Issues with AP9630 and PCNS 2.2.4

[ghuntzinger_apc]

This was originally posted on APC forums on 1/28/2010

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I thought I might save someone some trouble by reporting my experience installing this card and software under Windows 2000 Server for the first time.

The documentation supplied with the card is incomplete. In particular, there is a vague reference to "turning off ac and dc power" before installation, with no mention about just how to do that. It took a kbase search to finally find the procedure to turn off dc power.

In my configuration, the Device IP Wizard was unable to find the NMC2 card. I tried it from Windows XP and Windows 2000 Server. After reading this forum, I'm thinking that it is possible that the issue is that cards are now being shipped with the IP method set to Manual, so the new card comes up with no IP address. Hard to know, but the procedures in the docs caused me a lot of frustration. I finally configured the card with the supplied serial link and could finally access it from a web browser.

PCNS 2.2.4 - I spent the better part of two days getting this to work and the nicest thing I have to say is that the installation program is fairly decent. The software as installed never worked - never. I tried several of my servers and had identical results on all of them. The symptom was that the login screen would come up, I'd put in the user name and password, hit login and get the login screen again. Yes, I had the user name and password correct and they matched the login data on the card. I got no help from "support" on this issue.

After poking around in the PCNS program files directory, I found the EventLog.txt file and realized that the PCNS service was connecting to the card just fine. I also found gui.cmd and gui.std. Gui.std lauches the java app using http on port 3052 where gui.cmd usess https on port 6547. Changing gui.cmd to look like gui.std finally made the app login properly. I've no dea why this fixes things, some stupid java-thing I guess.

Beyond that, I had the same confusion as several others on this forum aobut just what the heck the shutdown setup settings really do. I'm still not clear about the delay settings on the card vs the ones in PCNS. Based on what I've seen on the forum and what I've seen in the documentation, I'm still not sure how all of that stuff works. It's pretty clear to me from my tests that the "on battery" event gets sent from the UPS to PCNS right away.

The main thing that really got me in trouble is the default setting in the PCNS Configure Shutdown menu of "Shutdown the UPS after the shutdown finishes". The default is that is checked (shutdown the UPS). This got me in real trouble during my testing since there are several servers on this UPS. I was trying to see if the server where I had PCNS installed would really shutdown. I set the PCNS shutdown time delay to a minute or so and pulled the plug on the UPS for a few minutes, then plugged it back in. Sure enough, the test server shutdown. I never expected the entire UPS to shutdown a short time later taking the other servers down. I'm now VERY careful about that check-box!

I'd appreciate hearing from anyone else, especially someone who can explain the port 6547 vs 3052 thing.

[ghuntzinger_apc · Accepted solution]

This was originally posted on APC forums on 1/28/2010

---

I thought I might save someone some trouble by reporting my experience installing this card and software under Windows 2000 Server for the first time.

The documentation supplied with the card is incomplete. In particular, there is a vague reference to "turning off ac and dc power" before installation, with no mention about just how to do that. It took a kbase search to finally find the procedure to turn off dc power.

In my configuration, the Device IP Wizard was unable to find the NMC2 card. I tried it from Windows XP and Windows 2000 Server. After reading this forum, I'm thinking that it is possible that the issue is that cards are now being shipped with the IP method set to Manual, so the new card comes up with no IP address. Hard to know, but the procedures in the docs caused me a lot of frustration. I finally configured the card with the supplied serial link and could finally access it from a web browser.

PCNS 2.2.4 - I spent the better part of two days getting this to work and the nicest thing I have to say is that the installation program is fairly decent. The software as installed never worked - never. I tried several of my servers and had identical results on all of them. The symptom was that the login screen would come up, I'd put in the user name and password, hit login and get the login screen again. Yes, I had the user name and password correct and they matched the login data on the card. I got no help from "support" on this issue.

After poking around in the PCNS program files directory, I found the EventLog.txt file and realized that the PCNS service was connecting to the card just fine. I also found gui.cmd and gui.std. Gui.std lauches the java app using http on port 3052 where gui.cmd usess https on port 6547. Changing gui.cmd to look like gui.std finally made the app login properly. I've no dea why this fixes things, some stupid java-thing I guess.

Beyond that, I had the same confusion as several others on this forum aobut just what the heck the shutdown setup settings really do. I'm still not clear about the delay settings on the card vs the ones in PCNS. Based on what I've seen on the forum and what I've seen in the documentation, I'm still not sure how all of that stuff works. It's pretty clear to me from my tests that the "on battery" event gets sent from the UPS to PCNS right away.

The main thing that really got me in trouble is the default setting in the PCNS Configure Shutdown menu of "Shutdown the UPS after the shutdown finishes". The default is that is checked (shutdown the UPS). This got me in real trouble during my testing since there are several servers on this UPS. I was trying to see if the server where I had PCNS installed would really shutdown. I set the PCNS shutdown time delay to a minute or so and pulled the plug on the UPS for a few minutes, then plugged it back in. Sure enough, the test server shutdown. I never expected the entire UPS to shutdown a short time later taking the other servers down. I'm now VERY careful about that check-box!

I'd appreciate hearing from anyone else, especially someone who can explain the port 6547 vs 3052 thing.