[rescue] Clariion raid questions (Fiberchannel)

[John Mothershead]

At 08:34 PM 12/3/2004, you wrote:

>Interesting... are the JBODs clariion? What brand (Black, blue, etc?)
>
>The old SPs (I can't think of the name, but generally each version of the
>SP has some sort of code name) had a secret where you type what I believe
>was a 4 character word, but you hold down control while doing so.
>
>Like Control-T control-E control-S control-T
>
>This was the really old parallel scsi units, not the fibrechannel ones.
>
>Have you tried to put a "normal" drive? For instance, say a disk croaks
>and you need to replace one, taking a normal Seagate fibrechannel disk and
>jamming it in there? I think they are very specific when it comes to disks
>-- like the SP will upgrade the firmware so all disks are the same
>assuming they have the proper clariion/emc code in the drive to begin
>with...
>
>Which brings me to another thing, are there availible tools to push and
>pull firmware on FC disks....
>
>Basically I sold the Cray and a Challenge XL to someone out of the country
>(old Cray that is way below export restrictions in MTOPS). The guy sent me
>4 Clariion DPEs from someone else in the US to throw in with the other
>equipment (since he is already paying alot to have the cray stuff
>shipped).
>
>Well, the more I look at the thing -- the more I like the thing.
>
>You said the management warez aren't a free download either? IIRC SGI used
>some sorta cruddy Java utility that would manage the things, and the same
>utility ran on other unices -- probably the Navisphere you mentioned.
>
>--
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I have both flavors, black and blue. The SP units are both 4500's I 
believe. FC only. The blacks are SGI rebadged and the blues are Clariions. 
Silkscreens on the SP boards indicate that they are Data General units, if 
memory serves me right. I have not messed with these units in a while, but 
now I'll have to go play with them a bit more. I have not tried "normal" 
drives, but I have been told that they will not work. As you pointed out I 
believe they do need the appropriate firmware.  I do think that there is a 
way to write the appropriate firmware to a "normal" drive, (or render it 
useless) from the console as well, but I'm not sure how. Typing 'help' at 
the console prompt provided a list of commands, however I found a few 
hidden commands after a bit of research.

The SP wirites an image of the OS and configuration on two or more drives, 
I think that this is configurable from the console. When the system boots 
it reads this info, if all the JBODS are not present when the system boots, 
it will not come up. ie, the system was built with 5 units, you now have 
three, no go. Using the console you can re-config however. It does 
overwrite all the disks when it rebuilds.

I installed a few of these units for a client using Navisphere for Windows. 
It was complete crap and I ended using the console interface off the SP 
that I could get into. I do have a copy of the Navisphere for Solaris, but 
I have not tried it yet. Maybe if I get some free time I'll give it a try 
of one of the Sun's in the office.

--John