Power supply monitoring in Linux?

Ben Scott dragonhawk at gmail.com
Wed Nov 7 13:55:30 EST 2007


On 11/7/07, Paul Lussier <p.lussier at comcast.net> wrote:
> It's not one the big 3, it's a whitebox platform, but it might have
> IPMI and/or BMC.

  It expand a little more on what I wrote:

  A lot of whitebox servers have a good quality server motherboard,
from Intel or Tyan or whoever.  Those will generally have IPMI, BMC,
and other management features.  However, the power supplies will often
be "dumb" units, and will be attached to a separate, "dumb" power
paralleling board.  The motherboard then just attaches to the
paralleling board as if that were a regular power supply.

  So just because you see IPMI on the mobo, it doesn't mean you'll be
able to find out what the power supplies are doing.

  Also be aware that there may be capabilities in the mobo which the
box builder didn't use.  So there might even be sensors indicated as
"power supply" or whatever, but they might not be hooked up to
anything.

  I'd suggest contacting the whitebox vendor if you can.  If that
doesn't pan out, check with the motherboard manufacturer.  Good ones
will at least tell you what's present in the mobo design.

-- Ben


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