System Crash, Cant Boot System

[Srividhya Narayanan]

Hi,

I tried to install a scsi disk drive and reboot our development system. The system did not boot properly and it hung up. So i did a hard boot after removing the disk drive and it took a long time and finally said "system crash". Now I cant boot the system. Please help.

Thanks
Sri

[Andy Monks · Accepted solution]

You either need to call your local hp response centre or provide much more info, on what actually happens when it attempts to boot?

However, as you've been playing with scsi, ensure you've not forgotten to plug a terminator back in. If it's fw-scsi and any the system still had power on (although shutdown) while you were changing things, it's possible you blew the fuse in the card. That will require an CE to fix.

As for your original problem, it sounds like a clash of scsi addresses.

[Antoanetta Naghiu]

Did you try to install a internal or an external disk?
Did you check the SCSI id on the current disks and the new one?
If external, did you properly terminate the SCSI chain?
Sorry for this one: Is the disks unit power on?
Try to boot the system in single user mode. Is it coming up?
Come back with detail.

[Rick Garland]

It would seem that something is still connected. I know that you said you removed it but was it disconnected?

Another possibility, something fried?

[Srividhya Narayanan]

Thanks for all your responses. actually I'm new to
unix system. I'm trying to install an external scsi
disk. how do i find out if the new scsi address
clashes with the excising one? but i'm not sure if i
terminated the scsi chain when i removed the disk
drive. I'll check that one right away.
Yes, the disk unit powers on. I also tried to boot in
single user mode, it still doesnt boot up, it just
hangs up. I'll also post the actual messages what i
receive.

Thanks again for your help
Sri Narayanan

[Andy Monks]

To find out what scsi devices your using you can do :-

ioscan -fk

Then look for things like 'disk', or 'tape' in the left hand column. The 3rd column will be some number like '2/0/1.6.0' which on my workstation indicates scsi address 6 on the bus 2/0/1. The last 0 is the lun number (you won't be using that unless your plugging in an array of some sort).

Basically you've got numbers 0-6 per bus (unless it's a fast-wide bus when it's 0-6, 8-15). address 7 is usually the address of the scsi card (and is shown on the ioscan output).

you can also use ioscan -fkn to see the device files associated with the hardware paths too.

[Srividhya Narayanan]

It worked!!!! I had forgotten to terminate the scsi chain when i removed the disk drive. The system booted ok, it did tell me "file system not shutdown properly" and did some repair.
It also gave these messages
snmptrap: The connect(2) system call failed
sbin/rc: failed to read row and column info from screen

Now, i've to try and install the new scsi drive and check for conflicting addresses. If i find a clash in the scsi addresses, how do i fix it? In this system the scsi addresses are like 4.0.0, 4.1.0, 4.2.0 etc.

Thanks so much
Sri

[Alan Riggs]

There are little jumpers on teh back of the drive. 4 of them, corresponding to 8-4-2-1. You set the scsi ID just as you would code the value in binary. (is: up-down-down-up == 1001 == 9)

[Srividhya Narayanan]

I'm really sorry i did not understand your solution. Do I've to change the scsi address of the excisting drive? Also since i cant boot the system with the new drive in it how do i determine which drive's address is conflicting with this new one.

Thanks
Sri

[Srividhya Narayanan]

I'm really sorry i did not understand your solution. Do I've to change the scsi address of the excisting drive? Also since i cant boot the system with the new drive in it how do i determine which drive's address is conflicting with this new one.

Thanks
Sri

[Antoanetta Naghiu]

Sri,
Does the external disk have a case? I supose that... On the back of the disk you have a little .... something with a digit written on it. On top and below that number, probably there are some botton that if you press them the digit shown is changed...
No, run ioscan -fnC disk, ioscan -fnC tape and look for the SCSI id, see man ioscan or post here the output of ioscan command to be able to get help.
If you identify the scsi id already in use, you can go ahead and set up on the new disk a different one...
Connect the disk, do not forget to terminate the scsi chain, and should work.

[Alan Riggs]

Sri,
A scsi conflict will happen only if your new drive shares a scsi path with other devices. If you connect it to its own controller, then you are fine. If other devices are on teh scsi chain then you need to look in ioscan and find the scsi id that each uses. Then you set the scsi id on your disk, using the jumpers, to a value that is not being used by any other device on the chain (1-6, 8-15 are the values to choose from).

[Srividhya Narayanan]

Alan, It works. I did exactly what you said with the jumpers, i made them (up-down-down-up) and the system booted ok and there was no clash with the other disks.

Thanks for all your help.
Sri