Summary: Using CLARiiON Disks in a T3

Good morning all..

First and foremost, a VERY Large thank you to all those that responded. to my
question below. Especially to Scott Mickey who came up with the correct
solution.

Not to be outdone by the programmer of ' scsiinfo ' John DiMarco


Here is Scott's response and my original email.   This worked absolutely
flawlessly. Although it may be a bit tedious, the outcome is phenominal.

SUMMARY :--------------------------------
Hello Glenn,

I recently purchased several used Seagate ST118273FC 18GB
hard disks for use in a Sun A5100.  These came from a
Clariion disk array setup specifically for use with SGI
computers.  Here is how I got them working in the A5100:

Short version:
1. Format once, selecting drive type "0. Auto configure".
2. Update /etc/format.dat using scsiinfo program.
3. Format again, selecting drive type added to format.dat.
4. boot -r
5. format command will now be able to label the disk.

Full detail:
For each disk, Sun's format will show:
  2. c1t6d0 <drive type unknown>
"<drive type unknown>" means Solaris sees the physical
disk, but cannot interpret it's logical setup.

First, get John DiMarco's excellent scsiinfo program for
Sun machines:
ftp://ftp.cs.toronto.edu/pub/jdd/

# ./scsiinfo-4.7-sunos5.8-32bit -o -F /dev/rdsk/c1t6d0s0
./scsiinfo-4.7-sunos5.8-32bit: Drive is formatted with
with sector size 520, should be 512

So the disk's sector size is wrong for Solaris.
SGI's IRIX operating system uses a 520 byte block size
on disks, so this is no surprise.
Back to the Sun format command:
The trick is to select disk type "0. Auto configure"
and answer y (yes) when it asks if it should reformat
device to 512-byte blocksize.  -If it doesn't ask to
reformat to 512-byte blocksize, you are stuck and
probably can't use the disk unless you can find
another program to do the job.  I don't know of any
such program at this time.

AVAILABLE DRIVE TYPES:
        0. Auto configure
        ...
        18. SUN4.2G
        19. other
Specify disk type (enter its number): 0
Must reformat device to 512-byte blocksize.  Continue? y
Formatting...

If Solaris format can "talk" to the disk, it will be
busy for quite awhile as it reformats the disk.  No
indication of progress will be printed on the screen.
You have to look at the blinking disk light to see
activity.  No verify will be done by format at this
time.  -Verify writes a pattern of bytes to the disk,
then reads them to see that the disk retained the data.

After it finishes, exit the format command and run
scsiinfo again:

# ./scsiinfo-4.7-sunos5.8-32bit -r /dev/rdsk/c5t3d0s2
Vendor:                      SEAGATE
Model:                       ST118273 CLAR18
Revision:                    SG0C
Serial:                      LP480760 SGI
Device Type:                 Disk
Data Transfer Width(s):      8
Supported Features:          LINK_CMD TAG_QUEUE
Formatted Capacity:          35291613 sectors (17.6 GB)
Sector size:                 512 bytes
Physical Cylinders:          7501
Heads:                       20
Sectors per track (Avg.):    237
Tracks per zone:             13440
Alternate Sectors per zone:  0
Alternate Tracks per volume: 0
Rotational speed:            7177 rpm
Cache:                       Read-Only

Note sector size = 512 now, not 520, so we are half
way to our goal.  scsiinfo has an option to create
data that can be added to the Solaris config file
/etc/format.dat:

# ./scsiinfo-4.7-sunos5.8-32bit -o -F /dev/rdsk/c1t6d0s0
disk_type = "SEAGATE ST118273 CLAR18" \
        : ctlr = SCSI : fmt_time = 36 \
        : trks_zone = 13440 : atrks = 0  : asect = 0  \
        : ncyl = 7443 : acyl = 2 : pcyl = 7501 : nhead = 20 : nsect = 237 \
        : rpm = 7177 : bpt = 139356

partition = "SEAGATE ST118273 CLAR18" \
        : disk = "SEAGATE ST118273 CLAR18" : ctlr = SCSI \
        : 2 = 0, 35279820


I changed the string "SEAGATE ST118273 CLAR18" to
"SUN18G" to match Sun's typical disk labels, and
added additional partition info to the partition table.
The following text was added to my /etc/format.dat:

#
# Seagate ST118273FC from SGI-Clariion array, named "SUN18G".
# Data from John DiMarco's scsiinfo program.
#
disk_type = "SUN18G" \
	: ctlr = SCSI : fmt_time = 36 \
	: trks_zone = 13440 : atrks = 0  : asect = 0  \
	: ncyl = 7443 : acyl = 2 : pcyl = 7501 : nhead = 20 : nsect = 237 \
	: rpm = 7177 : bpt = 139356
#
# SUN18G partition table leaves first 16 and last 16 cylinders unallocated.
16cyl = 37MB.
partition = "SUN18G" \
	: disk = "SUN18G" : ctlr = SCSI \
	: 0 =  unassigned, wm, 0,0 \
	: 1 =  unassigned, wm, 0,0 \
	: 2 =  0, 35279820 \
	: 3 =  unassigned, wm, 0,0 \
	: 4 =  unassigned, wm, 0,0 \
	: 5 =  unassigned, wm, 0,0 \
	: 6 =  usr, wm, 16, 35128140 \
	: 7 =  unassigned, wm, 0, 0
#


Now back to the format command again, this time do not
select disk type "0. Auto configure", but instead
select disk "SUN18G" which format is getting from
/etc/format.dat.  (Your disks will be SUN36G, of
course).  Format the disk again.  This time it will
verify the disk (2 passes) after the format is
complete.  This will take a lot of time.  You would
expect to be able to label the disk now, but this
is not the case.  Label will fail.  Exiting the
format command and restarting it will not help.

Formatting...
  98% complete (00:00:58 remaining) done
Warning: error writing VTOC.

Verifying media...
        pass 0 - pattern = 0xc6dec6de
   7442/19/165

        pass 1 - pattern = 0x6db6db6d
   7442/19/165

Warning: error writing VTOC.
Total of 0 defective blocks repaired.

...

partition> label
Ready to label disk, continue? y

Warning: error writing VTOC.
Label failed.

The trick now is to reboot the machine.  boot -r
will rescan the disks and Solaris will now see the
disks correctly.  If you cannot reboot, perhaps
# drvconfig; disks
would work OK also, but I did not try this myself.
Run the format command yet again, select the disk
type you added to format.dat, check the partition
table, label, and the disk should finally receive
the label successfully (no error messages).

I did not update the firmware on the disks using
Sun's Firmware Download Utility because the disks
are working.

Good luck with your 36G disks.

Scott Mickey


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: CLARiiON Fibre Disks
Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 11:27:20 -0400
From: "Glenn, May (COMFIN, VFS, Consultant)" <may.glenn@gecapital.com>
To: <sunmanagers@sunmanagers.org>

Good morning managers...

OK, Here is one to rack your brains with..


I have in my possession a number of Seagate ST136403FC disks that are set-up
for a CLARiiON disk array. The CLARiiON number is 118030145-01.

I would like to use these disks inside of a T3 chassis.

Here is the problem. The disks are set with a CLARiiON firmware, and for a
520kbit block. Since Sun is looking for a 512 block, the disks are failing to
format. I have tried wiping them inside of the T3, no good. I put them inside
of an A5000 and looked at them. I am unable to format them, even low level.
When I try doing a firmware download to them, the download software will not
recognize the disks.

I have also tried running a VTOC on the disks to clear out any holding
sectors. Nothing.


According to Seagate, these are the exact same disks as used with the T3,
simply have the other firmware on them.


Does anyone out there know what I can do to re-configure these drives for
512k
blocks and use them in a T3?



Thanks in advance for all of your help.


Glenn May
END OF SUMMARY :-----------------------------------------------------

Thanks again to all who responded..
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