTE: A NOTE indicates important information that helps you make better use of your computer.
NOTICE: A NOTICE indicates either potential damage to hardware or loss of data and tells you how to avoid the
problem.
CAUTION: A CAUTION indicates a potential for property damage, personal injury, or death.
____________________
Information in this document is subject to change without notice.
© 2006 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of Dell Inc. is strictly forbidden.
Trademarksusedinthistext:Dell,theDELLlogo,Inspiron,DellPrecision,Dimension,OptiPlex,Latitude,PowerEdge,PowerVault,PowerApp,
PowerConnect, and XPS are trademarks of Dell Inc.; Intel, Pentium, and Celeron are registered trademarks of Intel Corporation; Microsoft,
MS-DOS, Windows, and Windows Server are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation; Red Hat is a registered trademark of Red Hat,
Inc.;SUSEis a registered trademarkofNovell,Inc.; UNIX is a registeredtrademark of The Open Group in the United States and other countries;
EMC is a registered trademark of EMC Corporation.
Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this document to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products.
Dell Inc. disclaims any proprietary interest in trademarks and trade names other than its own.
June 2006 P/N DJ894 Rev. A00

Contents 3
Contents
1 About Your System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Other Information You May Need . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Accessing System Features During Startup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Front-Panel Features and Indicators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Back-Panel Features and Indicators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Connecting External Devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
NIC Indicator Codes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Diagnostics Indicator Codes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Hard-Drive Indicator Codes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
System Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
System Beep Codes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Warning Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Diagnostics Messages. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Alert Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Baseboard Management Controller Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
2 Using the System Setup Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Entering the System Setup Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Responding to Error Messages. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Using the System Setup Program. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
System Setup Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Main Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
CPU Information Screens. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Integrated Devices Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Console Redirection Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
System Security Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Exit Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

4Contents
System and Setup Password Features. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Using the System Password . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Using the Setup Password . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3 Installing System Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Recommended Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Inside the System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Opening the System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Removing the Bezel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Removing the Cover. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Front-Panel Drive Inserts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Removing the Front-Panel Drive Inserts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Installing the Front-Panel Drive Inserts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Closing the System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Replacing the Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Installing the Bezel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Connecting Drives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Interface Cables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Drive Cable Configurations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
DC Power Cables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Diskette Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Removing a Diskette Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Installing a Diskette Drive. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Optical or Tape Drives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Installing an Optical or Tape Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Hard Drives. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Hard Drive Installation Guidelines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Configuring the Boot Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Removing a Hard Drive from the Drive Bay. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Installing a Hard Drive in the Drive Bay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Removing a Hard Drive from a Lever-Release Drive Carrier . . . . . . . . 59
Installing an Hard Drive in the Lever-Release Drive Carrier . . . . . . . . 60
Hot-Plug SATA Hard Drives Using the SAS Backplane. . . . . . . . . . . 61
Removing a Hot-Plug SAS or SATA Hard Drive. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Contents 5
Cooling Shroud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Removing the Cooling Shroud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Installing the Cooling Shroud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Cooling Fans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Removing the Front System Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Installing the Front System Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Removing the Back System Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Installing the Back System Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Power Supply . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Removing the Power Supply . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Replacing the Power Supply . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
Expansion Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Installing an Expansion Card . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Removing an Expansion Card. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Replacing the SAS Controller Card Battery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Memory. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
General Memory Module Installation Guidelines . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
Installing Memory Modules. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
Removing Memory Modules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Microprocessor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Removing the Processor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Installing a Processor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Installing a RAC Card . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
System Battery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Replacing the System Battery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Front I/O Panel (Service-Only Parts Procedure). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Removing the Control Panel Assembly and Chassis-Intrusion
Switch. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Installing the Control Panel Assembly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
System Board (Service-Only Parts Procedure) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Removing the System Board . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Installing the System Board. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

6Contents
4 Troubleshooting Your System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Safety First—For You and Your System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Start-Up Routine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Checking the Equipment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
Troubleshooting IRQ Assignment Conflicts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
Troubleshooting the Video Subsystem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
Troubleshooting the Keyboard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Troubleshooting the Mouse. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Troubleshooting Serial I/O Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Troubleshooting a Serial I/O Device . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Troubleshooting a USB Device . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Troubleshooting a NIC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Troubleshooting External Connections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Troubleshooting a Wet System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Troubleshooting a Damaged System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Troubleshooting the System Battery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Troubleshooting Power Supplies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Troubleshooting System Cooling Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Troubleshooting a Fan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Troubleshooting System Memory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Troubleshooting a Diskette Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Troubleshooting an Optical Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Troubleshooting an External SCSI Tape Drive. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
Troubleshooting a Hard Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Troubleshooting SATA Hard Drives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Troubleshooting a SATA Hard Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Troubleshooting a SATA Hard Drive in a RAID Configuration . . . . . . 106
Troubleshooting a SAS RAID Controller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Troubleshooting Expansion Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Troubleshooting the Microprocessor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Contents 7
5 Running the System Diagnostics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
Using Dell PowerEdge Diagnostics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
System Diagnostics Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
When to Use the System Diagnostics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
Running the System Diagnostics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
From the Utility Partition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
From Removable Bootable Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
System Diagnostics Testing Options. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Using the Custom Test Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Selecting Devices for Testing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Selecting Diagnostics Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
6 Jumpers and Connectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
System Board Jumpers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
System Board Connectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Disabling a Forgotten Password. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
7 Getting Help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Obtaining Assistance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Online Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
AutoTech Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Automated Order-Status Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Support Service. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Dell Enterprise Training and Certification. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Problems With Your Order . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Product Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Returning Items for Warranty Repair or Credit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Before You Call. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Contacting Dell. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126

8Contents
Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155

About Your System 9
About Your System
This section describes the physical, firmware, and software interface features that provide and ensure
the essential functioning of your system. The physical connectors on your system’s front and back
panels provide convenient connectivity and system expansion capability. The system firmware,
applications, and operating systems monitor the system and component status and alert you when a
problem arises. System conditions can be reported by any of the following:
• Front or back panel indicators
• System messages
• Warning messages
• Diagnostics messages
• Beep codes
• Alert messages
This section describes each type of message, lists the possible causes, and provides steps to resolve
any problems indicated by a message. The system indicators and features are illustrated in this
section.
Other Information You May Need
CAUTION: The Product Information Guide provides important safety and regulatory information. Warranty
information may be included within this document or as a separate document.
• The Getting Started Guide provides an overview of system features, setting up your system, and
technical specifications.
• CDs included with your system provide documentation and tools for configuring and managing
your system.
• Systems management software documentation describes the features, requirements, installation,
and basic operation of the software.
• Operating system documentation describes how to install (if necessary), configure, and use the
operating system software.
• Documentation for any components you purchased separately provides information to configure
and install these options.

10 About Your System
• Updates are sometimes included with the system to describe changes to the system, software, and/or
documentation.
NOTE: Always check for updates on support.dell.com and read the updates first because they often
supersede information in other documents.
• Release notes or readme files may be included to provide last-minute updates to the system or
documentation or advanced technical reference material intended for experienced users or
technicians.
Accessing System Features During Startup
Table 1-1 describes keystrokes that may be entered during startup to access system features. If your
operating system begins to load before you enter the keystroke, allow the system to finish booting, and
then restart your system and try again.
Table 1-1. Keystrokes for Accessing System Features
Keystroke Description
<F2> Enters the System Setup program. See "Entering the System Setup Program" on page 29.
<F10> Opens the utility partition, allowing you to run the system diagnostics. See "Running the
System Diagnostics" on page 112.
<Ctrl+E> Enters the Baseboard Management Controller (BMC) Management Utility, which allows
access to the system event log (SEL). See the BMC User’s Guide for more information on
setup and use of BMC.
<Ctrl+C> Enters the SAS Configuration Utility. See your SAS adapter User’s Guide for more
information.
<Ctrl+R> Enters the RAID configuration utility, which allows you to configure an optional RAID
card. For more information, see the documentation for your RAID card.
<Ctrl+S> Option is displayed only if you have PXE support enabled through the System Setup
Program (see "Integrated Devices Screen" on page 34). This keystroke allows you to
configure NIC settings for PXE boot. For more information, see the documentation for
your integrated NIC.
<Ctrl+D> If you have the optional Dell Remote Access Controller (DRAC), this keystroke allows
access to selected DRAC configuration settings. See the DRAC User’s Guide for more
information on setup and use of DRAC.