BL465c G7 hangs on reboot

[Rob Buxton]

Not yet. I'm not seeing PSODs though.
we are in the process of updating the following:
be2net driver to 2.102.518.0
be2net firmware to 2.102.485.4
virtual connect switch firmware to 3.15
onboard Admin to 3.21

It's complicated by a problem we have where vMotion seems to cause the host to lose network connectivity. It's a different issue from the hang as the server is still operational. But we do then need to cold boot it to get connectivity back. Means we can't put the server into maintenance mode without losing a bunch of VMs. we only have development servers on it at the moment, but losing those also causes quite a bit of ire in the dev community!

Once we have this all updated I'll retest. From what Chris has said it doesn't seem as though this will fix the hang. If it fixes the vMotion issue I'll be a lot happier though. I can live with the hang issue for a bit.

[Rob Buxton]

Also note that my e-mail address is listed above. Feel free to drop me a line. We can swap HP call numbers. Chris and I have already made HP aware of the associated calls. The more the merrier.

[bradfordc]

I've been in contact with someone in Turkey with similar issues this week.

My most recent update on this is as follows:
> New CNA driver 2.102.518.0 from VMware does NOT resolve this issue
> New CNA firmware 2.102.517.6 does not resolve this issue.

I have found that executing the following commands from the console (unloading the be2net driver manually before reboot) allows the server to reboot.
1. /sbin/services.sh stop
2. /sbin/esxcfg-module â u â f be2net
3. reboot

HP have all of the support case numbers, so we're slowly building a case. If anyone else has a similar issue please contact me:
chris dot bradford AT spicers dot co dot uk

HP are now trying to replicate our setup, they have a full virtual connect and chassis config dump.

As soon as anything else comes along I'll be sure to update here.

[bconstant]

Fyi, I can also trigger a PSOD (PF Exception 14) if I remove the last vNetwork Distributed switch from a host.
This is not a common operation I do but the PSOD occurs eveytime I do that.
I also noticed vCenter is triggering alarm on memory health even tough the IML is empty.
Only one of my blades had IML entries related to ECC memory errors so I got a replacement from HP but the alert is still present in vCenter.

[ronsexton]

Only see the PSOD issue now but we haven't widely tried the BIOS power setting 'solution' yet.
BL465c G7 2.1Ghz 2 x 12 core AMD 6172

Sept HP BIOS
ILO 1.15
be2net 518 driver and 517 firmware
Running off 4GB MicroSD (Kingston - $10) no hard drives or added array controller exist.
HP LP1205 mezzanine card.
HP September ESXi 4.1 image for install. All updates applied to current.
VC-F10 virtual connects (bay 1 and 2) and VC-FC 8GB virtual connects(bay 3 and 4).
OA 3.21
VC 3.10 and 3.15(i would do 3.15)

Right now only the PSOD issue exists for us and it is very infrequent and not reproducible which makes it hard to resolve.

[ronsexton]

P.S. Reseating the blade seems the only way to fully reset the server even after BIOS updates. Errors would come up in POST relating to iSCSI (which we aren't using) and would go away only after reseating the blade.

[ronsexton]

I also went ahead and set the power profile in BIOS to max and will track if it happens with this applied.

[bconstant]

I did had a case open with VMware support who asked me to install the "VMware ESX/ESXi 4.x Driver CD for Emulex BladeEngine 10Gb Ethernet Controller driver".
This driver version "vmware-esx-drivers-net-be2net_400.2.102.518.0-vmw.2.17.249663.329992"
has resolved my PSOD on reboot issue.

[AdvanBokhoven]

We have the same issue. Different firmware versions used by now, including the latest set advised by HP in combination with latest VMware driver this issue still remains.

[bradfordc]

A new CNA driver is available (pre-release version) - this is designed specifically to resolve the reboot issue.

Driver version is be2net-2.102.518.0 patch 1. Intital tests have been *good* on the reboot issue, no PSOD (although this was resolved with version 486) and no hang.

Tested from maintenence mode and normal mode, also from the ILO and vCenter GUI.