Replacing the midplane

(Trained service technician only) Use these instructions to install the midplane in the Flex System Enterprise Chassis.

To install the midplane, complete the following steps.


Graphic illustrating the installation of a midplane into a chassis

  1. Remove the connector covers from the midplane, if they are installed.
  2. Carefully align the midplane with the guide pins in the chassis and slide the midplane all the way into the chassis until it stops.
    Attention:
    • You must hold the midplane up against the top inside of the chassis shell and keep the midplane vertical during installation. If the midplane is not inserted correctly, the guide pins can contact the midplane connectors and damage the connector pins.
    • Do not grasp the connectors on the midplane when you install it in the chassis. Touching the connectors might damage the connector pins.
    • Make sure that the rear LED card cable is out of the way when you slide the midplane into the chassis.
  3. Install the six screws that secure the midplane to the chassis.
  4. Install the guide post with a 3/16 inch (5 mm) deep socket hex driver.
Important: After you install a new midplane, you must install and program the rear LED card that comes with the new midplane, and program the vital product data (VPD) (see Replacing the rear LED card for instructions), so that Lenovo XClarity Administrator can use the same UUID for the chassis afterwards.
After the new rear LED card is installed, reassemble the chassis and program the vital product data (VPD) that is stored on the card. Complete the following steps:
  1. Reinstall the shuttle into the chassis (see Replacing the shuttle).
  2. Reinstall the components that you removed from the rear of the chassis.
  3. Connect any cables that you disconnected from the modules in the rear of the chassis.
  4. Connect the chassis to power (see Connecting the chassis to power).
  5. Log in to the CMM and access the command-line interface (CLI). You can access the CMM CLI through a direct serial or Ethernet connection to the CMM, through a Telnet connection to the IP address of the CMM, or through a Secure Shell (SSH) connection to the CMM. You must authenticate with the CMM before issuing commands. Use the CLI vpdrep command to program the serial number, machine type model, and the universal unique identifier (UUID) into the replacement rear LED card. The CLI command to program this data can be executed in two ways, the data for the three command arguments can be entered individually or together in any combination. At least one command argument must be present. For example, to program all three fields at once: vpdrep -sn -tm -uuid where:
    vpdrep command arguments Description
    -sn Chassis serial number (7 alphanumeric characters)
    -tm Machine type model (7 alphanumeric characters)
    -uuid Universally unique identifier (32 hex digits, spaces not allowed)
  6. Restart the CMM for the vital product data change to take effect. The vital product data values can be queried by using the CLI info command.
  7. Close the release handles on the compute nodes, I/O modules, and the management node (if one is installed) in order to seat the nodes and I/O modules in the midplane connectors.
  8. Restart any compute nodes that you shut down. See the documentation that comes with the compute node for detailed instructions.
  9. The I/O Modules are powered-on automatically by the CMM.
Parent topic: Removing and replacing FRUs