User Guide

74.....Avocent® ACS 6000 Advanced Console Server
Accessing a Console Server with a DSView Software
Installation via Dial-up
When a DSView software user establishes a serial session, the following events occur:
• The user selects a serial port to access.
• A viewer is downloaded from the DSView server to the user's workstation.
• The DSView software passes information to the viewer, such as an authorization key, the
console server's IP address and serial port.
• The viewer then accesses the console server's serial port through an SSH session by
passing the authorization key obtained from the DSView server.
• The serial session begins.
To ensure constant connectivity, a DSView server can be configured with an out of band (OOB)
“back door” that will allow it to call a console server via modem in the event of a network or Internet
failure.
Installing DSView software with an OOB back door
The DSView server must be running on hardware that has a connected modem, and the console
server must have a built-in modem or access to a modem via a PCMCIA card, USB or serial port.
For this installation, the DSView server must be the central point of reception of both the packets
leaving the downloaded viewer and the console server. To ensure this, Proxy mode must be
configured within the DSView software. The viewer will then point to the DSView server (not the
console server) to establish the SSH connection. The DSView server would then route the packets
by changing both the source and destination IP addresses and act as a middle point of
communication.
Under normal operating conditions, packets received from the Video Viewer would route through
the DSView server via Ethernet. In an error state, the DSView server would detect that the normal
path to the console server was interrupted and would dial out to the console server, pass
authentication and establish a PPP connection. Packets that would normally pass via Ethernet
would instead be routed via PPP.
Because of the speed differences between Ethernet and dial-up, performance would be notably
slower, but still present. Multiuser connections would further degrade performance and are not
recommended. For this reason, dial-up backup is recommended as an emergency backup feature
only.
Configuring dial-up for a console server
To configure dial-up to a console server within the DSView software: