topic Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4 in ProLiant Servers (ML,DL,SL)

Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

vbezhenar — Fri, 04 Aug 2017 13:41:31 GMT

Hello. I want to install RHEL 7.4 on server with B120i raid controller (using raid configuration, not AHCI). I couldn't find image with drivers for RHEL 7.4, latest for RHEL 7.3. Should I want for new drivers or I can use old ones?

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

Jimmy Vance — Fri, 04 Aug 2017 16:33:17 GMT

The drivers are kernel specific and I do not know the status of driver updates being offered beyond RHEL 7.3. The B120i is a chipset AHCI SATA controller that requires a kernel specific proprietary driver for software derived RAID functionality. Many refer to these chipset SATA controllers as 'fake raid'. Since you are doing a fresh installation the HPE recommendation is to use the 'mdadm' software RAID feature included with the OS. For Gen9 and Gen10 with UEFI, HPE offers documentation on how to make both disks bootable and available in the UEFI ESP. You could do something similar for an older BIOS based system to make the 2nd disk bootable in case the primary disk fails.

LSRRB (Linux Software Raid Redundant Boot), refer to the LSRRB users guide available here
https://downloads.linux.hpe.com/SDR/project/lsrrb/

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

vbezhenar — Sat, 05 Aug 2017 20:35:57 GMT

Thanks. I'm forced to use B120i Raid because otherwise server's fans are too loud and I didn't find a way to make them quiet with AHCI mode. I tried to use RHEL 7.4 with new kernel and indeed hpvsa driver causes kernel panick on boot, I guess the only way is to wait for new driver.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

fredo1664 — Thu, 14 Sep 2017 08:14:51 GMT

I have the exact same problem after upgrading to 7.4

Do you have a workaround? Use 7.4 with the kernel from 7.3 ?

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

Ken Green — Thu, 14 Sep 2017 13:40:40 GMT

Have you tried to see whether the driver from 7.3 works on 7.4? The hpsa driver (for HW SmartArrays) is fairly tolerant of kernel versions. I've not tried with the SW SmartArray drivers.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

vbezhenar — Thu, 14 Sep 2017 20:52:03 GMT

It doesn't work, server panics.

According to previous releases, HP builds new driver about a month after RHEL release. So I think that driver will be available soon.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

CCS1 — Wed, 20 Sep 2017 20:07:09 GMT

I was able to do a fresh install of RHEL 7.4 using the current HP 7.3 B120i Driver.

But doing a upgrade from RHEL 7.3 with the current HP 7.3 B120i Dirver to RHEL 7.4 the kernel panics

Driver used kmod-hpvsa-1.2.16-102.rhel7u3.x86_64

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

Jimmy Vance — Wed, 20 Sep 2017 20:51:49 GMT

The driver is kernel specific, really suprised it even tries to load. I wouldn't trust storing any data on it without a known good backup.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

vbezhenar — Fri, 13 Oct 2017 15:00:33 GMT

So it's two monthes, driver is not available yet. Is there any new information? Centos 7.4 was released as well. If it's abandoned, it would be good to know.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

gregorgregor — Sun, 22 Oct 2017 17:05:35 GMT

Now I'm also hit by this problem on three Servers.

Any news here? Has anybody a support subscription and is able to create a support case?

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

fredo1664 — Sat, 28 Oct 2017 13:33:08 GMT

I still have the issue.

I found out that HP actually released a SPP for RHEL 7.4, here: https://downloads.linux.hpe.com/SDR/repo/spp-gen8/rhel/7.4/x86_64/gen8.0_postprod/

... but the hpvsa driver is still for 7.3... :-(

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

MagicUK — Sat, 28 Oct 2017 18:40:35 GMT

Hi all,

I'm also in the same situation. Like others have said, I was hoping that as CentOS and RHEL 7.4 have both been out for a while that HP would have provided updated hpvsa packages by now.

It would be handy to know if HPE plan to release a new version? I'd rather not have to re-install my server if possible.

Cheers,

Neil.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

Jimmy Vance — Mon, 30 Oct 2017 18:43:57 GMT

@MagicUK wrote:
It would be handy to know if HPE plan to release a new version? I'd rather not have to re-install my server if possible.

Yes a RHEL 7.4 version of hpvsa is currently in the QA process. I don't have a release date, but unless an issue is discovered during QA, I would assume the driver will be released soon.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

fredo1664 — Tue, 31 Oct 2017 05:26:28 GMT

That's very good news Jimmy, thanks.

I'm not very knowledgeable of RPM packages. Couldn't the hpvsa package be made dependent on the specific kernel version so that the kernel doesn't upgrade if the driver is not available, so that a simple 'yum update' doesn't end up in a kernel panic?

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

MagicUK — Fri, 17 Nov 2017 12:01:13 GMT

Hi,

Sorry to nag, is there an ETA from HPE?

Thanks,

Neil.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

K_Mu — Wed, 29 Nov 2017 11:31:03 GMT

@Jimmy VanceThank you for the information. However, another month has passed. I don't quite understand why it takes so long. RHEL 7.4 has already been released on August 1st. For comparison:

SLES 12 SP3 was released on September 7th, the HPE driver was released on September 15th.
On September 15th a new driver for SLES 11 was released.

Is Red Hat no longer supported? I haven't been able to patch my system for four months, despite some security flaws.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

wagnerfl — Mon, 11 Dec 2017 10:46:26 GMT

Hello Togehter,

i'm facing the same problem and i was chatting with HPE Support for about an hour and i dont even get a hint. Just:
There will be a driver for 7.4 and it is in testing process.

But not even a hint on the time of realse.

The support guy is driving me crazy on all the time repeating that i should contact the OS Company! On a HPE driver related problem.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

K_Mu — Fri, 15 Dec 2017 14:05:58 GMT

The kernel module for RHEL 7.4 is now online: https://support.hpe.com/hpsc/swd/public/detail?swItemId=MTX_fc9cb2b56d854a7aacc6a9c0b5

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

fredo1664 — Sat, 16 Dec 2017 06:34:06 GMT

Thanks!

I have installed it manually and it worked.

Re: Drivers for B120i for RHEL 7.4

MagicUK — Tue, 19 Dec 2017 21:06:20 GMT

Thanks for sharing the link - worked for me also.

I did see several dracut errors when installing the RPM, but after examining syslog this appears to be from trying to insert the new kernel module into the initramfs for the older kernels.

Now running with the 3.10.0-693.11.1.el7.x86_64 kernel :-)

Cheers,

Neil.