AIX

To summarize the problem: The "IBM FastT Storage Manager Client v8" shows that our Disk Farm is arranged into 6 logical drives each in a RAID 5 configuration. This software also shows that 5 of the 6 logical drives (from Disk Farm) are in a error state: "Failed Logical Drive - Drive Failure". However none of the hard disks in the Disk Farm have RED LED lights displayed, so we do not think it is a hardware issue. Out of the 42 hard disks in the disk farm, the software is displaying a Yellow X Icon on 10 of these drives. (See the attached PDF to this post for a picture of the GUI)

I powered down the system on Friday completely by turning of the EXP700's FIRST and then turning off the FastT600. When I turned it back on later in the day, I noticed some hard disks had ORANGE LEDs for about 5 minutes before returning to GREEN. I wonder if the Raid 5 logical drives may have been lost because I powered off the EXP700's first then the FastT600? Is there anything we can do to resolve this? I noticed there is an option in the GUI for "Reviving a failed hard disk" but have not tried it yet, since there are 10 that appear to be errored. What do you advise us to do? Can the GUI be used to fix and recovery the other logical drives? What about the AIX server side?


Here is the model/type/serial information of our hardware:

1. Disk Farm
a. FastT600 Total Storage
Type/Model: 1722-60U
Serial: 23A2442

b. EXP700 Total Storage
Type/Model: 1740-1Ru
Serial: 23D1765

c. EXP700 Total Storage
Type/Model: 1740-1Ru
Serial: 23D2162

2. Storage Manager (Windows 2000 Terminal Server SP4, Contains Software: IBM FastT Storage Manager Client v08.33.G5.03)
IBM xSeries 345
Type/Model: 8670-91X
Serial: KP-YLH70

3. DB/Storage Access Server (AIX Version 5, mounts the Disk Array SAN)
a. IBM pSeries 650
Type/Model: 7038-6M2
Serial: 10-C268F

b. IBM pSeries 650
Type/Model: 7038-6M2
Serial: 10-B80BF

4. Fiber Switches (directly attached to the pSeries 650 and Disk Farm)
a. IBM Fiber Switch 3534F08
Type/Model:3534-F08
Serial: 1317452

b. IBM Fiber Switch 3534F08
Type/Model:3534-F08
Serial: 1317743

Each EXP700 is a storage disk shelf containing 14 disk drives. The FastT600 is the storage head unit which also contains disk drives. The FastT600 is connected to the EXP700 disk shelves via fiber optic cable and provides access to the disks in all three devices. For simplicity, we will call these three devices the Disk Farm from now on. The Disk Farm has a total of 42 physical hard drives.

The storage manager runs the "IBM FastT Storage Manager Client v8" software that is showing the status of our Disk Farm (Attached to this email). It also allows us to control how the Disk Farm groups the physical drives into logical drives for presentation to external servers (such as our DB/Storage Access Servers).

The DB/Storage Access Servers mount the logical drives on the Disk Farm. Some of the logical drives are used for storing DB2 files, others are simple file systems. It is dual-path connected to the Disk Farm via 2 separate IBM Fiber Switches.


- I was not able to attach the PDF with the GUI picture of the Storage Manager Client, and the errpt logs of the AIX servers because these forums dont support pdf.

Oh well, Any help you can offer us is greatly appreciated!
-Bill

The attachment is available from:
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/fo...0&%20Errpt.pdf