Setboot on Itanium

[Daniel M. Gonzales]

I'm trying to set my primary bootpath to my tape device. I didn't have any problems doing it on a PA-RISC machine (11.23), but I'm getting the following error on my Itanium machine.

//> setboot -p 1/0/0/3/1.1.0
setboot: error accessing boot path - Invalid argument
//>

Any ideas? Something different on Itanium? Thanks.

[Arunvijai_4]

Hello,

May be this thread can help you,

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=229909

-Arun

[Geoff Wild]

is there a tape in the drive?

[Daniel M. Gonzales]

Yep, tape in device...

//> ioscan -nkfC tape
Class I H/W Path Driver S/W State H/W Type Description
=======================================================================
tape 0 1/0/0/3/1.1.0 stape CLAIMED DEVICE HP C5683A
/dev/rmt/0m /dev/rmt/0mnb /dev/rmt/c3t1d0BESTn /dev/rmt/c3t1d0DDSb
/dev/rmt/0mb /dev/rmt/c3t1d0BEST /dev/rmt/c3t1d0BESTnb /dev/rmt/c3t1d0DDSn
/dev/rmt/0mn /dev/rmt/c3t1d0BESTb /dev/rmt/c3t1d0DDS /dev/rmt/c3t1d0DDSnb
//> < /dev/rmt/0m
//> dd if=/dev/rmt/0m bs=16k count=1
VOL1HP0129 30+1 records in
0+1 records out
//>

[Bharat Katkar]

Hi,
The thread below shud help.
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=992922

Regards,

[Geoff Wild]

I don't think you can set the primary boot path on Itanium to be a tape device from setboot - I think you have to do that from the Boot Console Handler using the pf command...

Can you try alternate?

setboot -a 1/0/0/3/1.1.0

I guess the other question is - why would you want the tape to be primary?

Rgds...Geoff

[Lolupee · Accepted solution]

You cannot set boo tfrom a tape. You can however, boot from CD and redirect to continue using tapoe device.

Itanium servers do not support buting from tape.

Boot from CD while the tape is there and redict you booting to tape at boot up.

[Daniel M. Gonzales]

Thanks for the responses guys. The reason for setting my primary bootpath to tape is so I can test my Ignite tapes, without having to stare at the console, interrupt the boot process (10-second window), and then re-direct to tape. After I'm done testing the tape, then I reboot and change the primary bootpath back to disk.

So setboot will not work for a tape device on IPF? I'm stuck staring at the console?

[Mridul Shrivastava]

On itanium booting from tape is not supported, the only way u can do is to boot from recovery CD and then from there u select tape to boot.
So like PA-RISK it's not supported in Itanium.

[Daniel M. Gonzales]

Thanks for the confirmation, appreciate it.

[Sameer_Nirmal]

Hi,

As others told already, the direct tape boot support on Itanium server is not possible as of now. The indirect method i.e. DVD/CD direct boot and then tape is only option.

As per my understanding, the direct tape bootup support requires support in ignite-ux s/w as well as in system firmware/hpux boot loader.
Ignite-UX s/w (C.6.x) has been modified to ensure the compliance for direct tape boot support. Saying that Ignite-ux is ready for direct tape bootup, but system firmware/boot loader is not. I guess HP would release the firmware in near future which will modify the HPUX bootloader ( through EFI ) to support direct tape bootup.

If you have HP support, you can ask them about the availibility of the same.