Hi folks: Just FYI that out of band management is moving forward and that dependency upon active-x for clients is finally going away. The raritan seems to support a pretty wide variety of unix flavors including RHEL, Mac OSx and Solaris.
Raritan, Avocent and Cyclades all have IP KVM's that allow you to get full console access (Keyboard, mouse and video) over an SSL link. Previously all three were ie on windows32 only, but Raritan and Cyclades have both started shipping full java clients with Avocent a little behind. I just had a chance to play with the Cyclade AlterPath system for Interop New York HotStage. Basically from a single management portal I could launch java terminal applets for serial console access (over SSH) to any terminal server in the network, even across subnets and through firewalls. I could also launch a KVM client to get access to any of our servers in the NOC racks. They also have intelligent power strips so that with the same authentication used for console access I can also power down outlets. Lastly, the OnBoard system aggregates all those new service processor ports onto a single IP address and front ends them with a common interface. So if your running Dell's DRAC, or Sun's ALOM or HP's iLo or Intel's IPMI...they all get a common front end through this product and everything is managed from a single portal. The pricing is also dropping like a rock too....a 32 port KVM is now in the $2200 range with dongles (ps/2, usb, etc) in the $125 range. Oh yeah...all these units run the connections over CAT5 up to 50 meters. Some configs go as high as 40 ports in 1RU. Cyclades has a nice unit that is four serial console ports and 4 KVM ports in a single unit. /brian chee University of Hawai'i at Manoa School of Ocean & Earth Science & Technology Advanced Network Computing Lab 1680 East West Road, POST rm 311 Honolulu, HI 96822 808-956-5797 voice, 877-284-1934 fax
