Microcluster

So I decided to get everything hooked up to see how it would look all spread out on my workbench..... well.... here it is!





I also took a video of the testing of the hardware....
You may want to make sure your volume is down... one of the CPU fans is VERY loud and needs to be replaced. It makes a TERRIBLE sound in the video!


Now all thats left is the software.... Maybe tomorrow?

This is what the system is looking more like right now....

Anyone know what rig this is?

After looking around... it seems the RedHat Cluster Suite is a bit out of my price range (not free), so I have had to reconsider what to do.... So.. for the time being, I will be still running CentOS 5, but running the Rocks Clustering package.
This package allows for High Performance Compute (HPC) and well as HA. It also includes a web front end for admin, so after its up and going, you guys can check it out on the web.

I was hoping to have this thing up and running and warming my workbench by now, but I am having problems getting the OS installed. It seems to hang up when installing the packages. Not sure what to do at this point.

I have replaced the optical drive, and that made a difference, the process is actually now getting to the point where it will install some of the packages. When it does hang up, the mouse cursor locks, and the caps lock and scroll lock lights just start blinking on the keyboard....any suggestions?

I am going to be asking around on Linuxforums.org to see if they can help me with this problem as well.

That's indicative of a kernel panic. You MAY be able to hit Ctrl-Alt-F1 / Ctrl-Alt-F2 to view the panic, doubtful though. As much as text mode sucks, try installing that way. I think it's just "linux text" from the boot prompt to do this.

Kernel panics in general are signs of bad hardware at some point, I'd immediately suspect RAM just based on past experiences but it could be about anything. Maybe run a memtest86+ overnight on it or try your next batch of hardware to see if it has the problem? It's also possible but very unlikely that your ISO image is corrupt, check the md5/sha1 sums.

Reaper wrote: That's indicative of a kernel panic. You MAY be able to hit Ctrl-Alt-F1 / Ctrl-Alt-F2 to view the panic, doubtful though. As much as text mode sucks, try installing that way. I think it's just "linux text" from the boot prompt to do this.

Kernel panics in general are signs of bad hardware at some point, I'd immediately suspect RAM just based on past experiences but it could be about anything. Maybe run a memtest86+ overnight on it or try your next batch of hardware to see if it has the problem? It's also possible but very unlikely that your ISO image is corrupt, check the md5/sha1 sums.

I was finally able to get it installed last night. Ran it in text mode. Everything installed properly. Now the only thing is an issue with internet connectivity. It will lock up as soon as it starts getting info from the net. I was originally going to post this from the machine last night, but as soon as the webpage would begin to load, it would hard lock.

I am running some tests on it at home right now, while Im here at work (eg. call my wife to see how its going). I think I have a bad PCI NIC. But thats ok.. I have a dozen more to pull and check.

I will run Memtest86 tonight anyway, and see if there is indeed a mem problem.
Eurosoft 6.5 said all was ok.

I've had the same problem with some bad NICs before. But one thing to keep in the back of your mind if the hardware is really old (sounds like it is somewhat), the NIC might be sharing IRQs with something and that might be causing problems. Probably bad NIC though...

If it didn't panic in text install then you've not necessarily got a memory problem. Honestly it could be anything at that point, GUI mode pushes every aspect of the hardware harder.

I forgot to mention... I did run Eurosoft PC-Check 6.2 on it over the weekend as well, and it turned up no problems.

So I went ahead, and installed on a different node. It went perfectly! It seems there was an issue with the onboard NIC taht was causing the hangups.

Now that the easy part is out of the way, time to make then cluster together!

I am also in the process of securing a 2 drawer metal filing cabinet which will be modded to be the enclosure for this machine! If anyone has one that is in OK condition, and wants to donate it to a good cause, let me know.