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SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

 
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bbenson
Occasional Advisor

SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

Hello all,

The previous thread on what a SWXCR control is and does was very helpful but the links to the software are no longer valid.

I have an Alpha 1200 that I need to keep running for another year. I would like to add some disk space to my JBOD array. The array has 4 disks installed and three empty slots. I would like to add some 18GB disks to the array and migrate all my data to them and then replace the 9GB disks with more 18s.

It looks like the last sys admin (who is no longer available of course) did not change the RAID configuration but he also did not install any of SWXCR software. I canтАЩt find any RAID CDs at my facility but I did find the Firmware CD and Storage Works Floppy which has the RA200RCU.exe utility. ra200info returns what looks like reasonable information about the controller and drives.

ra200info (paraphrased):
Model KZPAC
FW 2.42

Group 0 : <0,0>
Group 1 : <0,1>
Group 2 : <0,2>

<0,0> DEC RZ2DA-LA тАж OPT
<0,1> DEC RZ2DA-LA тАж OPT
<0,2> DEC RZ2DA-LA тАж OPT


1. Can I get any of the SWXCR software (SWXC123 or SWXCRMGR) from a generous admin or maybe from the HP website?
2. Can I add and remove disks from the JBOD on a running system or do I need to bring the system down to the SRM each time I do disk changes?

IтАЩm running Tru64 4.0G currently.

Thanks in advance,
Brian


10 REPLIES 10
Hein van den Heuvel
Honored Contributor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

2) You can just 'pop' those storage bricks into a running, but hopefully not busy system. When you pop them out, don't jank them out all the way and start walking. Give them ten seconds to spin down, otherwise giroscopic forces may cause damase.
When you pop them into a previously unused slot, tell the system to scan the bus with scu.

The scu (Scsi Cam Utility) command can find new devices and show what it out there.
On 4.0 you'll need makedev to create the devicefiles.
You can give following commands
# scu scan edt
# scu show edt

First commands targetted to the new disks should probably be 'file' and 'disklabel -r'

For more words:
Google: +tru64 +"scan edt" +makedev


hth
Hein van den Heuvel
HvdH Performance Consulting
Frank Gessner
Frequent Advisor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

Hi,
I think Hein isnt right. The KZPAC-Controller is a PCI-Raid which cant be scanned via "scu scan edt" before there is a new logical drive defined with swxcrmgr-tools.
This tool to use runs from arc-console
"run a program" a:\ra200rcu.exe
Reconfigure your raid setup here and after initializing the units you can find them later under the booted OS.

regards, Frank
Hein van den Heuvel
Honored Contributor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

I think Frank is right.

Somehow I thought there were two independent questions, one about some swxcr config (possibly attached outside the box) and the other about JBOD's in the box and possibly attached to a local scsi bus (kzpaa/kzpba).

I must admit it is more likely that the JBODs mentioned are behind the SWXCR in which case a scsi scan will not do any good.

Cheers,
Hein.
bbenson
Occasional Advisor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

Frank and Hein,

Thank you for you replies. Maybe I have not provided enough information or maybe my system is different than the standard.
Some times things are not as simple as expected. I dont know why but it appears I have TWO SCSI buses connected to my Mylex enclosure (what I called a JBOD) before. I only expected one.
If I put drives in the lower three slots they show up on the Mylex controller and I can configure them with the RCU utility, format them etc. If I put drives in the top 4 slots they appear on a different controller, Mylex and QLOGIC.
The original configuration as you can see from above was 3 drives, 9.1GB each. The RCU configuration has each drive in its own group and the Mylex presents them to the OS as three drives. Tru64 recognized them as re[0-2]x devices and the AdvFS file-system was happy to make one drive under one domain. So the Mylex controller was presenting a JBOD.
As for a forth drive, (not shown above) I put a new 9.1GB drive in slot 4 and the Mylex would never see it from the RCU utility even though the AlphaBIOS still showed it on both the Mylex and QLOGIC buses. If I booted the OS, it saw the drive and presents it as a rz9 drive under the /dev directory. From the OS I have formatted and used this drive w/o issues. What I want is to have 7 drives under RAID5 all off the Mylex bus.

So Hein, you make an interesting comment because the scu does find the 4th drive but only because it is not on the Mylex bus. Frank├в s assumption was correct because my intent was to have all drives off the Mylex bus and therefore the scu would fail to find the drives.

Anyone have a clue why I have two busses in the same physical disk array? The QLOGIC controller does NOT appear in the ra200rcu utility (Select Controller) but the Mylex one does just fine.

I have tried two or three different drives in a combination of slots and the Mylex never sees another drive(s). The RCU software has provision for 7 drives but they are never found beyond 0,1,2.


My big deficit is that I don├в t have any documentation or software on Mylex RAIDs etc.

Thanks to anyone who might have some info or software,
Brian
Hein van den Heuvel
Honored Contributor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

I have 2 minutes for a comment now.
Maybe more later.

The Qlogic is one of those KZPBA style controllers, possibly onboard.

The disk array is aa BA356 style, but built-in. They can be set up for split bus, or single bus.

You'll need to open the box and look behind the storage container for a 'jumper plug'.
Google site:hp.com for system/scsi details.

good luck,
Hein.

bbenson
Occasional Advisor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

Hein,

That├в s what I feared. I can├в t open the case now but maybe in a few weeks.

Stay tuned I guess.

Thanks,
Brian

Hein van den Heuvel
Honored Contributor
Solution

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

>> What I want is to have 7 drives under RAID5 all off the Mylex bus.

Are you sure about that?
Must folks running systems really like a simple, tangible, single, system disk.
Something you can grab and replace.
Something you can mirror or clone as need be.

You may also have a SWXCR gotcha's coming your way. Maximum lun size is 32 GB.
So while you can have 7x9GB drive in a group, the resultind 6x9GB Raid-5 will have to be presented as 2x27 (or 32+22)

Given that your storage shelf is probably split already, you may just have the swxcr hooked up to the 4 disks part and raid-5 those out as a 27GB lun.

The other 3 would be 3xJBOD on a Qlogic?
Is it a 3-channel swxcr?
Maybe you can connect those 3 to an other channel instead of the simple scsi bus?

For more help, show us >>> SHOW CONFIG ?

I looked around some, but still could not find the right documentation on line.

Your system probably looks most like the 'single system' in:
http://goldeneggs.spyderbyte.com/geggs/GTAU121PF.pdf

I found an old pdf copy for a regular BA356, but there the bus splits over alternating drives, so an internal shelf is different:
http://www.xenya.si/sup/info/digital/MDS/jun99/Cd3/STORAGE/BU356UGA.PDF


http://h18002.www1.hp.com/alphaserver/download/as1200ug.pdf

http://ftp.digital.com/pub/Digital/info/SOC/AlphaServer_1200_Pedestal_R_29jun1999SOW00BMW.doc

H8520-AA UltraSCSI bus splitter kit. Required when configuring internal storage shelf in split-bus mode. Includes SCSI bus extender card, SCSI data cables, terminator, power harness assembly, and installation guide.

"The SWXCR controller supports a maximum of eight LUs, each with a maximum of 8 drive groups. An LU represents an amount of storage space presented to the host operating system as a single storage device. A drive group consists of one to eight physical drives that are defined and addressed as a single unit. Logical volumes do not have fixed sizes. You can configure the size of a logical volume, as needed, up to a maximum of 32 GB. In addition, the SWXCR controller can have either one SCSI channel or three SCSI channels that support 7 or 21 backend SCSI disks, respectively."

Regards,
hein.

bbenson
Occasional Advisor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

Hein,
I''m glad you mentioned the 32GB limit again. This would not get me what I wanted. I have concerns about failing equipment so I wanted to RAID some storage but the 32GB limit does not help much.
I am going back to the drawing board and see if using bigger disk drives (18GB x 4) on the QLOGIC bus is a better solution and do more backups to tape or other storage.

Thanks for all your time and suggestions. I will close this thread.

Brian

bbenson
Occasional Advisor

Re: SWXCR software availabilty - where is it now?

Still never found SWXCR software but got lots of good information.