Sometimes the ILO web interface is painfully slow to use when you are just trying to get on the console of a server. To get around this I have been taking advantage of the fact that you can SSH to the ILO and access the server console from there.
In order to do this you must add the following to the bottom of /etc/inittab.
S1:2345:respawn:/sbin/agetty 115200 ttyS1 vt100
Then you must add ttyS1 to the bottom of /etc/securetty. If you don't you will not be able to log in as root from the serial console. So don't forget this step.
Then ssh into the ilo console -- and run the following command.
</>hpiLO-> VSP
Note that this works on the ILO2, and possibly on the ILO3. It does not work on ILO1.
Great, this helped me a lot!! Thank you
Posted by: Jaime | August 19, 2011 at 09:53
Great article and great site. I tried the steps above as I'm not a big fan of using the web ilo for console access. However, after running the VSP command, I never actually receive a login prompt, just the escape sequence to break out of the VSP. Any idea what I'm missing?
Posted by: Steve | December 22, 2011 at 17:15
Humm, what server? Ilo version?
Posted by: fatmin | December 24, 2011 at 09:25
This is on a HP ProLiant BL465c G7 running ilo3.
Posted by: Steve | January 03, 2012 at 07:52