RP8400 PDC Upgrades and Downgrades

[David G Monk]

Hi

When replacing a faulty RP8400 Cell board which has a PDC level or 16.009 and the replacement has a newer revision is a scree board required to assist in downgrading the PDC level of the new board to the same as the other cell boards (16.09).

What exactly is a scree board required for? Pic attached)

Thanks in anticipation of assistance


Regards

Dave

[Torsten.]

A PDC level of 16.009 indicates firmware version 4.0, but the current is 6.4. You should think about an update. The Scree board is comparable to a bus terminator and need to update the Field Programmable Gate Array inside the system. This board is sometimes not installed on older systems, but the only way to check is to open the box. Contact HP and ask for a CE for the check and update procedure.

[Joshua Scott]

From the rp8400 firmware v. 6.4 release notes, page 9 (see attached)

16. On the rp8400 server only, updates of cell FPGAs using the OSP Utility,
requires the use of a scree board (HP P/N 1253-5394) mounted at connector
J-22 of the system backplane board.
17. The following warning is issued during cell board FPGA updates using the
OSP Utility to remind users that a scree board may be required:
WARNING: This system MAY lack the hardware connectivity
necessary to allow updating of FPGA's on the cell boards!