Users Guide
Table Of Contents
- Lifecycle Controller User's Guide
- Introduction
- Using Lifecycle Controller
- Operating system deployment
- Monitor
- Hardware inventory view and export
- About view and export current inventory
- About view and export factory-shipped inventory
- Viewing hardware inventory — current or factory shipped
- Exporting hardware inventory — current or factory shipped
- Viewing or exporting hardware inventory after part replacement
- Viewing or exporting current inventory after resetting Lifecycle Controller
- Lifecycle Controller log
- Firmware update
- Configure
- System control panel access options
- Configuring iDRAC
- Configuring system time and date
- Configuring RAID
- Configuring RAID using software RAID
- Creating a secure virtual disk on a RAID controller
- Key encryption
- Local key encryption mode
- Breaking mirrored drives
- System setup — Advanced Hardware Configuration
- Collect system inventory on restart
- Configuring a local USB drive
- Configuring NFS and CIFS servers
- Conditions while configuring HTTP or HTTPS server
- Maintain
- Easy-to-use system component names
- Using the system setup and boot manager
- Troubleshooting and frequently asked questions
Operating system deployment
The OS Deployment feature allows you to deploy standard and custom operating systems on the managed system. You can
also configure RAID before installing the operating system if it is not already configured.
Lifecycle Controller allows deploying the operating system using the following options:
● Manual installation
● Unattended installation. For more information on unattended installation, see Unattended installation
● UEFI Secure Boot. For more information on UEFI Secure Boot, see UEFI Secure Boot
NOTE: Driver packs are available for the deployment of Windows and Linux operating systems supported by Lifecycle
Controller. Before deploying these operating systems, make sure that Lifecycle Controller is updated with the latest driver
packs. You can download the latest drivers pack from https://www.dell.com/support.
NOTE: When drivers are mounted from driver pack using iDRAC/RACDM/WSMAN or other interfaces, you can not launch
LC UI or it may not be available.
NOTE: FAT32 limits the size of a single file to 4 GB. If you are using a Windows image file that is more than 4 GB, split the
file in to multiple files. For more information see the documentation available at Docs.microsoft.com.
NOTE: UEFI environment doesn't support NTFS file format. USB Boot Media must be MBR disk with FAT32 filesystem.
Topics:
• Installing an operating system
• Using the optional RAID configuration
• Configuring RAID using the operating system deployment wizard
• Unattended installation
• UEFI Secure Boot
• Driver access
• Installing an operating system on iSCSI LUN and FCoE LUN
• Post reboot scenarios
Installing an operating system
Before installing an operating system, make sure that the following prerequisites are met:
● Optical DVD drive, virtual media, RFS, or a bootable USB drive is connected to a server.
● Software RAID or PowerEdge RAID controller is installed with the latest firmware, and at least two hard-disk drives
are available for creating the virtual disk. For information about the supported controllers and related firmware, see the
operating system documentation.
NOTE:
You can install the operating system on media such as Dual SD or PCIe SSD. However, RAID configuration is not
supported on these media.
● For installing an operating system in an unattended mode, make sure that you copy the required configuration file
(autounattend.xml for Windows and ks.cfg for RHEL 7) to a USB or network share.
● Ensure the Lifecycle Controller Operating System Driver pack is installed.
To install an operating system:
1. Start Lifecycle Controller. For more information, see Starting Lifecycle Controller.
2. In the left pane, click OS Deployment.
3. In the right pane, click Deploy OS and select one of the following:
● Configure RAID First — Click to configure a RAID connected to the server. For information about configuring a RAID,
see Using the optional RAID Configutation .
NOTE: Configuring RAID is optional if an already-connected virtual disk is present.
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18 Operating system deployment