Booting from FC-AL RAID

[James Jone]

What do I need to do in order to boot from a fibre channel raid drive?

Server: Visualize J7000 (9000/785/J7000)
OS: HP-UX 11.0
HBA: A5158A
System Firmware: 5.0


When I search for boot devices, all I can see are the internal SCSI drives.

Is there suppose to be firmware on the A5158A card that supports booting? If so, where can I find it?

Any suggestions are appreciated.

Tom

[Michael Tully]

You can get the latest driver from here:

http://www.software.hp.com/cgi-bin/swdepot_parser.cgi/cgi/displayProductInfo.pl?productNumber=A5158A

I'm sure anything below the 11.00.06 version did not support FC booting.

[Jeff Schussele]

Hi Tom,

Michael's correct.
Anything pre-11.00.06 will not work. Believe 11.00.10 is current I suggest you get that.

Now when you search are you using
SEA
or
SEA IPL

What does an SEA return? Any FC devices at all? Are you using switched fabric? DO the switches have current firmware?

If this is initial load of OS, then use SEA because there will be NO devices except the CD-ROM that are bootable. Also boot is very dependent on proper PDC revision - although I *think* 5.0 is current for a J7000.

Rgds,
Jeff

[Eugeny Brychkov]

To be able to boot from device, you're correct telling that PDC should see it in 'SEA IPL' output. If media has no system insalled, then it should appear in 'SEA' list for OS installation.
Which storage device do you use? Switches/hubs?
What 'SEA' and 'SEA IPL' command tell you?
Eugeny

[James Jone]

Thanks for the responses.

I have installed the 11.0.10 version of the driver. That is the latest version I see.

When I search for boot devices using SEA, I see the CDROM drive and the 4 internal SCSI drives (FWSCSI.6.0, .5.0, .4.0, .3.0). No FC devices are listed.

If I use SEA IPL, I only see the bootable internal drive (FWSCSI.6.0).

The server is connected to the disk array through a Gadzoox Capellix 2000C SAN Switch.

Once the server is booted from the internal drive, I have no problems accessing the disk array.

If I get into the IPL menu and look at the IO device information (IN IO), I see that there is no firmware version listed for the A5158A board. Is this correct? I'm new to this environment, so this may be a basic question, but isn't the driver loaded from the disk? Wouldn't firmware be needed on the HBA in order to access the disk array at boot time?

Thanks again for your help.

Tom

[Eugeny Brychkov]

I'm not sure if this config you're trying to build is tested, but you can try one test to avoid switch issue: connect storage device directly to A5158A (this will be truly fc-al, so storage device must be configured not to try fabric connection, but stay in fc-al). Then try searching for devices again.
If you would have brocade switch or HP hub and HP storage device (for example, VA) then there would be not a qustions about configuration and support, but in your case it's hard to advise you...
Eugeny