Modular Data Router VMS MEDOFL after moving to different switch in same fabric

[Benjamin Levy]

Hello

I have a SAN Fabric consisting of a brocade 4100 and a brocade 2800 with a single ISL between the two.
The only device left on the 2800 is a single-port modular data router (MDR).

I would like to move the MDR from the 2800 to the 4100, and then power-off the 2800. I tried this last week. At the physical layer, the modular data router established a connection with the 4100 and I got green lights at both ends. However the VMS SLS software would not perform a backup in the normal way – it reported “%MOUNT-F-MEDOFL, medium is offline”. When I backed out the change and reattached the MDR to the 2800, SLS started running in its old happy way again.

I don’t have much experience with the MDR, but in the past from time to time (for example when suspecting a bad GBIC), I have moved HSG80’s and EVA ports from one place in a fabric to another place in the same fabric and VMS seems to recover seamlessly. This seems to be different. Possibly the difference is that these other devices use the multi-path driver, while the MDR is single-path.

The documentation for MCR SYSMAN IO SCSI suggests that command might be appropriate, followed by MCR SYSMAN IO AUTOCONFIGURE. I have not yet tried these for two reasons:
1) My instinct says that they should not be necessary. VMS should not care which port on a switch a device is attached to as long as they are in the same fabric. I poked around in SDA, but I could not find any data structure where VMS appears to cache the port number to which a device is connected. (Maybe it is there and I missed it – much in SDA is undocumented.)

2) I am nervous about getting into a situation where a port is marked offline and I cannot revert to a good configuration without a reboot. Getting a reboot on this node is possible, but not easy. It would be awkward if I were to try moving this tape device and suddenly decided I needed a priority reboot.

I wish I had a test system with an MDR, but I don’t.

The VMS system is running VMS V7.3-2 and SLS V2.9J

The 2800 is running V2.6.2D, which I believe is the final version for that device.
The 4100 is running V6.2.0B. I am not sure if that is the latest version, but it is relatively recent.

The MDR is running firmware version 1187, which I believe to be the latest published.

The fabric is running zoning, but I had a zoning expert here double-check it and I don’t see any obvious issues. Here is a truncated display:
Effective configuration:
cfg: c_rdc_fabricb
zone: z_r1ac03_fgb0_3
50:00:1f:e1:50:01:7f:8c
50:00:1f:e1:50:01:7f:89
50:00:1f:e1:50:01:82:78
50:00:1f:e1:50:01:82:7d
50:05:08:b3:00:10:28:d1
20,3


I did a port-show on each port, but did not see anything obviously significant.


Thanks for any help you might be able to provide!

[Benjamin Levy]

Here is the details of the PORT-SHOW



This is the portshow for the modular data router on the brocade-2800, where it is working:
admin> portshow 6
portFlags: 0x23805b
PRESENT ACTIVE F_PORT G_PORT U_PORT LOGIN NOELP LED ACCEPT
portType: 3.1
portState: 1 Online
portPhys: 6 In_Sync
portScn: 6 F_Port
portRegs: 0x81010000
portData: 0x10305600
portId: 070600
portWwn: 20:06:00:60:69:12:13:4a

portWwn of the device(s) connected:
50:05:08:b3:00:10:28:d1

Distance: normal

Speed: 1Gbps

Interrupts: 289 Link_failure: 15 Frjt: 0
Unknown: 58 Loss_of_sync: 8 Fbsy: 0
Lli: 120 Loss_of_sig: 6
Proc_rqrd: 153 Protocol_err: 0
Timed_out: 0 Invalid_word: 11
Rx_flushed: 0 Invalid_crc: 5
Tx_unavail: 0 Delim_err: 0
Free_buffer: 0 Address_err: 0
Overrun: 0 Lr_in: 4
Suspended: 0 Lr_out: 26
Parity_err: 0 Ols_in: 24
Ols_out: 23



And here is the output on the brocade-4100, where it will get a link but the software will not work satisfactorily

admin> portshow 6
portName:
portHealth: No Fabric Watch License

Authentication: None
portDisableReason: None
portCFlags: 0x1
portFlags: 0x24b03
PRESENT ACTIVE F_PORT G_PORT U_PORT LOGICAL_ONLINE LOGIN NOELP LED ACCEPT FLOGI
portType: 10.0
POD Port: Port is licensed
portState: 1 Online
portPhys: 6 In_Sync
portScn: 32 F_Port
port generation number: 1062
portId: 140600
portIfId: 43020006
portWwn: 20:06:00:05:1e:35:b8:da
portWwn of device(s) connected:
50:05:08:b3:00:10:28:d1
Distance: normal
portSpeed: 1Gbps

LE domain: 0
FC Fastwrite: OFF
Interrupts: 26 Link_failure: 0 Frjt: 0
Unknown: 0 Loss_of_sync: 2 Fbsy: 0
Lli: 16 Loss_of_sig: 3
Proc_rqrd: 197 Protocol_err: 0
Timed_out: 0 Invalid_word: 180
Rx_flushed: 0 Invalid_crc: 0
Tx_unavail: 0 Delim_err: 0
Free_buffer: 0 Address_err: 0
Overrun: 0 Lr_in: 2
Suspended: 0 Lr_out: 0
Parity_err: 0 Ols_in: 0
2_parity_err: 0 Ols_out: 2
CMI_bus_err: 0

Port part of other ADs: No