I have a Dell PowerEdge 1850 running Ubuntu in my basement, primarily running a Minecraft server. Leaving it on all the time is a waste of money, and it makes noise at night, so I typically turn it on during the day and turn it off before night, unplugging it when off because the fans run even when shut down.
What I want to do is possibly eventually wire a switch, hooked up to the server's power cord, to elsewhere in the house (i.e. near my computer). This way I could simply flip the switch, wait for it to boot, and then VNC into it. When I'm done, I'd stop the Minecraft server, shut Ubuntu down, and flip the switch off again.
Currently, however, I can't do this. The BIOS has an option to resume its last state when plugged in, but if I shut down Ubuntu prior to unplugging it, it will not turn on and boot automatically when it is plugged in again, as its last state was having been shut down.
Is there any way I can have it automatically turn on, even when I had previously shut down the machine? Alternatively, is there a safe way to kill Ubuntu by unplugging it to simulate the "AC power failure" that the BIOS option is designed for?