SOFTPAQ NUMBER: SP30734 PART NUMBER: N/A FILE NAME: SP30734.EXE TITLE: Systems ROMPaq Firmware Upgrade Diskette for HP ProLiant BL25p/BL45p Servers. VERSION: 4.03A LANGUAGE: English CATEGORY: ROMPaqs DIVISIONS: Systems PRODUCTS AFFECTED: HP ProLiant BL25p/BL45p OPERATING SYSTEM: ALL SYSTEM CONFIGURATION: N/A PREREQUISITE: N/A EFFECTIVE DATE: July 5, 2005 ELECTRONIC DISTRIBUTION ALLOWED: Yes SOFTPAQ UTILITY VERSION: 2.X SUPERSEDES: SP30410 DESCRIPTION: This release provides updated system ROM images for the latest maintenance releases of HP BL25p/BL45p Servers. New Features - ProLiant BL25p/BL45p ROM A02 (06/03/2005) ============================================ IMPORTANT: If using Linux RHEL4, RHEL4 Update 1, SLES9 Service Pack 1, or SLES9 Service Pack 2, please see the information relating to Linux in Item 2 below. For these versions of Linux, time corruption issues may occur if certain steps are not taken. These issues are related to the PowerNow support available in these operating systems and are not unique to HP's ProLiant servers. 1) Added support for dual-core 200-series AMD Opteron processors. 2) Added support for OS control of processor performance states and HP's Power Regulator feature (using the AMD PowerNow technology) that allows customers to configure their server's power usage based on their needs. This server supports HP Power Regulator - Static Low Power Mode. OS control of processor performance states is supported if Power Regulator is Disabled (default). The features include: HP Static Low Power Mode: This mode will reduce all installed processors' frequency (and voltage for certain processors) to reduce power usage. This mode will reduce performance in environments with high CPU utilization, but will have little to no performance affect for other environments. This mode is useful for customers whose environment has constrained power availability and need to guarantee a lower overall system power usage. Power Regulator Disable (default): When HP Power Regulator is disabled, Demand Based Switching may be enabled under the operating system to provide processor performance states. The operating system will modify the CPU's frequency and voltage based on CPU Utilization. This feature can be enabled under Microsoft Windows 2003 Service Pack 1, RedHat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 4, RHEL4 Update 1, and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES9) Service Pack 1. However, due to a "clock skew" issue (where system time is not kept correctly) HP recommends that PowerNow be disabled in RHEL4 (64-bit), RHEL4 Update 1 (64-bit), and SLES9 Service Pack 1 (64-bit). These operating systems do not have a work-around for the time corruption issues. Please see below information for important details for OS control of processor performance states including information on how to disable PowerNow. Note: If using OS processor performance states, also known as Demand Based Switching, the following may be useful. This information is critical for customers using certain versions of Linux. The issues described below are not unique to HP ProLiant Servers. Windows 2003 SP1: - Windows 2003 SP1 supports AMD PowerNow with single-core AMD Opteron processors. If using dual-core AMD Opteron processors, a new processor driver is required which does not ship with Windows 2003 SP1 base media. This driver is available from AMD. - IMPORTANT: When using AMD PowerNow, the boot.ini file must be modified to add /usepmtimer. Although HP has not identified issues relating to not performing this step, AMD indicates this is a required step. - Windows 2003 SP1 does NOT enable processor performance states by default. Use configuration options under the Control Panel to enable this feature. Linux: - OS control of processor performance states can be utilized with RHEL4 32-bit, RHEL4 U1 32-bit, and SLES9 SP1 32-bit. PowerNow support will be enabled by default. This is an OS policy. - When using AMD PowerNow with any of the above operating systems, set clock=pmtmr. This prevents a time corruption issue. Since PowerNow is defaulted to enabled, this step must be performed. - RHEL4 64-bit, RHEL4 U1 64-bit, and SLES9 SP1 64-bit do not support set clock=pmtmr. Since PowerNow is enabled by default, the user must disable PowerNow when using these operating systems to prevent time corruption issues. Disable PowerNow in the following manner: In Red Hat, run: # chkconfig --level 12345 cpuspeed off and reboot the server. In SUSE, set: POWERSAVE_CPUFREQD_MODULE="off" in the /etc/sysconfig/powersave/common file and reboot the server. - SLES9 SP1 32-bit will work without issue with single-core AMD Opteron processors. However, set clock=pmtmr must be used to prevent time corruption issues. - RHEL4 32-bit and RHEL4 U1 32-bit require manual update of configuration files to enable this feature. By default, PowerNow is NOT enabled due to this issue. If the user wishes not to utilize PowerNow, they do NOT need to set clock=pmtmr. If the user does wish to utilize PowerNow, they should set clock=pmtmr and do the following: 1. Edit the /etc/cpuspeed.conf file and replace: #DRIVER = "powernow-k7" with the line: DRIVER = "powernow-k8" 2. Restart the "cpuspeed" daemon using: # service cpuspeed restart - When using dual-core AMD Opteron processors with the current Linux operating systems supporting PowerNow, an "out of synch" error may occur. This is an erroneous error which does not actually cause an issue. - HP expects RHEL4 U2 and SLES9 SP2 (available in the future) will address the above issues with AMD PowerNow. It is not yet known whether it will be required to set clock=pmtmr for these future operating systems. For the latest information regarding PowerNow support when using Linux, please visit the following link: http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers/linux/powernow-notes.html Problems Fixed - ProLiant BL25p/BL45p ROM A02 (06/03/2005) ============================================ 1) Resolved issue where the Broadcom PXE Option ROM did not use the proper Universal Unique ID. This will not result in any issues unless a specific UUID is required. If the PXE server is configured to only download images to servers with specific UUIDs, then the PXE installation will not work properly if the UUID the PXE Option ROM is using does not match the one configured on the PXE server. 2) Resolved issue where single and multi-bit memory errors might be reported on the incorrect DIMM. HOW TO USE: 1. Obtain a formatted 1.44 MB diskette. 2. Download the SoftPaq to a directory on your hard drive and change to that directory. The file that is downloaded is SP30734.EXE. 3. From that drive and directory, execute the SoftPaq file: SP30734 [ENTER] You will be prompted to place the formatted 1.44 MB diskette into a diskette drive to create diskette. 4. After the diskette is created, you may delete the downloaded file SP30734.EXE if you wish. Copyright 2005, Hewlett-Packard Company. All rights reserved. Product names mentioned herein may be trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective companies