Semi-Summary: No Tape devices for fibre-channel tape robot...

From: Dan Penrod (dan@nortom.com)
Date: Wed Nov 24 1999 - 12:35:41 CST


Still doesn't work. The solution is we're RMA'ing the FC-AL card.
Could take a while so I thought I just go ahead and summarize now.

To briefly restate the problem... I'm connecting a SUN E450 to an ADIC
tape robot (with dual DLT7000 drives) over fibre-channel, with a
Cambex/QLogic FC card in the Sun. I can't see the robot... no tape
devices are being generated with a 'reboot -- -r'.

Just about everyone (Sun Managers) suggested the same thing... "Make
sure the st.conf has the correct geometries." I tried Sun's default
geometries for the drive as well as some provided by ADIC, the tape
robot vendor. One suggestion was to add a FC/SCSI MUX/Bridge. Not an
option right now. One suggestion was that the tape device might be
appearing someplace else... /dev/xxx/rmty ? Nope.

Both Sun and ADIC suggested that I should be able to see the drives with
a 'probe-scsi-all' and that if I couldn't... it was probably the card.
Sun of course wanted to know why I wasn't using a Sun FC-AL card (and in
hind site, I certainly wish I was). Cambex could only say they mostly
support NT and AIX and just don't know much about Sun/Solaris/ or
E450s. Doh! :( (make a note)

Things I tried...

   * seating and reseating the card.
   * seating and reseating the gbic in the card.
   * changing slots of the card.
   * upgrading the E450 firmware from OBP 3.12 to OBP 3.14.1
   * Using Sun's DLT7000 geometries in st.conf
   * Using ADIC's DLT7000 geometries in st.conf
   * Queried with Sun's 'probe-scsi-all', John DiMarco's 'scsiinfo',
     Legato's 'inquiry'
   * Rebooted -- -r a zillion times
   * placed threatening calls and emails with...
        o Cambex
        o Sun
        o Legato
        o ADIC

Hopefully a new card from a new vendor will ultimately solve the
problem.

Thanks to the following for their thoughful suggestions (in order of
response).
Michael Ernest <mfernest@earthlink.net>
James Mularadelis <james.mularadelis@bms.com>
Wallis Peter <peter.wallis@icl.co.za>
Mike Fisher <mlf@eng.paradyne.com> Go Hotwire!
Richard J. Niziak <rniziak@harvard.net>
Rasana Atreya <rasana_atreya@hotmail.com>
Jaime Hourihane <jaime.hourihane@allfun.com>
Christopher Rouch <chris.rouch@ubs.com>

- d a n

Systems and Network Admin, Sr.
-------------------------
Norm Thompson Outfitters, Inc.
http://www.normthompson.com
http://www.solutions-catalog.com
http://www.earlywinters.com
-------------------------





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