Converting from 32bit to 64bit on a D380

[David Richburg]

Is it possible to change an R Class 9000/810 D380 from 32bit to 64bit?

[DCE]

David,

According to the following link, 64 bit is supported on the D380

Dave

http://www.hp.com/products1/unix/operating/public_hp-ux_systems_support.pdf

[David Richburg]

ok now do you have any info on how to make the change from 32 to 64bit?

I would really appreciate that.

[DCE · Accepted solution]

David,

The following thread, although long, has several very good comments/directions on the conversion. More threads can be found by performing a search for "converting to 64 bit"

Dave

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=748892

[A. Clay Stephenson]

You don't have to "do" anything, at least hardware-wise, your R box is already a 64-bit processor. You simply need to load a 64-bit version of HP-UX 11.0 or 11.11 and you are there.

You should load the latest version of firmware (42.11).
http://www1.itrc.hp.com/service/patch/patchDetail.do?BC=patch.breadcrumb.main|patch.breadcrumb.search|&patchid=PF_CULU4211&context=firmware:cpu

You should also remove any EISA cards because there is no EISA support in 64-bit land. You then install the 64-bit version of 11.x and you are now a 64-bit box.

[Luk Vandenbussche]

Hi David,

If you have EISA cards installed in your D380, then you cann't install the 64 bit version. First remove you cards, then you can perform an upgrade or reinstall

[Ted Buis]

Are you sure you would want to upgrade to the 64-bit version of HP-UX? The amount of physical RAM for a D380 is below the 32-bit maximum, so you don't get an advantage there. It is true that your Virtual Memory could be larger, but would that really help you? From a performance perspective, your performance may actually be less, since your effective cache size will be reduced by 64-bit pointers and 64-bit data types that were previously 32-bit. You might spend time doing this with little or no gain, unless you were looking to match the rest of your systems. Some applications are only supported on 64-bit HP-UX, so that would be a good reason to make the change. There are probably more, too, but I thought I would raise the issue.

[David Richburg]

Thanks for all your input. We are a development shop and need to support Oracle which now only runs on 64bit HPUX.