DL380 Teaming

[Paul Erskine]

Hi all,

I have a strange problem with a DL380 G4 and teaming the NIC's.

Once the NIC's are teamed, I have a couple of HP JetDirect cards they can't ping. I have upgraded the NIC drivers and teaming software to the latest versions. If I unplug on of the NIC's I can ping the JetDirect card.

Any Ideas?

many thanks


Paul

[Oleg Koroz]

If you don't use Network Configuration utility - uninstall it , if Teaming used verify settings, try differed options

[Robert S. Carr]

Paul:

Very strange you cannot see the JetDirect cards. Some ideas to consider.

1) Use a static IP address for the server not DHCP. Do not rely on DHCP from another server or the booting server itself. Using DHCP from a server is slow. Using it from a switch or router the server it is connected to is much faster but a static address is fastest. Suggest you use that.

2) Use a static speed for the server NICs. Do not use Auto Negotiate. Once again, it's a time waster. Set it to the correct config. e.g. 100 Mb/s Full Duplex

3) Teaming is very sensitive regarding DNS data. Two adapters must use the same DNS data. If out of sync Teaming can experience problems. To sync the adaptors

i) Disable teaming. Disable the second adaptor.

ii) At the command prompt

ipconfig 0 /registerdns

iii) Now enable the second adaptor and at the cmd prompt

ipconfig 1 /registerdns

iv) Re-enable teaming. See if this helps.


Using /registerdns will initiates manual dynamic registration for the DNS names and IP addresses that are configured at a computer.

see http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/ip
config.mspx?mfr=true

Another avenue to look into is TCP port 9100. JetDirect communicates on this port and if it is blocked or unable to communicate when the cards are teamed, communication may not be possible.

Another idea is just to communicate with the printers strictly using LPD rather than JetDirect. I have never had a problem using HP printers and IP printing. Avoiding JetDirect may just solve the problem as well.

Hope that helps.

Rob


Rob

[Connery]

Paul,
There are two potential causes:

1. My guess is that you are using either the "Automatic" team type or the "Transmit Load Balancing (TLB)" team type.

With either of these team types, non-Primary NIC ports in the team can be used to load balance transmit traffic. Thus, a non-Primary port with MAC B may send a frame to the JetDirect card and the JetDirect card is expecting a frame from MAC A (Team MAC). This is not a bug with Teaming (hint hint) since the JetDirect should not care what the source MAC address is in the frame it receives from the team.

You have found one workaround - unplug all but one port in the Team. Since the team is only using one port, the MAC address is always A and the JetDirect is not confused.

Another workaround is to change to the Network Fault Tolerance Only (NFT) team type. This team type transmits and receives everything on one port and won't confuse the JetDirect card.

2. You may also try updating the Teaming driver to the latest version 8.30. There is one other problem associated with ARP that 8.20 provides a fix for. Some ignorant devices don't like how pre-8.20 Teaming transmitted ARP replies. 8.20 works around the other ignorant devices by forcing all ARP replies out of the Primary port.

You can find 8.30 here:
http://h18004.www1.hp.com/support/files/networking/us/download/23964.html

Let us know how it goes!

Best regards,
-sean