Product Review: HP ProLiant MicroServer Gen10 Plus v2The Hewlett Packard ProLiant MicroServer Gen10 Plus v2 continues their small-scale server line. (See also Product Review: HP ProLiant MicroServer Gen8, Product Review: HP ProLiant MicroServer Gen10.) StorageThis unit has a smaller profile than earlier models. It still accepts four 3½" SATA drives, but no longer has a dedicated bay for a 2½" drive (for solid state drives) or an internal optical drive. Instead, solid state drives can be used with a separately-available bay adaptor. This allows a mixture of SSD for performance and HDD for capacity. The machine ships with 16 screws which are attached to the front of the machine (once the bezel has been removed) and these are screwed into the side of the drives so they lock into position. SetupTo access the internals of the machine, there are two rear black screws which are released and the motherboard slides out. The motherboard sits snugly so this requires some confidence. This only needs to be removed part-way to access the RAM slots or to install the standalone iLO adaptor. (The iLO default password is written on the underside of the server, not attached to the iLO unit itself.) The iLO unit is generally a very low cost and is definitely worth having. There are two video outs, RGB and DisplayPort, but these may never be needed as the unit can be fully setup and configured using the iLO interface. Provisioning is easily done. Once a drive/drive has been attached, the startup process will prompt to press F10 to initiate Intelligent Provisioning. Then follow the wizard, answer questions about drive preparation and supply installation media on DVD or USB. SecurityThis unit now ships wth an on-board Trusted Platform Module (TPM). On enabling BitLocker in Windows Server and rebooting, Windows may report that BitLocker was not enabled after rebooting to perform the “system check”. In this situation, set up BitLocker again and let it reboot for the system check again. (Note that in this scenario, the second attempt at enabling BitLocker will result in a different recovery password for the drive, so be sure to take a copy of that code also.) Secure Boot is supported but not enabled by default. To enable, boot the server, press F9, choose Server Security etc. It would be best to enable this before installing the operating system, but by default Windows will install in UEFI mode so enabling Secure Boot afterward should not cause a problem. Be sure to upgrade the iLO firmware and BIOS. |