i/o issues and patches

[joe_91]

we have had numerous i/o hangs (we replaced hba cards) etc and now i find that the server does not have the gold base and the gold apps installed. when i do analysis it selects about 318 products to install. will this be the root cause of our i/o issue. we are almost out there to swap a new hardware bvefore i ran into this finding. how critical are these.

Thanks

Joe

[A. Clay Stephenson]

Could you answer your own question with the data provided? I suspect that you are going to find a number of i/o and network and kernel patches which are marked "Critical". The answer to your question will be in direct proportion to the number of those that you find BUT your fundamental problem could still be hardware.

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom Joe,

Patching is where you want to be with HP-UX. A properly patched system is fundamentally more stable.

I would bring the system up to current gold patch level and Bundle and HWe merely to comply with good systems administration practices. It also will help eliminate the OS as a problem.

vi /etc/rc.config.d/savecrash

set the savecrash variable to 1

Next time your system hangs, you can hit the TOC button (or do it via software console) and you'll get a crash dump.

This can be analyzed by HP and they can recommend further action.

Checking out the hardware with cstm/mstm or xstm is a good precaution as well.

I have had issues like yours with well patched systems and the crash dump revlealed some more patches I needed.

You Sir have some work ahead of you.

I would not run a system without a Gold Patch set released 3-12 months prior to today's date.

SEP

[Torsten.]

"will this be the root cause of our i/o issue?"

Maybe.

(Same detail level as your question ;-)

[Bob E Campbell]

I second the recommendation to install the latest QPK and HWE bundles, but that recommendation comes outside of finding your actual problem.

If you do not want to search for related problems using the ITRC (http://itrc.hp.com) you might try doing some research with Software Assistant. First time I have thought of using it in a diagnostic fashion, so interested in hearing your thoughts if you try it.

After downloading from HP (https://go/swa) you should be able to identify all missing critical fixes via the command:

# swa report -a CRIT

An html-formatted report will then be found under ~/.swa/report/swa_report.html. You should be able to use the 1-line descriptions and hyperlinks to look for a candidate patch quickly.

Alternatively you could run:

# swa report -a QPK -a CRIT -a SEC -a PCW

and then:

# swa get -t /var/tmp/MyDepot

And install the contents of MyDepot on your system. SWA does not currently grab the HWE bundle, but that is for enablement and not HW defect fixes.

This second option will not help you know what was wrong, but if it is resolved by a patch it will find it with little of your time invested. You need to decide how best to make that trade off.