Can not boot from tape drive

[zila zukkoko]

One of our HP 9000 server is crashed due to power failure. I tried to boot the system from a recovery tape. I inserted the recovery tape to tape drive and did a "sea IPL" to find the path tape drive, instead of returning the path info, it returned "Cannot find ENTRY_TEST". Following is the output of "sea IPL":
Path number Device path Device type and utili
P0 8/4.5 Radom access media
Cannot find ENTRY_TEST
P1 8/16/6.0 LAN Module

What is wrong? Why it can't detect tape drive? How can I boot the system from the recovery tape?
Thanks for your help!

[steven Burgess_2]

Hi

Try

> search

> Boot P0

'N' when asked to interact with ISL

Regards

Steve

[Helen French]

Hi Zila:

This document may be helpful (TKB #UXDNKBRC00001016):

http://us-support2.external.hp.com/cki/bin/doc.pl/sid=eabce4d119f273eed0/screen=ckiDisplayDocument?docId=200000058670557

HTH,
Shiju

[zila zukkoko]

Hi, All, thanks for the quick reply.

My problem is I need to boot from a recovery tape, but looks like the tape drive can not be found. Why?

[Patrick Wallek]

Do you know the path to the tape drive? If so you can specify it in the boot command.

Like:

boot 0/1.6.0

Or try doing just an SEA and see if it returns the path to the tape drive.

Are you absolutely sure the tape is a bootable tape?

[zila zukkoko]

The tape is made by calling make_tape_recovery. And I did sea, it doesn't return device path for tape drive at all.

[Helen French]

Hi Zila:

Again, remove the tape and do "SEA" again. It will list you the path of the tape drive. Then insert the media back to the drive and give:

bo p0
OR
bo 10/4/4.0

If the media is proper, it will boot from that now.

HTH,
Shiju

[Kelli Ward]

Hi Zila,
You might want to verify a couple of quick things.
Is your drive connected or powered up?
Some external DDS3's do not have a power switch, so the only way you can tell is to power it off and on with the cord. If power comes up, the light will begin blinking If not, check your supply, fuses and circuit breakers. If they do, verify your connectors.
If it is internal and you don't see any lights, can you insert a tape at all? If you can't, it's probably not powering on. It would also behoove you to reseat all connections in association with your tape drive. (internal or external)
If all looks well, try your sea command again.
If all is well, it should show you your path information and a descriptor of "Sequential Access Media"
If not, you might have to consider your tape drive might have gone bad in the power outage.

Don't quote me on this, but I think your system should see the tape drive regardless of whether or not you have a tape in the drive unless the search specifically shows IPL in it's output or you use the command sea ipl.
Good luck,
Kel

[zila zukkoko]

Thanks Kelli, I finially find the tape drive path. But the system still not booting up.

The output from >bo 8/16/5.0
Booting...
Cannot find ENTRY_TEST
Failed I/O operation with
ENTRY_IO
Status = -4
00800000 00000000 ...
...

Error Reading IPL.

Maybe as Patrick questioned the tape is not a bootable tape?

Let me explain my situation from the very beginning. The system went down due to a power failure, someone tried to bring it back, but did not success, how, Don't know. When I start looking at the system, I found that all filesystems are empty, only /dev, /etc and /sbin still have files. And all the files under /dev/vg00, /dev/vg01 ... are gone too. So I am thinking that only recovery disk can help me bring the system back. Am I wrong, Maybe I need to rebuild the OS?

[Clemens van Everdingen]

Hi,

To be sure that the tape is defect !
Could you boot from this tape on a similar test system ?
Or, do you have another make_recovery tape to boot from on this system.

This error is caused bye for example:

1. defect tape
2. defect tape drive
3. defect controller

Start testing the tape, and if the tape is ok you probably want to log a call at HP response Center.

C.

[Michael Tully]

Hi,

I am assuming that this is a 'D' class server and your trying to boot off the internal tape drive. I am quite certain that the address you should be using is '8/16/5.0.0' note the extra 'zero'

I would do a power cycle of your server and halt the boot process. Then attempt to do the boot using this:

bo 8/16/5.0.0

This may explain the error.
HTH
~Michael~

[R. van Huissteden]

Hi,

This is the first time for me to reply to an question so it's a test also.

If the ignite tape you have is your only "full backup" (all vg's included), you can use the tar file wich is on the tape after the boot part.
Write protect the tape and put it in an other machine and do:
# mt -t /dev/rmt/0mn fsr (the n is for no rewind)
The tape is now posisioned before the tar file.
do
# tar tvf /dev/rmt/0m and you can check if the tape (tar file) is readable and check the contents. If the contents is indeed "all files" you can axtract the vg information wich you can use to install hpux from cd.
When you system is running again. restore the tar file from the ignite tape:
# mt -t /dev/rmt/0mn fsr
The tape is now posisioned before the tar file.
# tar xvf /dev/rmt/0m
The tar file wil extracted to disk.

Remember that the old passwords are in use again.

I hope this can be of any help

[Georg]

Sometimes...
The cause for Softwareproblems might be hardware...
If Your Tape is external You should recheck the connection Cable and especially the Terminator...
Maybe this reply ist bullshit but You can give it a Try.