1.8.2 Virtual HMC
Initially, the HMC was sold only as a hardware appliance, including the HMC firmware installed. However, IBM extended this offering to allow the purchase of the hardware appliance and a virtual appliance that can be deployed on ppc64le architectures and deployed on x86 platforms.
Any customer with valid contract can download it from ESS site or it can be included within an initial Power E1080 order.
The virtual HMC supports the following hypervisors: Ê On x86 processor-based servers:
– KVM – Xen
– VMware
Ê On Power processor-based servers: PowerVM
The following minimum requirements must be met to install the virtual HMC:
Ê 16 GB of Memory
Ê 4 virtual processors
Ê 2 network interfaces (maximum 4 allowed) Ê 1 disk drive (500 GB available disk drive)
For an initial Power E1080 order with the IBM configurator (e-config), HMC virtual appliance can be found by selecting add software ® Other System Offerings (as product selections) and then:
Ê 5765-VHP for IBM HMC Virtual Appliance for Power V10 Ê 5765-VHX for IBM HMC Virtual Appliance x86 V10
For more information about an overview of the Virtual HMC, see this web page.
For more information about how to install the virtual HMC appliance and all requirements, see IBM Documentation.
1.8.3 Baseboard management controller network connectivity rules for 7063-CR2
The 7063-CR2 HMC features a baseboard management controller (BMC), which is a specialized service processor that monitors the physical state of the system by using sensors. OpenBMC that is used on 7063-CR2 provides a graphical user interface (GUI) that can be accessed from a workstation that has network connectivity to the BMC. This connection requires an Ethernet port to be configured for use by the BMC.
The 7063-CR2 provides two network interfaces (eth0 and eth1) for configuring network connectivity for BMC on the appliance.
44 IBM Power E1080: Technical Overview and Introduction
Each interface maps to a different physical port on the system. Different management tools name the interfaces differently. The HMC task Console Management ® Console Settings ® Change BMC/IPMI Network Settings modifies only the Dedicated interface.
The BMC ports are listed see Table 1-24.
Table 1-24 BMC ports
Figure 1-16 shows the BMC interfaces of the HMC.
Figure 1-16 BMC interfaces
The main difference is the shared and dedicated interface to the BMC can coexist. Each has its own LAN number and physical port. Ideally, the customer configures one port, but both can be configured. Connecting power systems to the HMC rules remain the same as previous versions.