Kernel Panic when booting OEL 5.4 64bit on DL385 G7

[jeg1972]

I have run into a major problem when attempting to run OEL 5.4 64 bit on the HP Proliant DL385 G7 platform, although the HP DL385 G7 is a certified platform according to Red Hat (https://hardware.redhat.com/show.cgi?id=597230) I also assume by Oracle as well, I am unable to boot after the installation. The process is this;

1) OEL 5.4 64 bit is installed via kickstart and as part of the process, the kerenel is update to 2.6.18-164.15.1.0.1.el5.
2) The installation process completes successfully and then reboots, the boot process continues successfully until it reaches smartd and the then the following error message appears;

Starting smartd: hdc: drive_cmd: status=0x58
{DriveReady SeekComplete DataRequest}
ide: failed opcode was: 0xa1
hdc: drive_cmd: status=0x58
{DriveReady SeekComplete DataRequest}
ide: failed opcode was: unknown
hdc: drive not ready for command
hdc: status timeout: status=0xd8
{ BUSY }
ide: failed opcode was: unkown

This then appears for 5 minutes on screen before it produces a Kernel Panic and fails to continue.

I have seen the the two additional notes on the RedHat certification site, but these apply to 32bit 5.5. I've also seen this as well http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c02283398〈=en&cc=us&taskId=101&prodSeriesId=4132832&prodTypeId=15351 but again, this regards the 32bit not 64bit verstion.

I need to be able to install OEL 5.4 on this server platform and any help is appreciated.

Thanks

John

[Johan Guldmyr]

Hey, I'm no oracle/linux guy - but it looks to me like it stops when it's trying to access the hard drives.

In that part of the installation process - have you configured partitions? What about RAID/ a disk array?

Where are you trying to install OEL? On a flash card, SAN disk or on local disks?

I suppose you are using the P410i storage controller or do you have another one?

Downloads:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/DriverDownload.jsp?prodNameId=4132957〈=en&cc=us&prodTypeId=15351&prodSeriesId=4132832&taskId=135

But in OEL 5 AMDx64 there are no special downloads for the storage controller..

There are however special drivers if you click on RHEL instead in the link above.

Is OEL drivers compatible with RHEL? Maybe that would be worth a shot?

[jeg1972]

Johan

Thanks for the response...

>In that part of the installation process - >have you configured partitions? What about >RAID/ a disk array?

I've configured the the two discs as a mirrored pair and the installation process successfully completes, including the formating of the partitions.

>Where are you trying to install OEL? On a >flash card, SAN disk or on local disks?

Local discs

>I suppose you are using the P410i storage >controller or do you have another one?
>There are however special drivers if you >click on RHEL instead in the link above.
>Is OEL drivers compatible with RHEL? Maybe >that would be worth a shot?

Just using the standard DL385 controller the drivers for which are already in the kernel, however... thanks for pointing that out, I never actually saw the controller drivers for the RHEL distro before, so I might actually try this RPM... Cheers for the heads up.

John

[Johan Guldmyr]

Let's hope so, but if the partitioning is already done it looks to me like it's working, a little bit anyway :)

[jdoz22]

Hey there... I just ran into the exact same issue this morning. I booted into single user, chkconfig'd smartd off, and everything boots fine.

Sounds like smartd needs updated?

John

[jeg1972]

Well, it appears that the problem (and workaround) has already been published in the RedHat Bugzilla...

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=657294

I removed my DVD and it boots perfectly.

It appears that this problem exists on DL385 G7's running RHEL and OEL 5.4, 5.5 amd 5.6 (and therefore probably CentOS as well.)

John

[Johan Guldmyr]

Ah, nice one :)

[P Badrinath]

Hi, I am trying to install OEL5.4 32 bit and having the same issue, the bugzilla link is not accessible, pleaselet me know what was the work arround, if you could paste the contents of the bug id 657294.

Regards

Badri