Partitioning an RX2800 to boot from OpenVMS or HP-UX

[Paolo_c]

We're looking to purchase some rx2800 i2 Servers with a view to "partitioning" some of them to allow Servers to be booted from either HP-UX or OpenVMS (but with only one OS on at a given time). I'm aware that the rx2800 does not support hard partitions but was wondering if it would be possible to use something like EFI boot menu to achieve our objective above, by adding separate boot disks for OpenVMS and HP-UX with associated storage for each O/S screened off from the other  ?) .

I'm presuming that under such a configuration it might be possible for each OS to separately access the same network cards ? We were looking to host the storage on an MSA60, but not sure if the functionality on an MSA60 allows for disks to be separated by hostname /zoning or whether there was an option for exporting disk to a specific host -  similar to 3PAR SSMC console allows ) ? I appreciate that HP no longer support VMS but was hoping that some of the users on this forum may have configured something similar to what we're proposing above ?

[Steven Schweda · Accepted solution]

> We're looking to purchase some rx2800 i2 Servers with a view to
> "partitioning" some of them to allow Servers to be booted from either
> HP-UX or OpenVMS (but with only one OS on at a given time). [...]

   That's not "partitioning", it's only booting from a different disk.
Which should be no problem (assuming that you're attending to the
console when the system is started, so that you can choose a non-default
boot volume when the choice is offered).

   I do this on an rx2600 system and a zx2000.  One has disks for HP-UX,
VMS, and Debian GNU/Linux, as I recall.

> I'm presuming that under such a configuration it might be possible for
> each OS to separately access the same network cards ? [...]

   Sure.  Unless you want to use DHCP, a system running one OS and the
same system running a different OS might as well be two completely
different systems.  To avoid confusion (mine) I normally configure a
different IP address for each OS on a given system.

   If you _did_ want to use DHCP, then I'd expect you to use a different
interface (with a different MAC address) for each OS.  If the rx2800
comes with two (non-management) Ethernet holes, then that should be easy
enough.  Otherwise, I'd guess that there's some kind of PCI slot where
more Ethernet holes could be added.

> [...] We were looking to host the storage on an MSA60, but not sure if
> the functionality on an MSA60 allows for disks to be separated by
> hostname /zoning or whether there was an option for exporting disk to a
> specific host - similar to 3PAR SSMC console allows ) ? [...]

   I use only local disks, and I know nothing about any MSA storage, but
even if it can only export every volume it has to the multi-OS system,
I'd expect that system to be able to use the volumes which it wants (and
which contain a conpatible file system).

> [...] with associated storage for each O/S screened off from the other
> ?) .

   Generally, a VMS system won't see much of anything intelligible on an
HP-UX volume, and vice versa.  If you don't initialize a volume when
you're running the wrong OS, what could go wrong?

> [...] something like EFI boot menu [...]

EFI Boot Manager ver 1.10 [14.61]  Firmware ver 2.31 [4411]

Please select a boot option

    VMS - REX PKA0.0                                                
    EFI Shell [Built-in]                                            
    Internal Bootable DVD                                           
    HP-UX                                                           
    Boot Option Maintenance Menu                                    
    System Configuration Menu                                       


    Use ^ and v to change option(s). Use Enter to select an option

   Apparently, I've lost the (seldom-used) Debian option in the menu,
but that OS is still visible using the EFI Shell uption:

fs4:\EFI> ls
Directory of: fs4:\EFI

  04/14/09  09:30p <DIR>          2,048  .
  04/14/09  09:30p <DIR>              0  ..
  11/01/13  03:50p <DIR>          2,048  debian
          0 File(s)           0 bytes
          3 Dir(s)

   (Someday, when I get ambitious, I should add that option back in.)

[Paolo_c]

Hi Steven,  Thank you for the information provided.