Server tour: UID LED, USB and Panel

Immediately to the left of the power supplies, we can see a UID LED – one of these LEDs are present on the front and another on the back of the server in order to assist with the identification of the server that you’re working on. We also see the two network interfaces plus keyboard, mouse and video ports.






Further to the left, a serial port, and two USB ports can also be found. The IPMI interface is above the USB ports – this port is generally plugged into a management network and a web server is running on this interface which provides the ability for administrators to remotely work on the server.







A small panel can be popped out from the front of the server, which provides an at-a-glance overview of server health. In this image, an orange LED is illuminated on one of the power supplies, indicating that it’s not plugged in or not operating properly.






This panel neatly folds away, allowing you to access the UID and power buttons, optical drive and front VGA port (even if you use KVM switches in a data centre environment, it’s always a good idea to have a spare USB keyboard/mouse and LCD screen handy to take advantage of these ports in an emergency).






When the UID button is pressed on the front, the button is illuminated by a (very) bright blue LED...






 ...and if you walk around to the back of the rack, the UID LED on the back of the same server is also illuminated.


Next: Storage options

The Full Tour
A typical rack server
Opening it up
Heatsink, CPU and fans
Memory, slots and graphics card
Power supply
The USB and LED panels
Storage options
Cables
Managing the server