Proliant 3000 Memory error

[Trevor Page]

Geez, I wonder what I did wrong. Please bear with me, I'm new to the Proliant 3000.

The server was working fine yesterday and I pulled the drive cage out to install a DAT drive.

This morning I installed the drive cage and plugged the SCSI cable into the Smart SL2 card (I also have the internal drives hooked up to the same card in a RAID 5).

When I booted it up it reported a boot error so I powered down and removed the SCSI cable from the DAt to the card (after I realized its only a singel channel, duh!).

Now the server reports a memory error and won't boot past the memory check.

What should I do?

I should mention I picked this unit up used so I don't have the SmartStart CD but I have managed to find the disk images and have the ACU, RAID and Erase disks made up. I've just located the Diags disk as well.

Please help!

[Tom Mucha_1]

If you mean the Smartarray 2SL- you can't add tape drives to it. Only after the 532 (?) you can add certain drives.

Would you be able to get us the memory error? You can always try reseating the memory on the main board.

[Trevor Page]

Thanks Tom,

Yes the card is a Smartarray 2SL.

I have reseated the memory board and but I get the same error (201) twice. I'm assuming it thinks both the system RAM and the RAM on the memory board are bot right.

I should mention I have 256MB of RAM in the machine (128 on the system and 128 on the memory board).

I'm thinking that perhaps resetting the BIOS might help? Is there a way to do this?

Keep in mind I can't seem to boot from the floppy anymore, it won't get past the memory check.

[Tom Mucha_1]

The 201 defenatly means something is something wrong w/ the memory. You can always try taking 1 module out and see if that works. But then again, depending on the model 3000 you have, the memory may need to be in pairs to work.

There is a block of switches on the main board where you can clear the NVRAM. If you look at the inside of the side panel, it will show you which switch will clear the NVRAM (usually #6). You can always check Compaq's support site if you have questions since there are about 3 different models of the 3000, so your mileage may vary. Normally I would just flip the switch (to the ON position) turn on the power, wait for it to POST, turn it off, and put the switch back to the off position.

Hopefully this helps you out.

[Trevor Page]

Well, I've reseated both RAM banks, I also removed the RAM on the memory board and swapped it onto the system board (128 megs total only). Same thing.

I just reset the NVRAM and still get the same error message.

I also noticed when the systems boots it says 512kb at the top, then the Compaq system BIOS shows up, then the memory error (201) twice (I'm assuming both banks), then the both processors detected but then it locks up.

I can't figure out what happened here. I didn't touch anything on the logic board! I only removed the drive cage, installed the DAT drive and tried rebooting. Now its cooked (or so I think).

Is there ANY way to run diags on this with the memory errors the way it is?

This is depressing, the machines was running like a champ just yesterday.

[Tom Mucha_1 · Accepted solution]

Have you tried removing any cards yet? I would start by takeing out the Smart Array 2SL and take it from there.

[Trevor Page]

That did it!

I removed the Smart Array and it booted. I had to go in and reconfig the whole machine.

I put the card back in and now I'm just resetting the RAID to start over.

There's no loss of data at this point since I just installed RedHat so I'm back in business now!

First, this was my own fault since I didn't realize the 2SL was a single channel card and I should have know to pull the card to see if that would fix it.

Thanks for the pointers Tom, I'm learning lots about this Proliant every day!

[Tom Mucha_1]

It took a couple tries! Glad to help out Trevor.