On Tue, Mar 27, 2007 at 08:46:26AM -0400, Matthias Julius wrote: > In case of a rented dedicated server I would never enter the machine > room and the person changing hardware would have no login on it. > > For other machines the only possible access is by SSH which is > difficult if the network is not coming up. Setting them up with > keyboard/monitor (if they have a video output at all) or a serial > console (and RS232 is getting rare, too) is an inconvenience at least.
If you do not have physical access to the machine then serial access is a must (or some alternative, like IPMI-emulated serial console if you have the hardware). For example if you have to update the kernel and something goes wrong, a seral console can be _very_ handy (you can configure a once-only boot with the new kernel but that does not help to diagnose _why_ it does not boot). Gabor -- --------------------------------------------------------- MTA SZTAKI Computer and Automation Research Institute Hungarian Academy of Sciences --------------------------------------------------------- -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]