Installing OS onto SAN using Ignite

[ISS Unix Admin]

I have an HDS9960 SAN and an L2000/440/2.

Having previously Ignited the server onto it's internal disk, I now want to load the OS onto the SAN disk.

I have configured the SAN disks and have created test volume groups and logical volumes and all is 100%.

I start Ignite (B2.5.138) and when viewing the hardware of the server, note that the SAN disks are not listed - therefore I cannot change my root disk.

How do I get Ignite to rescan the hardware of the server so that I can re-select the root disk?

Thanks

Leon

[Patrick Wallek]

You probably can't see the disks on your SAN because there are no Fibre Channel drivers present when booting from the tape. If I remember correctly, the kernel that loads from Ignite is a small kernel and has drivers for only the basic hardware. I don't know if it is possible to make it so that you can see your SAN disks.

I would question though why you want to install onto a SAN. If you look at the thread today about booting from an EMC array then you will see that many sys admins, myself included, do not recomment installing the OS on anything except local disks.

[Dan Hetzel]

Hi,

I concur with Patrick, you won't be able to see your disks through the SAN as long as you don't have a fiberchannel driver loaded. Ignite kernel doesn't provide it.

Even if companies like EMC claim that booting from an EMC disk is possible (normal, they want to sell disks) it would be very bad practise to do so.
It is a general consensus that having the O/S on the local disk is preferable, as well as its mirror if any.

Best regards,

Dan

[Wodisch]

Hello Leon,

even more important than missing drivers in the Ignite
kernel (which could be addressed with a "custom"
install medium) is the lack of bootable SAN-cards in
your system's ROM! HP-UX roms can olny boot from
some interfaces - not all. Some ethernet-cards cannot,
FDDI- and FC-cards can usually not used for booting
from :-(
HTH,
Wodisch

[Michael Roberts_3]

The Ignite kernel (WINSTALL) used to bring up the Lclass does have fibre channel drivers in it:
td
fcp
fcT1
fcT1_fcp
fcpmux
fcT1_cntl
fcgsc_lan
fc_arp

As others mentioned, if the IODC (firmware) doesn't see the disk then it won't show up as a boot disk choice in Ignite. If you interupt the boot sequence and get to the Boot Console Handler (BCH) and do
Main Menu: Enter command or menu > sea

You'll see the list of devices that IODC sees, after the message:
Searching for potential boot device(s)
This may take several minutes.

So if a device shows up there and not in Ignite I'd like to know about that.