3 ms·

Thank you for reaching out and helping to complete the story of this box. Maybe someone from Blizz can even tell them what the server's role was...

Daneel_ 12y ago
Posting the email I sent: I saw your blog post about your WoW blade, via Hacker News, and couldn't help but want to contribute. I have worked as a sysadmin and hardware specialist for the past 5-6 years, with a lot of experience with HP equipment - I was wondering if you'd like me to help provide better descriptions of any of the parts of your blade? Extra detail like the fact that Hynix ram came in the machine from the factory, but the micron ram was added as an upgrade. Your machine probably only ever had those 6 sticks in it, as the next generation of servers used newer DDR2 and wasn't compatible (hence no reason to remove ram from this blade). That blade is what is called a 'half-height blade and it would have sat vertically in a Blade Enclosure, ie, the HPBL25p text would be horizontal. Blade enclosures usually hold up to 16 half-height blades, or 8 full height blades, but yours is a p-class blade, so it would have been in an enclosure for half-height blades only (8 blades max). The network ports and all other connections are on the blade enclosure. If you'd like a full spec sheet on your blade and the enclosure, you can look at this PDF from HP: http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/images/ap/BL25p_v7.pdf http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/images/ap/BL25p_v7.pdf Regarding your concerns about the CPUs and heatsink paste, etc: The CPUs will actually be attached to the heatsinks and you should simply be able to lift them out as a unit. This is done so that if a CPU were to fail in the blade you can replace the CPU in just a few minutes. The detail of which CPU you have is more than likely attached to the underside of the heatsink as well, next to the processor, but you can actually tell which one you have from the model number (that sticker that says 392439-B21). It's an HP ProLiant BL25p 275 2.2GHz-1MB Dual Core 2P 2GB Blade Server. This means your CPUs are AMD Opteron 275s, and you have two of them. The '5' in BL25p also indicates an AMD CPU. Intel servers end in a zero. I can also tell you what most of the bits of hardware on the motherboard do too, if you like.. I'm happy to annotate photos. The large green card towards the rear of the server with the little silver heatsink and the empty black slot is the hard drive controller. In this server the model would be a SmartArray 6i. The slot is for a small stick of RAM (128MB for this model) that the controller would have used for cache - it probably never had any installed though. As general information: the little 'add in cards' are called daughter-boards, and are actually completely normal in servers, especially of this size, partially due to space constraints. The main reason for daughter boards though is so you can quickly and easily replace a failed component. Servers are generally designed to be easily and quickly serviceable. I've personally replaced a server motherboard in under 10 minutes (from power off to power back on again). It's generally all tool-less and extremely modular. The clear magnetised lid on these server is definitely not standard - Blizzard must have added this when they decided to memorialise the server. The standard lid would be metal and held on with a quick-release lever mechanism.. I really like the magnetised approach though :) I can keep going on, but yeah, let me know if you'd like any information or more insight into the server. Glad to see that it's in the hands of someone who obviously cares about the equipment though :) it's nice that they made them into a collectible rather than just selling them to a used equipment vendor.

Daneel_ 12y ago

Posting the email I sent: I saw your blog post about your WoW blade, via Hacker News, and couldn't help but want to contribute. I have worked as a sysadmin and hardware specialist for the past 5-6 years, with a lot of experience with HP equipment - I was wondering if you'd like me to help provide better descriptions of any of the parts of your blade? Extra detail like the fact that Hynix ram came in the machine from the factory, but the micron ram was added as an upgrade. Your machine probably only ever had those 6 sticks in it, as the next generation of servers used newer DDR2 and wasn't compatible (hence no reason to remove ram from this blade). That blade is what is called a 'half-height blade and it would have sat vertically in a Blade Enclosure, ie, the HPBL25p text would be horizontal. Blade enclosures usually hold up to 16 half-height blades, or 8 full height blades, but yours is a p-class blade, so it would have been in an enclosure for half-height blades only (8 blades max). The network ports and all other connections are on the blade enclosure. If you'd like a full spec sheet on your blade and the enclosure, you can look at this PDF from HP: http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/images/ap/BL25p_v7.pdf http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/images/ap/BL25p_v7.pdf Regarding your concerns about the CPUs and heatsink paste, etc: The CPUs will actually be attached to the heatsinks and you should simply be able to lift them out as a unit. This is done so that if a CPU were to fail in the blade you can replace the CPU in just a few minutes. The detail of which CPU you have is more than likely attached to the underside of the heatsink as well, next to the processor, but you can actually tell which one you have from the model number (that sticker that says 392439-B21). It's an HP ProLiant BL25p 275 2.2GHz-1MB Dual Core 2P 2GB Blade Server. This means your CPUs are AMD Opteron 275s, and you have two of them. The '5' in BL25p also indicates an AMD CPU. Intel servers end in a zero. I can also tell you what most of the bits of hardware on the motherboard do too, if you like.. I'm happy to annotate photos. The large green card towards the rear of the server with the little silver heatsink and the empty black slot is the hard drive controller. In this server the model would be a SmartArray 6i. The slot is for a small stick of RAM (128MB for this model) that the controller would have used for cache - it probably never had any installed though. As general information: the little 'add in cards' are called daughter-boards, and are actually completely normal in servers, especially of this size, partially due to space constraints. The main reason for daughter boards though is so you can quickly and easily replace a failed component. Servers are generally designed to be easily and quickly serviceable. I've personally replaced a server motherboard in under 10 minutes (from power off to power back on again). It's generally all tool-less and extremely modular. The clear magnetised lid on these server is definitely not standard - Blizzard must have added this when they decided to memorialise the server. The standard lid would be metal and held on with a quick-release lever mechanism.. I really like the magnetised approach though :) I can keep going on, but yeah, let me know if you'd like any information or more insight into the server. Glad to see that it's in the hands of someone who obviously cares about the equipment though :) it's nice that they made them into a collectible rather than just selling them to a used equipment vendor.