P2Vme Blog

Cisco has released version 2.2 (1b) of the Cisco UCS Manager. I have been looking forward to this release. Lots of fixes, features and enhancements.

From the original article.

We are pleased to announce the release of UCS Manager 2.2 codenamed “El Capitan”. The release is now available for download on Cisco.com as release 2.2(1b).

Links to download this release are as follows:

• Infrastructure software bundle
  • B-series and C-series software bundles for this release are available at the above link, under “Related Software”.

Relevant documentation for the 2.2(1) release can be accessed as follows:

• Release notes for UCS Manager 2.2(1)
• Install & Upgrade Guides
• Configuration Guides for GUI & CLI
• Release Bundle Contents for UCS Manager 2.2(1)

The UCS Manager 2.2(1) release delivers several key features and major enhancements in the Fabric, Compute, and Operational areas. The following is a complete listing of the features in El Capitan:

• Fabric Enhancements:
  • Fabric scaling: VLANs, VIFs, IGMP Groups, Network Endpoints
  • IPv6 Management Support
  • Uni-Directional Link Detection (UDLD) Support
  • User Space NIC (usNIC) for Low Latency
  • Support for Virtual Machine Queue (VMQ)

• Operational Enhancements:
  • Direct Connect C-Series to FI without FEX
  • Two-factor Authentication for UCS Manager Logins
  • VM-FEX for Hyper-V Management with Microsoft SCVMM
  • CIMC In-band Management
  • Direct KVM Access
  • Server Firmware Auto Sync

• Compute Enhancements:
  • Secure Boot
  • Enhanced Local Storage Monitoring
  • Flash Adapters & HDD Firmware Management
  • Precision Boot Order Control
  • FlexFlash (Local SD card) Support
  • Trusted Platform Module (TPM) Inventory
  • DIMM Blacklisting and Correctable Error Reporting

UCS Manager 2.2 and its subsequent Maintenance Releases will be the last to support the Gen1 hardware, including 6100 series Fabric Interconnects, 2100 IO Modules, M1 series Servers, and M1-only adapters. Support for Gen1 hardware will drop starting the next major release, codenamed “Fletcher Cove”. With that in mind, UCS Manager 2.2 is planned to be a long-lived release, meaning the software lifecycle support is expected to be extended for another 12 months (~ 4 years) beforeannouncing the release EOS.

The UCS Advantage Trade-in Program provides an easy upgrade path for customers that want to migrate their Gen1 hardware to the latest Cisco UCS servers and technologies. This program is an excellent illustration of Cisco’s commitment to investment protection for our customers. Please contact your local Cisco Representative for details.