VCA now reports all Array Controllers - status Minor

[Rob Buxton]

Hi All,
I've updated to 7.80 on a couple of servers and they're all now showing various RAID Device Drivers as out of date but will not update them.

This is on a DL380 G3, which has a 5i Controller, but it is now showing devices like the "LSI CSB-6 Ultra ATA-100 Driver" as out of date in the VCA.
This in turns keeps the status as yellow.

I've checked and there is nn old driver on the server, but there seems to be these drivers on all of our servers, from what I can see it's part of a standard W2K3 installation.
A server with these drivers installed but not yet updated to 7.80 doesn't list these in the VCA.
Is there anything that can be changed so that the behaviour returns to normal?
I updated the VCRM to the latest version but that hasn't changed the behaviour.

[Rob Buxton]

Anyone else seeing this - it's the same on every server we've updated so far.
It doesn't matter what Array Controller is installed, it reports every other variant as out of date, except for the one you have.

I don't care what the driver version is for array controllers I don't have!

[Arian van der Pijl]

Maybe off topic but I saw the slightly the same symptoms with a clean Windows 2003 Server x64 SP2 Standard Edition with PSP7.80 in $OEM$ driver structure.

I can't remember exactly but after installing, PSP 7.80 told me that there was another Array Controller beside the (only) P400 who needs to be updated.

My guess is that the 'in the box' 'P400 driver' of Windows 2003 x64 stays loaded after the installation. Guess this 'in the box' (generic) driver shows to PSP 7.80 as another controller which was only used when installing the os.

Windows 2003 32bit did not show this behaviour.

Anyway .. you can look in 'device manager' under 'view' -> 'show hidden devices'.
Maybe it's listed there, I found my 'orphaned' driver there.

Regards,
Arian!

[Rancher]

Rob,
I have only updated to version 7.80 on two servers, but I am seeing the same thing you are on one of them so far. The server this is happening on is a Blade BL20p G2. The ML370 G4 is not having the issue.

I am going to roll 7.80 out to a couple more servers today and we will see what happens!

PS. My Sims server is completely updated and patched.

[Rancher]

I have two drivers that won't update. I just read the Component Details and found this on an earlier revision (two updates from what I have installed):

Component installer was enhanced to leave the component XML file (cpxxxxxx.xml) in a known location (%SystemDrive%\CPQSYSTEM\) so the HP Management and Version Control agents can retrieve information about the installed components on the server.

I am going to try to find that version of the driver, install it, and then try to install the latest. Maybe this will fix it!

[Rob Buxton]

Yeah, I'll have a bit more of a dig around today.
I believe W2K3 installs versions of drivers for all known arrays on installation, so they will be there. Up to now the VCA has correctly recognised the fact they are there but aren't needed.
It seems to have got something wrong on the recent release. Maybe it's just a matter of editing an XML file somewhere as a short term fix to get the reporting accurate again.

[Christopher Knight]

We are seeing this as well on our BL20p blades with 7.80 Agents. The Drivers that are showing our dated are:

HP StorageWorks Fibre Channel Array Notification Driver for Windows Server 2003
Installed Version: 5.30.0.32
Support Pack Version: 6.0.0.32

HP ProLiant Smart Array SAS/SATA Controller Driver for Windows Server 2003
Installed Version: 5.2.0.32
Support Pack Version: 6.6.0.32

HP ProLiant CSB-6 ATA-100 IDE RAID Driver for Windows 2000/Windows Server 2003 Installed Version: 4.1.730.2003
Support Pack Version: 4.2.805.2005

HP ProLiant 64-Bit/133-MHz Single/Dual Channel Ultra320 SCSI HBA and SCxxXe series SCSI HBA Driver for Windows Server 2003
Installed Version: 1.10.5.2
Support Pack Version: 1.21.8.0

When you try to force the installation of one of these drivers you get the following message:
The software will not be installed on this system because the required hardware is not present in the system or the software/firmware doesn't apply to this system.

Installation will not continue

[Melissa O'Brien]

We are seeing the exact same behavior! It is actually the new Version Control Agent software that's doing it - cp007354.exe. The description for this enhancement is "Integrated discovery module".

As a workaround you may be able to revert to a previous version of the VCA software.

We currently have similar case open with HP as we've seen this problem using P2P with the 7.6 version of VCA but they haven't come back with anything useful yet.

Hopefully now that they've released 7.8 and more people are experiencing the problem they'll actually fix it!

[Christopher Knight]

Reverting to the previous version of the Version Control Agent (ver. 2.1.7.770) has resolved the issue for us. Unfortunatly now the VCA is showing as minor but oh well! I guess we'll have to wait for HP to fix it.

[Rancher]

I will try that. It is odd that it doesn't happen on all of the servers. If I recall, I need to uninstall the old VCA first, before I downgrade.

[Rob Buxton]

Rancher,
You could try looking to see if the old drivers are actually installed on the servers not showing the issue.
Get the cp file, extract it and look for the driver and then search for it.

It may be on the servers that are okay some of the unused drivers were not installed.
Not too sure how that would happen.

[Arian van der Pijl]

Maybe you can execute PSP 7.80 locally on the server itself?

This way you can also see if the 'ghost' device is detected other than by the VCA itself.

[Rob Buxton]

They're not ghost devices as such, it's just that Windows installs versions of all the drivers it might need during installation.

In previous versions of the VCA it seemed to work out that the device wasn't there and therefore wouldn't try and load an updated driver. This has changed, the VCA now seems to see the unused driver and then thinks it needs to update it. The actual install script (cpnnnn.exe) knows better and reports an update isn't required.

This is a change in behaviour of the VCA, and probably means that most users will no longer have a VCA that reports OK with 7.80.

[Melissa O'Brien]

We've actually experienced this problem with the following drivers since PSP 7.6:

-AMD 800Chipset Support for Proliant Servers for Windows 2000/Windows 2003
-ATI2MPAD Miniport Driver (or HP Proliant ATI RAGE XL Video Controller Driver for Windows Server 2003)
- HP Proliant Smart Array Device Manager Extension for Windows 2000/Server 2003

We use sysprepped Ghost images across models and it's almost as if VCA is tripping over the Plug and Play of the newer drivers. Unfortunately HP does not support Ghost images (Altiris/RDP only) so we replicated the same problem with the P2P product and we now have an open case. I will let everyone know if they come up with a resolution or workaround!

The VCA seems overly sensitive with any driver that may have been present on the machine at one time. ??

[Rancher]

Rob, I will check to see if the drivers asre actually installed per your suggestion.

Arian, I have deployed PSP 7.80 on the servers in question.

The server I am seing this on was deployed through RDP. The server I don't have the issue on was a ghost image.

[Rancher]

I just tried Rob's suggestion for the two drivers in question on my server and this gets even more interesting.
One of the drivers is actually installed, and does look to be part of the 2003 iinstallation.
However, the other driver is NOT installed and when I researched it on HP's site, it is not even supported for this model of server!

[Rob Buxton]

Rancher,
Now you're just getting weird on me, I thought I understood what was happening!
What the VCA is doing at your site is a bit stranger than what I've observed here.
It would be nice if we saw an HP response, especially as it doesn't just seem to be a one person seeing the issue.
Looks like a call may need to be logged.

[Rogier Boeken]

fyi: i am having same issues with VCA agent reporting drivers in minor state since upgrading to 7.80

i cannot install the drivers manually on the server as it says driver is not supported

[Rancher]

Rob, I agree, it IS getting weirder!

I have only deployed 7.80 to some test servers so far. One is an ML370 G4 and I am not seeing this issue on that box.

The other is a blade BL20p G2. The one driver is wants that is NOT installed is for the HP ProLiant CSB-6 ATA-100 IDE RAID Driver for Windows 2000/Windows Server 2003.
I checked HP's site, and this driver is only supported on a HP ProLiant ML330 G3 Server!

Both of these servers are 2003, SP1.

Curiouser and curiouser!

[tmsmithvcs]

I will wait to see if someone comes up with a solution. Maybe the next VCA will correct this problem.

[Rancher]

One more piece of information. We also still have a few 2000 servers and one of the few new updates for them was the new VCA. I am NOT having trouble with the reporting on my 2000 test box with the new VCA.

[ArneLovius]

more of a me too but we see the "ghost" drivers on 2k3 and 2k3 R2, but not on 2k and I have also opened a case with HP. I wonder if it worthwhile opening a case for each of the servers still under carepaq that are exibiting these symptoms...

[Christopher Knight]

HP are you listening? Any input from you would be great!

[ETP_Vancouver]

Yup. I just ran into similar symptoms while pushing updates via SIM.

I manually uninstalled VCA 7.80 and replaced it with VCA 7.70. Problem solved.

I guess I'll wait for a fix before updating any more servers.

[ETP_Vancouver]

Yup. I just ran into similar symptoms while pushing updates via SIM.

I manually uninstalled VCA 780 and replaced it with VCA 770. Problem solved.

I guess I'll wait for a fix before updating any more servers.