6400r fails to boot from Samrt Start CD

[Greg Rusin]

I have a Proliant 6400r hat had a serious array failure. Actually, during some upgrade testing we caused the array to fail. I have deleted the array and am attempting to boot from the Smart Start CD to perform the disk clean and re-install the OS. The system boots off version 5.50, the Smart Start splash screen appears than the screen goes black, no signal to monitor, and the system does nothing. It refuses to boot past this point. Any ideas as to how to get the Smart Start to run?

[Terry Hutchings]

How much memory do you have installed? Most Smart Start problems can be traced to unsupported or bad memory.

Is there a 3rd party video adapter installed? Which firmware is installed on the server? You also mentioned the array controller had a problem. Is the same controller still installed in the server?

[Greg Rusin]

I was able to download the erase utility, and after running it, I am able to get Smart Start to run. When it configures the hardware and attempts to restart Smart Start, the server hangs at that point now. Screen goes blank, no signal. If I power down server, it complains that smart start was interrupted and I have to start all over again with the erase utility, but I still only get to the same point. The Video adapter is an ATI, but the issue seems to be something else now. Any ideas on how to get past this next problem? The server was able to run the smart start previously and was configured using it. The drives have been replaced with 143.6 gb scsi drives, they are brand new, the controller is a 5300. any clues?

[Terry Hutchings]

I would like to ask the same questions again. Is there ANY unsupported hardware (eg. 3com nic, pci video adapter, kingston memory, etc. - anything) installed?

[Paul Tisl]

I ran into a similar issue trying to run through smart start.

To resolve the issue I had to remove the RILO II card from the server until after I made it through the system config part of SmartStart.

Hope that helps.
Paul