Linux cannot see Compaq 3200 array
 

Not sure what happened to my original post from yesturday, but anyway, here goes...

I configured RH EL3 Linux on a Compaq Proliant DL360 G2. It picked up the onboard disk array, which we configured as a hardware RAID 1, no problem. However, we then added a Compaq scsi array using a 3200 controller card added to the box. Linux cannot see that array, nor can we mount it, as it is apparently not in the /dev directory. We even tried using the linux boot CD to see if we could use the disk management setup software; stil, no external array. We've scoured the HP website (among others) looking for the appropriate drivers, and we able to find this page: http://h18023.www1.hp.com/support/fi.../101_2543.html. We installed what we could from this page, even the management software, which see no divices whatsoever. We downloaded the rescan-scsi-bus.sh script, which found no devices. How can we get this working? Do we need to install the driver on boot? If so, how can we go about doing so? Is there another solution? Any insight is apprecaited. Thanks in advance.

Kernel version?
 

I've found the dsl-knoppix 50meg live-cd works quite well for detecting Proliant server hardware, It's based on the 2.4 Kernel version that supports ISA bus devices.
And for some reason unknown to me the PCI riser board in my server runs from an ISA bus(Proliant ML370 original running a smart 3200 array).

The steps I used were;

1) enable apt-get on the live-cd by using the tools menu.

2) grabbed my pre-setup hpacucli.deb package with
wget ht tp://24.64.108.198/home/hpacucli_7.20-17_i386.deb

3) dpkg -i hpacucli_7.20-17_i386.deb (got a version error on the dependancies, but couldn't work around it, so ignored it).

4) typed "hpacucli" and was able to setup the array with a bit of reading.

5) upon reboot was able to install Debian-etch to the scsi raid5 without any error messages.

Still having some issues though.
System won't boot - invalid system disk error.
Yet rescue mode on the install cd shows that everything is where it should be and the shell executes in / just fine.

It's long since retired but I ran a proliant 3000 back in 2004 I think.

I created the array with the smartstart 5 cd, then insalled gentoo with its raid kernel (the one with smartarray support). The device nodes appeared under /dev/ida/

I only had a tape drive connected to the main scsi bus, not a hard disk, but it always booted straight off the array for me.

I wouldn't want to try and set one up without the smartstart cd though.

If I understand your configuration, the SA3200 is connected to an external (MA5x0/MSA30/Old beige ProLiant disk shelf?) shelf, populated with some drives.

If you have the SmartStart CD, boot off it, and run the Array Configuration Utility to configure the SA3200. If it can't, there should be another option called "Drive Array Advanced Diagnostics" - run it and see if it can see the SA3200.

From what you're saying, I suspect that neither will see it. If DAAD can see the SA3200, you should be able to run the ACU.

TBQH I don't believe the SA3200 is a supported product on any of the DL or ML servers - it's a controller from a previous generation - PL3000/5500 era. Things to try:

1) Move the array controller to a different slot (this may not be an option given the size of the DL360)
2) Firmware update the server - this may improve compatibility with the older kit.
3) Firmware update the SA3200 - this may improve compatibility with the newer kit.

Could also be a broken SA3200, broken SCSI cable, duff backplane in your external storage box, dodgy drive in the external storage box spewing rubbish along the SCSI bus and confusing everything. I have seen all of these things cause problems.

The other possibility is that the SmartStart CD you have no longer supports the SA3200 at all. If you could get hold of something like a SA641, you could test it with that - any of the SA6xx series are the same generation as that server (SA641 is pretty much identical to the controller on-board the DL360).

Thanks, everyone for your advice. This is good stuff. I have a guy here who is the resident UNIX/Linux guru. Once he arrived on the scene, he learned me something :) We used dmesg to search for other scsi controllers. The command was dmesg | grep C0d0. Then, we were able to see the device as ida/c0d0. The other controller is cciss/.... Then, we used fdisk to partition and mkfs.ext3... to format. We then added our newly partitioned and formatted array to /dev as /dev/ida/c0d0p1, and we were in business. Linux names devices in weird ways. I was looking for sda or sdb. Thanks again.

IDA = Intelligent Disk Array

This was a Compaq thing and goes all the way back to the SMART-1 array controller. I think things changed with the SA5xy(y) controllers as these were a leap forward from the 3200 (which was just a juiced-up SMART-2DH).