North American Network Operators Group Date Prev | Date Next | Date Index | Thread Index | Author Index | Historical Re: KVM over IP Suggestions?
Here is an article that addresses some of these very issues, naturally there is always a costing factor, because non of the sought for solutions are easy to come by. http://www.networkcomputing.com/showitem.jhtml?docid=1616f3 -Henry --- Daniel Senie <[email protected]> wrote: > > At 12:41 PM 8/22/2005, Aaron Glenn wrote: > > >On 8/22/05, Simon Hamilton-Wilkes > <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > > They support P/S2 / USB / Sun and serial - > though are a very expensive > > > way to do serial. > > > >And (last time I looked, at least) they required an > expensive, > >proprietary, Windows-only authentication server > (DSView) in addition > >to the client software licenses and hardware costs. > > Avocent makes several products in the KVM/IP space. > Not all of them > are tied to Windows Server authentication. At the > low end, they've > got a sub-$1000 single port box that works nicely > for front-ending > existing KVM switches that have on-screen controls. > > We've used and tested 4 or 5 products in this > "single port" space. > Results have been fair, bad and ugly. I would not > consider any of > them to be acceptable or better. > > There are several issues. As someone else noted, > these usually push a > viewer to you over either Java or Active-X. The > little Avocent uses > Active-X, so I have to remember to load up IE before > accessing it. > > Internal authentication is, in my experience, > essential. After all, > if you're connecting in to deal with the server > that's doing your > authentication, you're screwed, yes, there are > likely expensive ways > to avoid that situation. > > Serial redirection and terminal servers are an > option, but only if > all of your servers support that. > > VNC isn't an option, unless you like your terminal > sessions going > over unencrypted pipes or set everything up to > tunnel over SSH or VPN. > > Solutions that use VNC direct to the target server > are insufficient. > If you can't talk to the BIOS of a server that's not > feeling well, > what's the point? Once a server is actually up, SSH > into the server > gets you all you need, or VNC over SSH if you must > do some graphics. > > Mouse control: all of the KVM/IP products we've > tested have had > serious issues with mouse control. With Windows > boxes, we generally > do our best to get boxes far enough up to use RDP, > and switch to that > because it's much cleaner. With Linux machines we > find this less of > an issue as we don't run consoles in graphics mode, > thus bypassing > the mouse sync issue. > > For the original poster, if you want to have the > ability to let > customers at the console of their server, but not > others, you're > going to be stuck using expensive equipment, with > the ability to > handle multiple simultaneous users, or go with > servers that have > KVM/IP as an on-board option (Intel's is the one I'm > personally > familiar with. Someone else mentioned Dell has such > too). > > We made the move to KVM/IP and APC power > cycling/control equipment a > few years back and have never regretted doing so. > > Dan > >
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