Power5 Firmware

Applies to: OpenPower, i5 and p5 Servers and IntelliStation 285

This document provides information about the installation of Licensed Machine or Licensed Internal Code, which is sometimes referred to generically as microcode or firmware.


Contents


1.0 Systems Affected

This package provides new firmware for OpenPower, i5 and p5 Servers, System i, System p and IntelliStation 285.

The firmware level in this package is:

If your system is already at Firmware level SF240_382, SF240_390 (Supplemental fix only), SF240_403 or SF240_415 then install this System Firmware level SF240_417 concurrently.
If you are not at SF240_382, SF240_390 (Supplemental fix only), SF240_403 or SF240_415, then installation of this Service pack is Disruptive.

For models 9119-590, 9119-595 and 9406-595
Refer to Section 2.3 Planning Information,  paragraph "Model 590 and 595 Recommendations" for more information.


2.0 Cautions and Planning Information

2.1 Read me first

Using HMC V7.3.4 when the user is electing to install only I/O microcode

The problem described below was  fixed on 8/20/09 with HMC  MH01186 (HMC V7 R3.4.0 SP3).

A problem has been identified with HMC V7.3.4 where unchecking the "Managed System and Power LIC" check box during the "Change Licensed Internal Code Wizard" will not stop the managed system and power code from getting installed when the user is electing to install only I/O microcode. If the repository selected contains system firmware that can be installed concurrently, the system will remain operational but if the system firmware is a disruptive update, it will be installed disruptively. This will be fixed in a future PTF.

Workaround: Utilize the operating system capability of installing I/O microcode.

All HMC-Managed Power5 systems

For System i servers with Server Firmware Update Policy set to Operating Systems, PTF MH01085 was built with an invalid product load ID. This was corrected with PTF MH01144 which was released on Oct 31, 2008. PTF MH01144 also changed the System Firmware level description (marker lid) to SF240_362. When the PTF was released it was also inadvertently made available to all systems that use the HMC option "Retrieve from IBM Support System".

Recommended Action:
If your system has the SF240_358 level installed, there is no need to install the SF240_362 level. (Both levels are identical.)

If your system has the SF240_362 level installed, there is no need to install the SF240_358 level. (Both levels are identical.)
 

HMC-Managed Systems

Product Engineering recommends installing HMC V7 R3.5.0 (Service Pack 4 PTF MH01277 (or higher) or V7 R7.3.0 Service Pack 2 PTF MH01279 (or higher) prior to installing this firmware level SF240_417 on the server(s).

Note:  For model 560 and model 570 systems, this firmware level provides an ehnancement to improve the reporting of power supply fan failures.  These failures will be identified via the new System Reference codes (listed below).  The SRC definitions can be reviewed at http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/powersys/v3r1m5/index.jsp?topic=/ipha6_p5/x1xxx.htm

New SRC codes for model 560 and 570 systems
Power Supply E1
Power Supply E2
Comments
New SRC for "predictive" fan fault
1100151E
1100152E
The power supply fan at location Un-E1 / Un-E2 stopped temporarily but recovered. Replace the power supply as soon as possible before the fan fails permanently.
New SRC for hard fan fault
1100151F
1100152F
The power supply fan at location Un-E1 / Un-E2 failed. Replace the power supply as soon as possible.

 Note: Only systems with firmware levels SF240_299 and above will support HMC V7.

System in Half Genesis Mode

Systems Affected:

9117-570, 9406-570, 9119-590, 9119-595 and 9406-595 systems, running system firmware release level SF235 or SF240 that was installed when the system was manufactured, and that have the redundant service processor feature installed and enabled.

Problem Description:

On the affected systems, prior to performing a concurrent firmware update or disabling service processor redundancy during runtime, see if the system is in half genesis mode.  Half Genesis mode means that only one of the two service processors has successfully booted the system and verified all its connections.

Product Engineering strongly recommends the installation HMC code V6R1.3 or V7R3.3 (or higher) prior to the installation of system firmware. When installing system firmware using an HMC at these levels, the HMC will automatically check for this condition prior to code load (via System Readiness Check).

Procedure to check if system is in half genesis mode via the HMC:
If half genesis mode is detected by the System Readiness Check, then the following message will be displayed to the user:

   HSCF0152E Service processor on <managed system> is in half-genesis condition.
   Licensed Internal Code update will cause loss of service processor redundancy.
   The system must be powered off and a service processor failover must be initiated
   before updating Licensed Internal Code.

For information about the recovery procedure if the system is in half genesis mode, call you next level of support.

2.2  Cautions

Downgrading firmware from any given release level to an earlier release level is not recommended.
If you feel that it is necessary to downgrade the firmware on your system to an earlier release level, please contact your next level of support.

Determining whether your p5+ Server requires the installation of AIX 5.3 TL05 prior to SF240 firmware upgrade

This information is being included to provide important information regarding a specific problem (described below) that may occur on p5+ servers under certain circumstances. If the Feature Code/CCIN  of the server you are installing this firmware on is not included in the table below, this information should be disregarded.

If the firmware is to be installed on a Power5+ server with one of the  Feature Code/CCIN's defined in the table, it is possible that AIX 5.3 TL05 may need to be installed prior to upgrading firmware to the SF240 release level.

To establish whether or not the server planned for the firmware upgrade will require AIX 5.3 TL05, determine whether the server meets the three conditions listed below:

    1) Is AIX 5.3 TL 5300-04 installed?   (oslevel -r)
    2) Is the kernel  64-bit?  (bootinfo -K)
    3) Is the bos.mp64 fileset lower than 5.3.0.41?  (lslpp -L bos.mp64)

If the answers to all these questions are yes, you must install TL05 (or higher) for AIX 5.3 before installing SF240 firmware.

If the above three conditions are met, and AIX 5.3 TL05 (or higher) is not installed, when AIX  enables 64KB pages after the firmware is updated to SF240_201 or higher, it may cause the system to crash with a DSI_PROC error.

If the above three conditions do not exist on the server, AIX 5.3 TL05 does not need to be installed prior to upgrading to the SF240 firmware.

The CCINs (Customer Card ID Number) of the processors, or system boards in the case of systems with integrated processors, can be view by looking at the output of the " lscfg"  command.
 
Power 5+ systems
Machine type-Model Processor Feature Codes (FC), CCIN
9110-51A All
9111-285  All
9115-505 FC  8289,  CCIN  53B1 
FC  7679,  CCIN  53B2 
FC  8290,  CCIN  53B3 
FC  8288,  CCIN  53B0
9116-561 All
9117-570 FC  7782,  CCIN  7782 and 53C8 
FC  8338,  CCIN  8338 and 53C9
9118-575 FC  7675,  CCIN  260F and 53CB 
FC  7676,  CCIN  260E and 53CC
9119-590 FC  8967,  CCIN  53BD
9119-595 FC  8968,  CCIN  53BE 
FC  8970,  CCIN  53BD
9131-52A All
9133-55A All

Systems at Firmware Level SF230_120 or SF230_126

If your system is HMC-managed, and is currently at system firmware level SF230_120 or SF230_126, you may see a failure on upgrades to this SF240 service pack. The failure is due to a timing condition in the SF230_120 and SF230_126 firmware  (look for an error log entry with SRC B181873C). If this problem is the cause for your failure, it is recommended you update to SF230_145 or a higher SF230 service pack prior to performing the upgrade to this SF240 service pack.  The update from SF230_120 or SF230_126 to a higher SF230 level can be done concurrently.

To obtain the latest level of the SF230 firmware, go to: http://www14.software.ibm.com/webapp/set2/firmware/lgjsn  Select your machine-type-model and scroll down to find the SF230 firmware.

Special Instructions for Models 9117-570, 9116-561 and 9406-570

Model 9117-570, 9116-561 and 9406-570 systems with any level of SF240 installed must be checked for GARDed out nodes, processors and memory before applying a new level of SF240 firmware.  Following are instructions to determine if any nodes, processors or memory is GARDed out.  If any hardware resource are found to be GARDed, contact your next level of support and have the situation corrected before applying this service pack.
  1. Log on to ASM as "admin".
  2. Click on the "Expand all menus" link to make all options visible.
  3. Navigate down to the options under "System Configuration" followed by "Hardware Deconfiguration".
  4. Click on the link "Processor Deconfiguration" to bring up the page that shows the number of processors present and whether or not they are configured.
  5. Click on the link "Memory Deconfiguration" to bring up the page that shows the total amount of memory present and if any is presently deconfigured.
  6. Click on the link "Processing unit Deconfiguration" to bring up the page that shows the processing units in the system and if any is presently deconfigured.
  7. Log off.

Installing System Firmware using a CD

Note:  When attempting to install system firmware from CD media you may receive an HMC error approximately 10 seconds after starting the installation. Here are probable causes for this problem:

Memory Considerations for Firmware Upgrades

The increase in memory used by the firmware is due to the additional functionality in later firmware releases.

2.3 Planning Information

Processor MES/FRUs that require minimum firmware level be installed on the system before MES/FRU installation

The SF240_258 or higher firmware level must be installed on the system, prior to installing an MES processor upgrade or FRU, that has this new combination of  processor feature code and custom card ID number (CCIN).
 
Machine Type-Model Processor Feature Code CCIN
9405/9406-520  8325 53C2
9405/9406-520   8327 53C3
9406-520 8330 53C4
9116-561 7781 53C7
9117-570, 9406-570 8338 53C9
9117-570 7782 53C8

For more information see the INFO APAR II14188 at:
http://www-912.ibm.com/n_dir/nas4apar.nsf/51d11a683a56a5cc862564c000763b23/bbc6f3511f2fb35f86257194004afa65?OpenDocument

The SF240_284 or higher firmware level must be installed on the following systems, prior to installing an MES processor upgrade or FRU, that has this new combination of  processor feature code and custom card ID number (CCIN).
 
Machine Type-Model Processor Feature Code CCIN
9118-575 7675 260F
9118-575 7676 260E

The SF240_299 or higher firmware level must be installed on the following systems, prior to installing an MES processor upgrade or FRU, that has this new combination of  processor feature code and custom card ID number (CCIN).
 
Machine Type-Model Processor Feature Code CCIN
9407-515 8327 53C3
9407-515 8330 53C4
9406-525 8330 53C4

Power5 Code Matrix

For information regarding HMC code and server firmware levels for the latest Power5 release see  http://www14.software.ibm.com/webapp/set2/sas/f/power5cm/home.html.

For information on supported code combinations see http://www14.software.ibm.com/webapp/set2/sas/f/power5cm/supportedcode.html.

IBM Prerequisite Website

For help in determining firmware and operation system prerequisites for features you currently have or are planning to add to your system, please visit the IBM Prerequisite website at:  http://www-912.ibm.com/e_dir/eserverprereq.nsf and click on the Hardware tab.

HMC-Managed Systems

For information concerning HMC releases and to access the HMC code packages, go to the following URL :  http://www14.software.ibm.com/webapp/set2/sas/f/hmcl/home.html

NOTE:   You must be logged in as hscroot in order for the firmware installation to complete correctly.

Attention:  Before installing firmware on an HMC-managed system:

If you connect to the Microcode Download web site via the HMC to obtain system firmware, the HMC will retrieve the latest Release Level.  It is important to be aware of the level of firmware that the HMC is retrieving from the web.

Model 590 and 595 Recommendations

59x Upgrade Path Reference Table

 
59x Upgrade Path Reference Table
From Level To Level Mechanism
SF230_xxx SF235_xxx Not supported
SF230_xxx SF240_xxx Order ECA815 and an IBM SSR will perform the upgrade (as required)
SF235_xxx SF240_xxx 9119 -59x Systems - Order ECA834 and an IBM SSR will perform the upgrade (mandatory)
SF235_xxx SF240_xxx 9406-595 Systems - Customer upgradeable or order ECA834 and an IBM SSR will perform the upgrade (as required)

Systems at Release Level SF240:

Customers with model 59x servers at firmware levels at or below SF240_299,  who would like to update their firmware to SF240_320 or higher can either perform the firmware upgrade themselves, or they can call 1-800-IBM SERV and request ECA839.  IBM will dispatch a Service Representative to complete this update for you.


3.0 Firmware Information and Description

IBM introduced the Concurrent Firmware Maintenance (CFM) function on p5 systems in system firmware level SF230_126_120, which was released on June 16, 2005.  This function supports nondisruptive system firmware service packs to be applied to the system concurrently (without requiring an IPL to activate changes).

For systems that are not managed by an HMC, the installation of system firmware is always disruptive.

Note:  The concurrent levels of system firmware may, on occasion, contain fixes that are known as deferred. These deferred fixes can be installed concurrently, but will not be activated until the next IPL.  Deferred fixes, if any, will be identified in the "Firmware Update Descriptions" table of this document.  For deferred fixes within a service pack, only the fixes in the service pack which cannot be concurrently activated are deferred.

Use the following example as a reference to determine whether your installation will be concurrent or disruptive.

Note:  The file names and service pack levels used in the following examples are for clarification only, and are not
             necessarily levels that have been, or will be released.

System firmware file naming convention:

     01SFXXX_YYY_ZZZ

NOTE:  Values of service pack and last disruptive service pack  level (YYY and ZZZ) are only unique within
a release level (XXX).  For example, 01SF235_250_120 and 01SF240_250_200 are different service packs.

An installation is disruptive if:

              Example:  Currently installed release is SF225, new release is SF230                Example:  SF230_120_120 is disruptive, no matter what level of SF230 is currently
                                   installed on the system                  Example:  Currently installed service pack is SF230_120_120 and
                                     new service pack is SF230_152_130

An installation is concurrent if:

              Example: Currently installed service pack  is SF230_126_120,
                                 new service pack is SF230_143_120.
 

Firmware Information and Update Description

NOTE:  For update descriptions of previously released firmware see Section 7.0  Firmware History.

 
Filename Size Checksum
01SF240_417_382.rpm 14429256 39569

Note: The Checksum can be found by running the AIX sum command against the rpm file (only the first 5 digits are listed).
ie: sum 01SF240_417_382.rpm
 
SF240
SF240_417_382
02/02/12
Impact:  Useability          Severity:  Attention

System firmware changes that affect certain systems:
  • A problem was fixed that may cause certain terminal interfaces to stop functioning after the installation of system firmware SF240_415.  On stand-alone servers (those that are not managed by a Hardware Management Console (HMC)), the system port serial interfaces may be disabled, with SRC BA201002 being logged.  On HMC-managed system, a partition management virtual terminal (vterm) or 5250 console may not display anything.  IBM Product Engineering strongly recommends installing SF240_417 on all systems with SF240_415 installed.
  • A problem was fixed that caused an address resolution protocol (ARP) reply request to fail if the client was performing a ping at the same time.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the partition firmware (PFW) to crash if a file with a name longer than 63 characters was transferred using the trivial file transfer protocol (TFTP) during a network installation manager (NIM) installation.  This problem was seen during the installation of Red Hat Linux.


4.0 How to Determine Currently Installed Firmware Levels

Instructions for determining the current level of firmware can be found at:
http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/systems/scope/hw/topic/ipha5_p5/viewexistlevel.htm

5.0 Downloading the Firmware Package

Follow the instructions on the web page. You must read and agree to the license agreement to obtain the firmware packages.

Note: If your HMC is not internet-connected you will need to download the new firmware level to a CD-ROM or ftp server.


6.0 Installing the Firmware

The method used to install new firmware will depend on the release level of firmware which is currently installed on your server. The release level can be determined by the prefix of the new firmware's filename.

Example: SFXXX_YYY_ZZZ

Where XXX =  release level

Instructions for installing firmware updates and upgrades can be found at
http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/systems/scope/hw/index.jsp?topic=/ipha5_p5/ipha5_applying_fixes.htm

Choose the options that match your server setup, and follow the instructions provided.

Note: For systems without an HMC, the update and upgrade procedure is the same.


7.0 Firmware History

 
SF240
SF240_415_382
11/28/11
Impact:  Availability       Severity:  ATT

System firmware changes that affect certain systems
  • A problem was fixed that caused a slow memory leak, which eventually lead to a reset/reload of the service processor, generation of a service processor dump, and SRC B1817201 being logged.
  • On systems with virtual I/O devices configured, a problem was fixed that caused a DLPAR (dynamic logical partitioning) operation on memory to fail.
  • On systems running shared processor partitions, a problem was fixed that caused a partition to hang until powered off and back on.
  • On systems with external I/O drawers, the firmware was enhanced such that SRCs 10001B02 and 1000911C place a call home.
  • On systems with two HMCs attached, a problem was fixed that caused one of the HMCs to frequently go to an incomplete state.
SF240_403_382 09/07/10 Impact:  Availability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

System firmware changes that affect all systems:

  • A problem was fixed that caused the System Management Services (SMS) firmware to fail to respond to an address request protocol (ARP)  request during the ping test.
System firmware changes that affect certain systems:
  • HIPER: On model 560 and model 570 systems, the firmware has been enhanced to improve reporting of power supply fan problems, which reduces the potential of a unplanned system outage.
  • On model 570 systems with 3 or 4 processor drawers, this service pack fixes a problem that prevented the power supply fan speed in these drawers from adjusting to changes in the ambient temperature.
  • On systems that are not managed by an HMC, problem was fixed that sometimes prevented the advanced system management interface (ASMI) from being viewable on the serial ports of the service processor after a reboot.
  • On systems or partitions loading Red Hat Linux, a problem was fixed in the System Management Services (SMS) firmware that caused the TFTP transfer of a file with a name longer than 63 characters to fail.
SF240_390_382 09/02/09 Impact:  Useability          Severity:  Attention

This level was made available via the Supplemental Firmware website ONLY. 

System firmware changes that affect all systems:
  • A problem was fixed that could cause an HMC VTERM, or System Port-attached ASCII terminal, to stop responding after an application output a large number of characters in a short period of time.
SF240_382_382 05/20/09 Impact:  Serviceability          Severity:  Special Attention

This level is a disruptive update from any SF240_xxx firmware level.   The system should be powered off before installing this level of system firmware.  If this level is installed when the system is running, the CECs will be rebooted, causing all partitions to be terminated, and a reboot will be required.

ATTENTION: Systems at Firmware Level SF240_371_201:

On model 560 and model 570 systems Product Engineering recommends system firmware level SF240_371_201 only be updated to SF240_403_382, or later, bypassing an update to SF240_382_382. While SF240_382_382 is a fully supported and reliable release, an update from SF240_371_201 to SF240_382_382 would result in removal of a HIPER fix from your server. Updating from SF240_371_201 to SF240_403_382 will retain the HIPER fix, along with including additional fixes available in the later release.

Fixes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  • A problem was fixed that caused the detailed data at the end of an "early power off warning type 5" AIX error log entry to be filled with invalid data instead of zeros.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented I/O slots in an I/O tower from becoming operational when bus numbers changed. 
  • A problem was fixed that prevented some types of service processor error log entries from being seen on an ASCII terminal, even though they could be seen when viewing the service processor error log using the web interface.
Fixes that affect certain p5 and i5 systems:
  • On model 570, 590, and 595 systems, the firmware was enhanced so that SRCs B1xxE676, B1xxE678, B1xxE679, B1xxE67A, B1xxE67B,  B1xxE67C and B1xxE67D are not erroneously logged.
  • On model 570 systems, the firmware was enhanced to better isolate the failing field replaceable unit (FRU) when there was a clock problem in a multi-drawer system.
  • For systems in an Opticonnect cluster, a problem was fixed that caused a system to crash with SRC B170E540 when partitions were booted on another system in the same HSL Opticonnect cluster.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented I/O adapters from functioning if an existing I/O drawer or tower was replaced by an I/O drawer or tower that was not the same model.
  • On model 505, 510, and 51A systems, a problem was fixed that prevented DVDs and CDs from being read by the media drive in certain systems.
  • On systems in a high-availability/concurrent multiprocessing (HACMP) configuration, a problem was fixed that caused a misleading error to be logged when the device given the "disk" alias in the system management services (SMS) had a reservation conflict due to the HACMP set up.
  • On systems on which the on-line reserve processor request was being made, a problem was fixed that caused the balance of a current 24 hour entitlement block to be lost when the number of reserve processors was changed while a reserve processor was being charged for.  This change also implemented an enhancement to the firmware such that the number of invalid attempts to enter a capacity on demand (CoD) key is logged in the extended error log data for SRC A7004700.
  • On systems running IBM i partitions that were using shared processor pools, a problem was fixed that caused the partition to crash.
SF240_371_201 09/07/10 Impact:  Availability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

System firmware changes that affect certain systems:
  • HIPER:  On model 560 and model 570 systems, the firmware has been enhanced to improve reporting of power supply fan problems, which reduces the potential of a unplanned system outage.
  • On model 570 systems with 3 or 4 processor drawers, this service pack fixes a problem that prevented the power supply fan speed in these drawers from adjusting to changes in the ambient temperature.
  •  For systems in an Opticonnect cluster, a problem was fixed that caused a system to crash with SRC B170E540 when partitions were booted on another system in the same HSL Opticonnect cluster.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented some types of service processor error log entries from being seen on an ASCII terminal, even though they could be seen when viewing the service processor error log using the web interface.
SF240_370_201 11/21/08 Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Attention 

 This level was made available via the Supplemental Firmware website ONLY.

New features/functions: 

  • Tools update to allow the DDR2 memory to be migrated to Power 595 (9119-FHA) from p590 (9119-590), p595 (9119-595) and i595 (9406-595). 
SF240_358_201

10/01/08 

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

Fixes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  • HIPER: A problem was fixed that caused large numbers of enhanced error handling (EEH) errors to be logged against the 4-port gigabit Ethernet adapter, F/C 5740, under certain circumstances.
  • DEFERRED:  A problem was fixed that, under certain rarely occurring circumstances, an application could cause a processor to go into an error state, and the system to crash.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B7006971 to be erroneously logged during dynamic LPAR (DLPAR) operations on memory.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B150D133 to be erroneously logged immediately after a B1xxE500 SRC.
  • A problem was fixed the prevented certain USB "traveling" keyboards from being configured by partition firmware.  This made the keyboards unusable when accessing the system management services (SMS) menus.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the boot list in the system management services (SMS) menus from being set by the operating system. 
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a logical partition from being created under certain rare circumstances.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the platform's time-of-day clock to be reset to 1970 if, when the hypervisor was booting, a communication failure occurred between the hypervisor and the service processor.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the hypervisor to require a reboot if a service processor error log with an invalid section size was received.
  • A problem was fixed that caused /tmp on the service processor to get filled up.  This caused SRCs B1814005, B1818504, and B1818A0D to be logged. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused an out-of-memory condition to occur on the service processor, and SRC B1551360 to be logged. 
Fixes that affect certain p5 and i5 systems:
  • HIPER:  On model 575 and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that could cause the service processor in the system and the service processor in the bulk power controller (BPC) to have duplicate IP addresses.  This caused the HMC to lose communication with the service processor in the system, and the system to crash.
  • In systems with clustered processors, various problems were fixed in the InfiniBand interconnection networks.
  • In networks using a time server, a problem was fixed that, under certain rare circumstances, caused the time-of-day clock on a client system to be reset to 1969 if the client system lost power.
  • On systems with redundant service processors, problems were fixed that caused the system to crash with SRC B181E692 when the sibling service processors lost their communication link.
  • On systems with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused a slow memory leak, which eventually leads to a reset/reload of the primary service processor.
  • The firmware was enhanced to improve the failure isolation and FRU callout when certain hardware failures that call out the clock card occurred.
  • On model 575 and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that could cause the service processor in the system and the service processor in the bulk power controller (BPC) to have duplicate IP addresses.  This caused the HMC to lose communication with the service processor in the system, and the system to crash.
  • On systems and partitions running Linux, a problem was fixed that prevented certain types of I/O adapter (IOA) errors from being detected.  When these errors were not detected, the appropriate enhanced error handling (EEH) errors were not generated.
  • On i5 partitions using IOP-based I/O adapters which are configured to use i5 clustering (SAN), a problem was fixed that caused the failover of an I/O drawer or tower, to a system which previously owned the drawer or tower, to fail.

  • On systems which are configured for i5 clustering (SAN), a problem was fixed that prevented unassigned hardware from being configured. 
SF240_338_201

01/28/08 

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.
 

System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  •  HIPER:  A problem was fixed that, under some circumstances during DLPAR (dynamic LPAR) operations or partition boot of a PCI adapter, caused another PCI adapter that shared the same bus (but was not necessarily in the same partition) to enter the freeze state and adapters on the same bus would become Defined.  When this problem occurred, SRCs were logged that indicated a problem with an adapter or bus (BxxxA6D9, BA180008, BA180009, and/or BA180010 for example). 
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused platform system dumps to be incomplete in firmware level SF240_332.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a system firmware installation to fail with SRC B1813028.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to intermittently fail to configure devices attached to the integrated USB port when booting.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems:
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused some functions that perform hardware operations during runtime to generate temporary extended error handling (EEH) errors.  This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330. 
    • p5:  9110-51A, 9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A.
Firmware fixes that affect systems not managed by an HMC and running AIX:
  • A problem was fixed that caused the time-of-day clock to reset to December 1969 or January 1970 after a power loss.
SF240_332_201

09/21/07

Impact:  Availability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

Additional features and functions:

  • Support was added for certain traveling keyboards.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused a system to crash with SRC B182E500 if a virtual adapter was configured with a virtual slot number that was a multiple of 512.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the reboot to fail, after the installation of Linux, if too many command-line parameters were entered.  SRC BA210012 sometimes occurred in this scenario, depending on the number of command-line parameters.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed in open firmware that caused a Linux kernel fault because a list pointer was corrupted during boot.
  • A problem was fixed that could cause the system to boot slowly, or hang, before the operating system got started.  If this occurred, the service processor might have rebooted or generated a dump. 
  • A problem was fixed that might have caused PCI I/O adapters on a bus to fail after several successive concurrent slot maintenance operations were performed on other PCI I/O adapters on that PCI bus.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a partition to fail to boot with SRC B2001230 (with word 13 = 000000BF and word 14 = 00000002) after the DLPAR removal of a PCI I/O adapter from that partition.   If a partition has failed to boot with this SRC, the platform must be rebooted after this level of firmware is installed to clear the error condition and allow the partition to boot.
  • The firmware was updated to add the system VPD card and service processor to the Advanced System Management Interface (ASMI) deconfiguration menu under the celogin. 
  • On systems running system firmware SF240, a problem was fixed that caused the system to stop booting and log SRC B1xxB0BF.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the correct FRU callouts from being made when a certain type of L3 cache failure occurred, with SRC B1xxE500 and word 8 being 00100016 or 00100017.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the correct FRU callouts from being made when memory UEs (uncorrectable errors) occurred, with SRC B1819522 (an informational SRC) followed by B170E500.  In this level, SRC B1819522 is followed by SRC B123E500, with the correct FRU callouts for the memory UE.
  • A problem was fixed that might have caused partitions that were sharing processors to hang.
  • A problem was fixed that intermittently prevented a USB keyboard and mouse from being configured during boot.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented an operating system installation from CDs when the CD drive was set up using virtual SCSI (vSCSI).
  • A problem was fixed that prevented enhanced error handling (EEH) from working on systems and partitions running Linux.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented some virtual SCSI (vSCSI) devices from being listed in the SMS boot list menu.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the operating system to crash, or future operating system dumps to fail, when certain adapters (usually FDDI adapters) were hot-plugged.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the operating system to crash after a processor host bus (PHB) was added by a DLPAR operation, followed by a concurrent firmware update.
  • A problem was fixed that caused partition firmware to hang if a USB headset was attached to the system during boot.
  • A problem was fixed that caused partition firmware to crash with SRC BA210000 if an attempt was made to boot from a CD or DVD that is not bootable.
  • A message was added to the "Configure I/O Enclosure" menu on the ASMI (advanced system management interface) asking the user to wait for the operation to be completed, because submitting multiple requests can cause the service processor to crash.
System firmware changes that affect HMC-controlled servers and clustered systems:
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the service processor's /tmp filesystem to became full.  This caused failures with various symptoms, the most common one being system termination.   This problem also could cause a concurrent firmware installation to fail with SRCs B1818A03, B1818A0E, B1818A08 and B1818A05.
  • HIPER:  On models 570, 590 and 595, the firmware was changed so that SRCs B150E678, B150E679, B150E67B, B150E67C, B150E67D, B150E67E and B150E67F have been made informational events; they no longer generate a call home.  In addition, the algorithm that is used to determine when to label SRCs B150E675, B150E676 and B150E67A "serviceable events" has been altered; the threshold is now more than 15 errors on a multiplexer card (also known as a "mux" card) have to be logged in less than 24 hours. 
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused SRC B155B086 to be logged, and a call home to be made, when the service processor was reset when the CEC was powered on.
     Here are the details for each SRC mentioned above:
    • B150E675:  Marked "informational" until the threshold is exceeded, then marked "predictive".
    • B150E676:  Marked "predictive" if the mux in both node 0 (or drawer 0) and node 1 (or drawer 1) fails to ping; informational in all other cases.
    • B150E67A:  Informational until the threshold is exceeded, then marked "predictive, degraded".
    • B150E678, B150E679, B150E67B, B150E67C, B150E67D, B150E67E and  B150E67F:  Informational
  •  On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused redundant service processor failover to be disabled after the concurrent installation of system firmware level SF240_299.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing the HMC to time out when doing a system firmware update, with SRC E302F928 logged.
  • A problem was fixed in the service processor firmware that caused the HMC to appear to be hung when the managed system was powering on.
  • On model 590 and 595 systems with four processor nodes, a problem was fixed that prevented the system from booting when an InfiniBand adapter was installed in slot P5-C13. 
  • On systems running i5/OS, a problem was fixed that caused i5/OS to continue to report a firmware update policy of "OS managed", even though an HMC had been reattached and the firmware update policy changed to "HMC managed".
  • On models 590 and 595, the firmware was changed so that the JMUX is called out first in the FRU list for SRC B1xxF131. 
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the HMC from reestablishing a connection to the managed system's service processor when the network between the two was fixed after a long outage.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HMC to be in the "incomplete" state after a service processor reset/reload.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the HMC from correctly opening a VTERM.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the managed system to crash with SRC B181EF88 being logged, and a service processor dump being generated.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that added approximately 10 minutes to the time it took the system to reboot.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused an unrecoverable error with SRC B1818610 during a firmware installation by the HMC.  This also prevents the new level of firmware from being activated. 
  •  On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the redundancy status panel on the HMC to be blank when the primary service processor had lost communication with the secondary, but the secondary service processor was still able to communicate with the primary.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the system to crash (with SRC B18187E3 being logged) when an administrative failover to the secondary service processor was initiated and Ethernet port 0 on the service processors was not available.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the system to crash (with SRC B1818600 being logged), followed by a service processor failover.
  •  On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the ASMI hardware configuration/deconfiguration menus to display "Invalid" for the state of the secondary service processor. 
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems:
  • On model 55A, 52A, and 285 systems with a graphics adapter, a problem was fixed that caused the system to hang (progress code D200B077 in the control panel) when it rebooted the first time after AIX was installed.
Additional information concerning this service pack: 

In addition to the fixes described above, this service pack also has content intended for newly-manufactured systems, or enhancements to system internal interfaces, which is not required for systems already in production use.   This content will not be activated on systems that install this service pack concurrently.  Even though this content is not required for systems which are already installed and in use, a disruptive installation of this service pack or a re-IPL after installing it will cause this content to become active.  It is not necessary to plan a window to re-IPL the system to activate this content.

SF240_320_201

05/14/07 

Impact:  Availability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.
    System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

    HIPER:  The initialization settings of the memory buffers were changed to eliminate spurious checkstops that were causing system and partition crashes with SRC B124E500 and word 8 = 0095xxxx.

SF240_299_201

04/03/07

Impact:  Availability        Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.
    System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
     
  • HIPER:  On systems using  virtual I/O services (VIOS), a problem was fixed that caused a system checkstop, with SRC B182E500, during a DLPAR memory removal action.
  • HIPER:  On systems using virtual I/O adapters, a problem was fixed that caused physical I/O adapters to be left in an unusable state, and therefore unavailable to the partitions. 
SF240_298_201

03/07/07

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Special Attention 

 New features/functions: 

  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a function was added so that a call home with SRC B181601E is made when the system is booted with failover disabled.  ATTENTION:  On systems with redundant service processors that are being upgraded from an SF235 release level to SF240_298 or higher, SRC B181601E will be posted during the firmware upgrade process.  In this case only, the SRC B181601E can be ignored. 
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 590, and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  • HIPER:  On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused service processor failover to be erroneously disabled after a CEC deconfiguration action. 
  •  HIPER:  On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the system to terminate with SRC B1xx951C after a failover to the secondary service processor.  This problem can also cause the system to terminate with SRC B1xx9523 after a reset/reload of the primary service processor.
  •  A problem was fixed that was causing multiple service processor reset/reload operations with SRC B1817201. 
  • On a partitioned system running i5/OS, a problem was fixed that caused error CPF9E75 ("i5/OS usage limit exceeded - operator action required") to be posted about once an hour, even though the system had a valid number of processor licenses. 
  • The firmware was changed so that HMC surveillance errors with SRC B1xxE433 are logged as informational (without hardware callouts) instead of predictive. 
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused a service processor failover to fail with SRC B181E911.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused platform dump data files to be unavailable from the new primary service processor after a service processor failover.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused SRC B1818A0E to be logged when the system was rebooted after a dump was captured.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the managed system to appear to be hung when viewed from the HMC. 
  • On model 590 and 595 systems,SF240_298 is the minimum firmware level required for FC 4503 CUoD DDR2 memory cards.
System firmware changes that affect systems using HSL Opticonnect:
  • HIPER:  For systems in an Opticonnect cluster with firmware levels prior to SF240_284 installed, a problem was fixed that caused a system to terminate with SRC B182E500.  Unlike the fix provided for this problem in SF240_284, this fix can be concurrently activated. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC 10009118 to be posted erroneously on systems in an Opticonnect cluster.
  • A problem was fixed that caused systems in an Opticonnect cluster to terminate with SRC B700F103 during the reset of an HSL connection.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
  • The firmware was updated to include additional resources on the Advanced System Management Interface (ASMI) deconfiguration menu for the celogin user. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to terminate with SRC B1xx9523 after a reset/reload of the service processor.
  • A problem was fixed that caused incomplete (including lacking the CEC memory data) and corrupted platform dumps to be collected. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused an "I/O slot vary on" operation to fail after a partition power-on, or after a DLPAR operation on that slot.
  • A location code was added to the error log entry when SRC BA188001 is posted. 
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems:
  • On systems running i5/OS, a problem was fixed that caused the copying of a main store dump to fail with the message "data transfer error".
  • On systems that are not managed by an HMC, a problem was fixed that caused the temporary (T) side of the flash to report its level as "unknown", and SRC B181300A to be posted, after an firmware installation from the operating system. 
SF240_284_201

11/30/06 
 

Impact:  Availability         Severity:  Special Attention 

System firmware changes that affect systems using HSL Opticonnect:

  • A problem was fixed that caused a system in an Opticonnect cluster to crash with SRC B182E500 when partitions were activated.
  • A problem was fixed that might have caused partitions running on systems in an Opticonnect loop to become unresponsive.
  • A problem was fixed that might have caused HSL Opticonnect connections between partitions in a cluster (which has three platforms in a common HSL ring) to fail when one of the platforms is rebooted.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented errors on PCI buses (connected by an HSL Opticonnect loop) from being handled properly; unpredictable results occurred in active partitions that were using the failing hardware. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HSL loops to fail, when the loop had switchable towers, and one of the servers on the loop was booted. 
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the hypervisor from correctly moving an IOP-less adapter if an I-ASP failover occurred.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the ownership of the IOP to be out of sync after an I-ASP failover.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the adapters that were not involved in an I-ASP failover to be missing, because they were not fully processed. The symptom depends on the adapters that were not fully processed.
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 590, and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  • HIPER:  On model 575, 590, and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused a memory failure with SRC B123E500 after the concurrent repair of a CEC DCA. 
  •  In a large cluster of systems, a problem was fixed that caused the clustered system manager to receive the same IP address for multiple managed systems - causing no connect or incomplete status to be displayed on the HMC for those managed systems.
  • In a large cluster of systems, a problem was fixed that caused the AIX  DHCP server to assign a new IP address to a service processor, even though the service processor was already using its old (valid) IP address. When this problem occurs, the HMCs start seeing different frames and/or CECs in the list of managed systems from the ones they normally see.
  • On model 590 and 595 systems, this firmware level fixes a problem that prevented capacity upgrade on demand (CUoD) DDR2 memory from being activated properly when it was installed in a system that had been running with non-CUoD DDR2 memory.  The problem is usually seen as having less memory activated than expected, possibly not enough to activate a partition.  To correct this problem if it currently exists on the system, after installing this firmware level the system must be rebooted (to recollect the memory configuration data) and new activation code for the CUoD memory have to be entered.  SF240_284 becomes the new minimum firmware level required for FCs 4500, 4501 and 4502 CUoD DDR2 memory cards. 
  • On a partition booting i5/OS, a problem was fixed that prevented the partition from booting if the partition had a large amount of memory (greater than approximately 200 GB) allocated to it. 
  • On systems that are partitioned, a problem was fixed that caused a partition with more than 128 MB of memory, and with a logical memory block (LMB) size of 16 MB, to fail to boot.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a partition with huge pages (with a page size of 16 GB) from completing the power-off process.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented some partitions from being reactivated after a short power outage caused them to be deactivated.
  • A problem was fixed that caused dynamic logical partitioning (DLPAR) operations to fail (with SRC HSCL025A:  "Service processor lock failed.") even though there appeared to be no other activity that would cause them to fail. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused a switchable tower to fail to recover after a tower switch operation.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HMC to go to the incomplete state when utilization data was requested from the managed system.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HMC to erroneously go to the incomplete state with SRC B7000602. 
  • A problem was fixed that was delaying the reporting of some platform errors to the partitions running on the system.
  • A problem was fixed that caused an IOP-less i5/OS partition with a large amount of memory and a small logical memory block (LMB) size to fail to boot.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the enclosure LED from being turned on when the FRU identify LED on one of the components in the enclosure was turned on.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused SRC B181B013 to be erroneously generated when the system firmware was upgraded from SF235_xxx to SF240_xxx.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused a duplicate IP address to be assigned to the eth0 port of the service processors.  This problem is most likely seen at first install of the machine, with an "invalid readiness" connection status shown on the HMC and an SRC B1xx3598 posted n the error log.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused an entry in the service processor error log that erroneously indicated that the secondary service processor had been guarded out.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the secondary service processor to reset/reload after several months of run time (with SRC B1817201), due to an out-of-memory condition.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused SRC B1815008 to be erroneously logged in the secondary service processor's error log.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the wrong service processor to be called out in the error log entry for SRC B7006990.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the connection state to toggle between "Incomplete", "No Connection" and "Already Connected".
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that could have allowed the firmware to initiate a service processor failover, even though the secondary service processor was not ready for the failover.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems:
  • On model 520, 52A, 550 and 55A systems, a problem was fixed that caused the second power supply to be called out as defective if power was applied to it after the system had started to power on.  If this error condition is already present on the system, the power supply will have to be reseated to clear the error.
  • A problem was fixed that would have caused the memory DIMMs to be replaced prematurely if correctable errors start to occur.  This applies to model 561 systems with processor features code 7295 or 7781 installed, and model 570 systems with processor feature code 7782 installed.
  • A problem was fixed that might have caused the wrong memory DIMM to be called out if a memory failure occurs.  This applies to model 561 systems with processor features code 7295 or 7781 installed, and model 570 systems with processor feature code 7782 installed.
  • On model 561 systems, a problem was fixed that caused B181B08E to be erroneously posted during the cold repair of a service processor.  This problem may occur in systems with processor feature code 7295 or 7781 installed.
  • A problem was fixed that might prevent the system from booting to runtime with power SRCs 11008456 and 110015x4, even though the power subsystem was functioning within specifications. 
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to crash with SRC B150D133. A system dump is generated as a result of the problem (SRC B181F03B).
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system or partition to crash when corruption was detected in low memory.
  • HIPER: A problem was fixed that caused I/O paths to be deconfigured after certain types of failures, indicated by SRC B170100A, until no I/O paths were left.  The firmware has been changed so that the I/O paths are no longer deconfigured under these circumstances.
  • DEFERRED:  A change was made to improve the reliability of system memory.  This change reduces the likelihood of SRC B123E500 occurring, and also reduces the likelihood of a system crash.  SRC B1xxF667 could be logged as a result of the outage.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the "ping" command in the system management services (SMS) to fail during a NIM installation.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a large number of B181C00A SRCs to be erroneously posted in the service processor's error log.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the service processor to run out of memory with SRC B1817201 and generate a service processor dump. 
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the service processor's serial ports from being configured to run at 50 baud and 2400 baud.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the protocol menu in the system management services (SMS) menu for virtual LAN adapters from being displayed. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused AIX to incorrectly report errors that occurred during booting and were then passed to the AIX error log.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a beep or bell sound from being heard when an error occurred in an X window.
  • A problem was fixed that erroneously caused a service processor dump when a power-off request was issued before a reboot that was in progress was complete.
  • The firmware was changed so that SRC B1xx3008 will not be reported to the error logs during and after a concurrent firmware update.
  • The firmware was changed so that SRCs B1xxE676, B1xxE678, and B1xxE67A will not be reported during and after a concurrent firmware update unless a threshold is reached.
SF240_261_201

09/26/06

Impact:  Availability         Severity:  Special Attention 

System firmware changes that affect model 575, 590 and 595 systems:

  • On model 590 and 595 systems, additional enhancements were made to the memory timing parameters for systems with feature codes 4500, 4501 and 4502 installed (DDR2 memory cards).
  • On model 575, 590, and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused SRCs 11008720 and 11008721 to be erroneously generated when the HMC was off-line (due to an HMC code update or network problem) for more than 21 minutes.  Bulk power code BP240_197, or a higher level, must also be installed to fully implement this fix. 
SF240_259_201

08/29/06
(Mfg Only)

Impact:  Availability         Severity:  Special Attention 

System firmware changes that affect model 561 and 570 systems:

  • A problem was fixed that caused an erroneous system memory failure with SRC B123E500 on model 561 systems with processor feature code 7781 and model 570 systems with processor feature code 7782.
SF240_258_201

08/18/06 
(Mfg Only)

Impact:  Function         Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

New functions and features:

  • With this service pack, 1 TB segments, and 64 KB and 16 GB large pages, are supported on model 590 and 595 systems. 
  • New processor feature code / CCIN code combination are supported.  Service pack SF240_258_201 provides the minimum firmware support level for these processor feature code/CCIN combinations.
 
Machine Type-Model Processor feature code (FC) / CCIN combination
9110-51A FC 7654 with CCIN 53C0
9405-520, 9406-520  FC 8325 with CCIN 53C2
9405-520, 9406-520, 9111-285 FC 8327 with CCIN 53C3
9131-52A, 9406-520, 9111-285 FC 8330 with CCIN 53C4
9131-52A FC 8323 with CCIN 53C1
9406-550, 9133-55A FC 8312 with CCIN 53C6
9116-561 FC 7781 with CCIN 53C7
9117-570 FC 7782 with CCIN 53C8
9117-570, 9406-570 FC 8338 with CCIN 53C9
9118-575 FC 7675 with CCIN  53CB, FC 7676 with CCIN 53CC
  • New Power 5++ processor feature codes are supported on the following systems:
 
Machine Type-Model Processor feature code (FC)
9110-51A 8282, 8284, 8284
9111-285 5326, 5327
9131-52A 8314, 8315, 8316
9133-55A 8285, 8286

System firmware changes that affect clustered systems using InfiniBand switches:

  •  HIPER: Various fixes and enhancements were made in firmware that supports InfiniBand switches attached to partitions running AIX or Linux.  This set of changes only affects clustered systems using InfiniBand switches.
System firmware changes that affect model 575 systems with DDR2 memory (processor feature codes 7675 and 7676):
  • DEFERRED and HIPER: On model 575 systems with feature codes 7675 and 7676 and DDR2 memory, a problem was fixed that caused a system crash with SRC B1xxE500.  This only affects model 575 systems with processor feature codes 7675 and 7676.
System firmware changes that affect systems with I/O drawers attached through HSL Opticonnect:
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused a partition to terminate during boot with SRC B6000103.  This change only affects systems participating in an HSL Opticonnect cluster environment.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented an HSL Opticonnect loop from reconnecting to one system in the cluster after a system in the Opticonnect cluster was rebooted.
  • A problem was fixed the prevented an HSL Opticonnect loop from initializing correctly for high bandwidth operation. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused partitions to fail to establish a connection with an HSL Opticonnect loop.
System firmware changes that affect all 9131-52A systems, and 9405-520 and 9406-520 systems with processor feature code 8325, 8327, or 8330:
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to crash with SRC B131E500, an I/O hub error.  This affects the following:  all 9131-52A systems, and 9405-520 and 9406-520 systems with processor feature code 8325, 8327, or 8330.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems with Power 5+ processors and DDR2 memory:
  • Enhancements were made to memory timing parameters for systems running DDR2 memory. 
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 590, and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  • A problem was fixed that kept entitled weight from being added to a partition if the logical partition (LPAR) group was changed while the partition was active. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B700F103 to occur if, when adding memory to a partition and the size requested exceeded the maximum amount of memory allocated to the partition, there were already dynamic logical partition (LPAR) changes in progress.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a service processor failover from being completed successfully after the primary service processor experienced a DMA transfer timeout.
  • On model 575, 590, and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused the IPL time to possibly be longer than normal.  If this problem is encountered, the system will complete the IPL but the IPL may be delayed by as much as 40 minutes.  During this delay, a C7004091 SRC with word 7 equal to 00000402 will be displayed.
  • A problem was fixed that caused system dumps to be truncated when more than one HMC was attached to the managed system.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HMC to truncate dumps that were larger than 4 GB.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a platform dump to fail internally in a way that the dump did not terminate the system, and no dump was available.  When this failure occurs, the service processor dump data should be available on the HMC.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused the secondary service processor to be guarded out when the network the service processor was on was set up incorrectly.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a platform dump to fail with SRCs B1xxF141 and B1xxE500, followed by multiple B1xxF511 SRCs, and possibly B1xxF6D3 SRCs.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused the service processor error logs to be overwritten.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that required a reset/reload of the secondary service processor to get it up to standby after an emergency power off (EPO).
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused the secondary service processor to be unresponsive, and the failover to fail, with SRC B113E500.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused SRCs such as 11001D02, 11001D03, and 11001D11 through 11001D18 to be erroneously logged during a failover.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused a platform reboot to fail with SRC B181850E.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that prevented redundancy from being restored after the communication link between the service processors was broken, then re-established.
  • A problem was fixed that caused extraneous B181F000 SRCs to be posted. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused an incomplete FRU list to be generated after an unrecoverable memory error.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B157F22A to be posted and the IPL to be halted after a platform dump.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused platform dumps to be corrupted.
  • A problem was fixed that cause the HMC to report that a dump was incomplete, even though all of the dump data was present.
  • A problem was fixed the prevented a concurrently-added expansion unit from being displayed on the HMC when there were active i5/OS partitions, and expansion units in the inactive state, on the system.
  • A problem was fixed that caused certain operating system commands (such as snap and lsvpd) to hang after a hardware problem flooded the hypervisor with errors.
  • On a system configured with the virtual partition manager (VPM), a problem was fixed that caused the F6 option in the i5/OS service activity log (SAL) to be unavailable when the system attention indicator was on.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system firmware to crash (indicated by "default catch") when booting a partition on a model 590 or 595 system with twelve fully configured 7040-61D I/O drawers.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a partition to boot very slowly, and the system management services (SMS) menu to be displayed incorrectly, on large model 590 and 595 systems with many USB adapters.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused SRC HSCL1400 to be erroneously generated, and the backup service processor to be guarded out, during the cold replacement of one of the service processors.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems:
  • HIPER:  On model 561, 570, 590 and model 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused memory to be deconfigured due to an erroneous memory controller failure, with SRC B121E500 and word 8 = 00EA0035.
  • DEFERRED and HIPER: The hardware initialization settings were changed to reduce the likelihood of a system crash with SRC B114E500 and word 8 = 03010008.   This affects the following systems:
    •  i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330. 
    • p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A.
  • On model 561, 570, 590, and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused the software portion of a dump to be lost, and SRC B150F62A to occur.
  • On model 561, 570 and 575 systems, a problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to collect dump data, and post SRC B1xx1007, after a system crash.
  • On model 505 systems, a problem was fixed the caused the HMC to incorrectly display the location codes of the PCI slots in the managed system. 
System firmware changes that affect model 561 and 570 systems:
  • A problem was fixed that caused system power control network (SPCN) error codes with the format 110015xx and 110016xx to be erroneously generated (against the drawer being serviced) during the replacement of the service processor at standby.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that caused C1001020 to persist in the control (operator) panel after the service processor that's in the same drawer as the operator panel was restored to the configuration and had come up to standby.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a voltage regulation fault that persisted through a service processor reset to result in an erroneous posting of SRC 11001632.
  • A problem was fixed that caused system power control network (SPCN) firmware downloads to expansion drawers to initially fail, with the system retrying the downloads until they were successful.
  • In a system with redundant service processors, a problem was fixed that prevented the IP information from the secondary service processor (that was deconfigured or not working) from being displayed by control (operator) panel function 30.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that was causing the service processor to reboot with SRC B1817201 when dump files were extracted by the HMC.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC BA188002, an EEH error, to be posted during a dynamic memory removal operation or high adapter usage, which resulted in the loss of an I/O adapter.  The partition had to be rebooted to recover the adapter.
  • A problem was fixed that caused platform dumps to be incomplete or missing.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to hang with SRC C700406E when the "reset PCI bus configuration" option was invoked. This option is in the factory configuration menu in the advanced system management interface (ASMI).
  • A problem was fixed that caused the additional error data words with SRC B2001150 to be incomplete.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot with SRC B181F407 if the vital product data (VPD) for a dual in-line memory module (DIMM) was not available.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot with SRC B181B0BF, even though a recoverable error had been logged.
  • A problem was fixed that caused incorrect hardware FRUs to be called out after a power failure.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot using the automatic power on restart function after AC power had been restored.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRCs 11001D11 through 11001D18 to be erroneously generated after a reset was issued from the advanced system management interface (ASMI).
  • A problem was fixed that was causing firmware to fail to boot an AIX or Linux partition (indicated by displaying "default catch") when the firmware console had been changed from one graphics adapter to another.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing the firmware to crash, when booting an AIX or Linux partition, when the boot device in the system management services (SMS) menu was changed to a SAN or SCSI device.
SF240_233_201

06/23/06

Impact:  Function         Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible. 

System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  • A problem was fixed that caused the hardware management console (HMC) to report that a partial platform dump was collected, even though all dump data are present.
  • A problem was fixed that caused platform dumps to be incomplete.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a logical partition to terminate during boot with SRC B6000103.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to hang with SRC C700406E when the "reset PCI bus configuration" option was invoked. This option is in the factory configuration menu item in the advanced system management interface (ASMI).
  • A problem was fixed that caused the additional error data words with SRC B2001150 to be incomplete.
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 59x, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems
  • HIPER: Various fixes and enhancements were made in firmware that supports InfiniBand switches attached to partitions running AIX or Linux. 
  • DEFERRED and HIPER: On model 575 systems with Power5+ processors, a problem was fixed that caused a system crash with SRC B1xxE500.
  • A problem was fixed that kept entitled weight from being added to a partition if the logical partition (LPAR) group was changed while the partition was active.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B700F103 to occur if, when adding memory to a partition and the size requested exceeded the maximum amount of memory allocated to the partition, there were already dynamic logical partition (LPAR) changes in progress.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented an HSL Opticonnect loop from reconnecting to one system in the cluster after a system in the Opticonnect cluster was rebooted.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a service processor failover from being completed successfully.
  • On model 575 and 59x systems, a problem was fixed that caused the IPL time to possibly be longer than normal.  If this problem is encountered, the system will complete the IPL but the IPL may be delayed by as much as 40 minutes.  During this delay, a C7004091 SRC with word 7 equal to 00000402 will be displayed. 
System firmware changes that affect model 570 systems:
  • A problem was fixed that caused system power control network (SPCN) error codes with the format 110015xx and 110016xx to be erroneously generated (against the drawer being serviced) during the replacement of the service processor at standby.
SF240_222_201

06/27/06 
(Mfg Only)

Impact:  Availability         Severity:  Attention 

DEFERRED:  A problem was fixed that caused SRC B131E500 ("A phased-lock-loop lock failure") to be erroneously generated. This affects the following systems:

  • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330.
  • p5:  9115-505, 9110-51A, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A
SF240_219_201

05/22/06

Impact:  Function         Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

New functions and features

  •  Support for 4GB, 8GB, and 16GB DDR II memory cards on the p5 models 9119-590 and 9119-595.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to interpret a machine condition as requiring special attention handling, where no such special attention existed.  This could result in a system checkstop.  This problem is also known as the "Master Attention Alone" condition.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that could cause unpredictable results when the control logic on the service processor is reset.
  • HIPER:  The hardware initialization settings were changed to prevent system checkstops with error code B1xxE500.
  • DEFERRED:  A problem was fixed that prevented a system dump from completing after a hardware failure, with error code B181F22A being logged.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot if the white power button was pressed within 10 seconds after reaching standby, but before C1802000 was posted on the control (operator) panel.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the service processor to perform a reset/reload too frequently, which caused too many dump files to be generated.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to crash with error code B181F141 when a PCI adapter was hot-plugged.
  • A problem was fixed that caused informational SRC B1813028 to appear in the service processor error log after a firmware update from one SF235 level to a subsequent SF235 level.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing some types of error codes to be defined incorrectly in the service processor error log.
  • The processor runtime diagnostic code was enhanced to more accurately point to the processor that is suspected to be failing when a dump is taken.
  • A problem was fixed on p5 systems (that have a graphics adapter and a USB adapter) that caused the firmware's console selection to be lost when firmware level SF240_202_201 was installed.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing the system or partition to drop to the open firmware prompt when  trying to view the fibre-channel boot devices in SMS menus.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing error code B181B013 to be erroneously generated during a code update from an SF230 level to an SF235 level.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented the "identify" LEDs from being toggled correctly on some enclosures.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented virtual adapters from being configured.
  • A problem was fixed that, in certain configurations, caused the HSL Opticonnect loop to fail when a single loop failed, even though a redundant path was available.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing excessive B7006970 error codes to be logged when an I/O tower or drawer failed. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to hang when booting after a main storage dump.
  • A problem was fixed that, under some circumstances, prevented remote support from gathering information about partitions that are running.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HSL Opticonnect ring between systems to fail when concurrently adding a tower to an HSL Opticonnect ring.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a frame that had been concurrently removed from an HSL Opticonnect ring to remain in the configuration displayed by the hardware service manager tool. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused the macro "nm lcsnm verifyvpd -xm" not to display all the bus VPD from XM.
  • A problem was fixed that caused two successive inband server firmware installations attempts to fail, but the third one to succeed. 
    • If the inband firmware installation fails on power down of the service partition, in some cases the next attempt will fail.  Retrying the inband update by powering down the service partition again will succeed.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the error data that is captured after an extended error handling (EEH) event to be zeroed out.
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code B7006970 to be logged after a partition is shutdown when certain types of DDR adapters are plugged into a DDR slot.
  • A problem was fixed that caused some slots to be unusable by a partition, and error codes B7006970 and B7006971 errors to be logged, even though the hardware error for that slot or bus was recoverable.
  • A problem was fixed that caused system firmware to report incorrect error information for some PCI slots, which prevented the adapters in these slots from being configured.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the "ping" command in the system management services (SMS) to fail during a NIM installation.
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 59x, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A potential server checkstop issue exists in clusters using p5 models p575, p590, and p595, when these models are used to execute compute-intensive applications tuned with the November Power5 Fortran compiler.  Clusters executing applications that are compiled for optimal performance by utilizing the software pre-fetch function are exposed to a server checkstop (B1xxE500). Hardware initialization settings were changed to fix this problem and  the performance tools modified to take these new settings into account.
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  An initialization problem was fixed that was causing the high-performance switch (HPS) network adapter to hit the adapter error threshold during run-time.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the corruption of registry values on the primary service processor.  This registry corruption was evidenced by the fact that the hypervisor reported the amount of configurable memory incorrectly.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused error code B1818A09 to be generated intermittently.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused runtime fail-over to the secondary service processor to fail.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot, and one of the service processors to become deconfigured.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that was causing the power control code to time out when querying the vital product data (VPD) on large system configurations.
  • DEFERRED:  A problem with the memory being allocated to high-performance switch (HPS) network adapters was fixed.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing a model 59x system to fail to boot (with error code BxxxF7A9) when a memory card failure was detected during the boot.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused a firmware installation to fail with multiple occurrences of error code B1818A0E.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused error code B181B013 to be logged in the secondary service processor's error log.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused both service processors to become "primary" after termination under certain conditions.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused error code B181E678 to be generated erroneously very early in the power-on sequence.
  • In a model 59x system with a redundant service processor installed, a problem was fixed that caused the "concurrent addition" of a node to fail with error code B1xxE500.
  • In a model 59x system or a model 570 system with a redundant service processor installed, a problem was fixed that caused the IPLing of the secondary service processor to fail due and error code B1xxF684 to be generated.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, the firmware was changed so that error code B181E911 is reported (with a recommendation to look at other error logs to isolate the problem), instead of B181E901 or B181E90C, when the firmware cannot identify the reason for a reset/reload.
  • In a model 59x system with a redundant service processor installed, a problem was fixed that caused error code B181F684 to be erroneously logged by the secondary service processor.
  •  In a model 59x system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused error codes 1000911C and 10009138 to be logged erroneously during a service processor failover.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the error "Message Not Found" to be generated during the cold repair of a service processor.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the secondary service processor to be removed from the configuration under some circumstances during an emergency power off.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing the system to reboot continuously while the secondary service processor was attempting to mount a file system.
  • For the model 59x systems, the FRU list for MCM and memory card VPD access errors was updated to include the MUX card.
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code HSCL1400 to be generated when a redundant service processor was installed with firmware release SF230 or earlier.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing all of the hardware in a processor node (in a multi-node 59x system) to be erroneously shown as "Deconfigured" with an error type of "Association" in the ASMI hardware deconfiguration menus.
  • A problem was fixed that caused some error log entries not to be seen on the HMC. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused multiple B176871C error codes to be generated.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing dynamic logical partitioning operations in a Linux environment to hang intermittently.
  • The firmware was enhanced so that the service processor will report a timeout if the hypervisor does not acknowledge a "memory resilience" message.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented system power control network (SPCN) firmware downloads from occurring after a hardware service action is performed from the HMC.
System firmware changes that affect p5 and i5 systems not in 24 inch racks
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code 11002600 SRC to be generated during the power-down sequence, and a failure of the subsequent power-on with error code B150F22A.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5 and i5 systems:
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused certain I/O adapters to fail at runtime.  This affects the following systems:
    • 5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330
    • p5:  9115-505, 9110-51A, 9111-285, 9131-52A, and 9133-55A
  • DEFERRED and HIPER: The hardware initialization settings were changed to reduce the likelihood of a system crash with SRC B114E500 and word 8 = 03010008.   This affects the following systems: 
    •  i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330. 
    • p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A. 
  • Additional hardware initialization settings were changed to prevent system hangs with error code B7xx406E.  This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330
    • p5:  9115-505, 9110-51A, 9111-285, 9131-52A, and 9133-55A
System firmware changes that affect model 570 systems
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code B182E500 to occur during a slow mode IPL of a model 570 system with two drawers and processor card feature code 29AE, 7781, 7782, 832E, or 8338.
SF240_202_201

03/03/06

Impact:  Function   Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused the advanced system management interface (ASMI) menus to be displayed incorrectly in languages other than English
SF240_201_201

02/21/06

Impact:  Function   Severity:  HIPER - High Impact/PERvasive, Should be installed as soon as possible.

New functions and features

  • Support for the model 9116-561 (System p5 560Q).
  • Support for model 9110-51A (OpenPower p5-511 and p5-511Q).
  • Support for Power5+ processors on the pSeries models 510, 510Q, 520, 520Q, and 570.
  • Support for Power5+ processors on the iSeries models 520, 550, and 570.
  • Support for IOP-less configurations on iSeries models 520, 550, and 570.
  • Support for mixing CoD-capable DDR2 memory with DDR2 memory that is not CoD-capable in a system.
  • Support for F/C 0649 (internal version) and F/C 0650 (external version), a new high-performance SCSI adapter with RAID 6 disk controller.
  • Support for the collection (and viewing on the HMC) of logical partitions' utilization of processor and memory resources.
  • Support for a thin console on iSeries systems.
  • Support for huge pages (16 GB) in the Advanced System Management  Interface (ASMI) menus.
  • Enhancements  to the "Restore to factory default" option, CoD options, time-of-day menu, and firmware update policy menu on the ASMI menus.
  • Location codes of the memory DIMMs were added to the memory deconfiguration menu interface in the ASMI menus.
  • The option to set the number of virtual LAN (VLAN) switches was added to the ASMI menus.
  • A feature to retry boot from a hard disk after an initial failure due to firmware timing, instead of immediate failure.  (This type of failure is typically seen on boot disks from external disk subsystem.)
  • Various enhancements and fixes to DS6000 and DS8000 storage systems firmware.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
  • The System Management Services (SMS) password recognition code was changed so that passwords that are allowed in the Advanced System Management Interface (ASMI) can now be typed to enter the SMS.
  • Fixed a problem that kept an already-connected uninterruptible power supply (UPS) from being detected correctly  after the service processor performed a reset/reload operation. 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing SRC B1xxE500 (with SRC word 8 equal to DD02) when processor runtime diagnostics were called during a dump.
  • Fixed a problem that caused the subsystem ID (the xx in B1xx yyyy) to be changed between the time processor runtime diagnostics reported an error to the gard code and when the service processor error log entry was created.
  • Fixed a problem that was causing the location codes in the VPD data to be invalid after the VPD (Anchor) card was replaced.
  • Fixed a problem that caused the system firmware to report an RTAS error (with error code FFFF D8F1 and malfunction code of 0000 000C) when certain types of hardware errors were encountered.
  • Fixed a problem that was causing the system firmware to crash when a certain type of KVM (keyboard, video, mouse) switch was used.
  • Fixed a problem that caused a BA180010 error to be logged when a PCI-X DDR slot was empty.
  • Fixed a problem that was causing an "IOP-less partition" to fail to boot; the partition was hanging at SRC B200F008.
  • The firmware console selection code was changed so that the time-out for console selection (approximately one minute) is independent of the number of potential consoles.
  • A problem with the slot allocation code was fixed that prevented partitions from being opened by the IVM (integrated virtualization manager).
  • Fixed a problem that caused extended SRC data to be missing when SRC B7000103 was generated.
System firmware changes that affect model 570 systems with more than one processor drawer:
  • On model 570 systems with more than one processor drawer, a problem was fixed that was preventing enclosure VPD keywords from being changed in the second, third, and fourth processor drawers using the ASMI menus.
  • On a system in which a redundant service processor is installed, a problem was fixed that was causing the wrong service processor to be called out when certain types of failures occurred.
System firmware changes that affect other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  • Fixed a problem that was causing the status of the HMC's connection (to the service processor) to be reported incorrectly to the server firmware.
System firmware changes that affect p5 and i5 systems not in 24 inch racks:
  • On a system that is not managed by an HMC, progress codes were being displayed on the potential firmware consoles; this caused the console selection message to scroll off the screen.
 
SF235
SF235_214_160

01/03/07

Impact:  Function        Severity:  Special Attention 

System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:
 

  • DEFERRED:  A change was made to improve the reliability of system memory.  This change reduces the likelihood of SRC B123E500 occurring, and also reduces the likelihood of a system crash.  SRC B1xxF667 could be logged as a result of the outage.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to crash with SRC B150D133. A system dump is generated as a result of the problem (SRC B181F03B).
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused prevented correctable L3 errors from being recovered, with the result that an error threshold was reached, and an erroneous FRU callout was made.
  • HIPER: A problem was fixed that caused I/O paths to be deconfigured after certain types of failures, indicated by SRC B170100A, until no I/O paths were left.  The firmware has been changed so that the I/O paths are no longer deconfigured under these circumstances.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that was preventing AIX system dumps with SRC D200A200 after a partition hang.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system or partition to crash when corruption was detected in low memory.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the platform dump function to fail intermittently.  The symptoms were that the dump did not terminate the system, and only partial dumps were collected. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B150F62A to be erroneously generated during a dump; the software portion of the dump was lost as well.
  • A problem was fixed that caused SRC B121E500 with word 8 = 00530006 to be erroneously generated after a memory steering operation.
  • A problem was fixed in partition firmware that caused a system or partition to hang at progress code CA00E891 when booting.
  • A problem was fixed that caused dynamic logical partitioning (DLPAR) operations to intermittently hang partitions running Linux.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a system or partition to crash when trying to view the fibre-channel boot devices in the SMS menus.
  • A problem was fixed that caused AIX to incorrectly report errors that occurred during booting and were then passed to the AIX error log.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the "ping" command in the system management services (SMS) to fail during a NIM installation.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the additional error data words with SRC B2001150 to be incomplete.
  • A problem was fixed that caused multiple B7005190 SRCs to be generated when virtual Ethernet adapters were configured.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a tower from being viewed on the HMC after a concurrent replacement of the tower's backplane.
  • A problem was fixed that might have caused a race condition in the hypervisor firmware to occur, which could cause a platform-wide hang. 
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 590, and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  • HIPER:  On model 575, 590, and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused a memory failure with SRC B123E500 after the concurrent repair of a CEC DCA. 
  • HIPER: On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the connection state to toggle between "Incomplete", "No Connection" and "Already Connected".
  • On systems that have two HMCs attached, a problem was fixed that caused a system dump collected by the HMC to be truncated.
  • On systems that have two HMCs attached, a problem was fixed that caused a firmware update to fail with SRC B181300A.
  • On model 590 and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused the platform dump to be corrupted when the hardware content of the system dump (which is set using the service processor menus) was set to "maximum".
  • On model 590 and 595 systems, the FRU callouts were enhanced to improve system reliability after an uncorrectable memory error occurs (with SRC B123E500).
  • A problem was corrected in which a system dump (collected by the HMC) that is greater than 4 GB is incorrectly truncated and returns invalid data. This change properly returns a 4GB system dump when truncation is required.
  • On systems managed by an HMC, a problem was fixed that caused the HMC to report that an incomplete platform dump had been collected, even though the entire dump was available.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that prevented the IP addresses of the secondary service processor from being displayed using function 30 on the control (operator) panel.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the secondary service processor to be guarded out when there was a failure in the network that connects the two service processors.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused SRC B1815008 to be erroneously logged by the secondary service processor after a firmware installation.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused SRC B1xxB013 to be erroneously logged after a firmware installation.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused an entry in the service processor error log that erroneously indicated that the secondary service processor had been guarded out.
  • On systems with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the secondary service processor to reset/reload after several months of run time (with SRC B1817201), due to an out-of-memory condition.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented a service processor failover from being completed successfully after the primary service processor experienced a DMA transfer timeout. 
  • On a system configured with the virtual partition manager (VPM), a problem was fixed that caused the F6 option in the i5/OS service activity log (SAL) to be unavailable when the system attention indicator was on.
  • A problem was fixed that prevented some partitions from being reactivated after a short power outage caused them to be deactivated.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the HMC to go to the incomplete state when utilization data was requested from the managed system.
  • A problem was fixed that caused an IOP-less i5/OS partition with a large amount of memory and a small logical memory block (LMB) size to fail to boot.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to crash with SRC B182E500, and a system dump to be created, when an I/O resource was removed by a DLPAR (dynamic logical partitioning) operation.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems:
  • HIPER:  On model 561, 570, 590 and model 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused memory to be deconfigured due to an erroneous memory controller failure, with SRC B121E500 and word 8 = 00EA0035.
  • DEFERRED and HIPER: The hardware initialization settings were changed to reduce the likelihood of a system crash with SRC B114E500 and word 8 = 03010008.   This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330.
    • p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A.
SF235_209_160

06/16/06

Impact:  Function        Severity:  Hiper 

System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 59x, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:

  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused one of the service processors to fail, and be removed from the configuration, if an interrupt was pending during initialization.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused one of the service processors to fail during a failover, and the hypervisor was then unable to reset the system.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused PCI bus errors to occur when a hardware reset of the service processor occurred at runtime, and the service processor was on a shared PCI bus.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5 and i5 systems:
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused certain types of I/O adapters to fail at runtime.  This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330.
    • p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused erroneous B113E500 errors.  This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330.
    • p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that intermittently caused a service processor performing a hardware reset to disturb other devices on the same PCI bus.  This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9406-570.
    • p5:  9117-570 and 9118-575.
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to crash with SRC B131E500 ("I/O hub error").  This affects the following systems if Remote I/O (RIO) attachment card F/C 1806, F/C 1807, or F/C 2888 is installed, and one or more I/O drawers is attached to this adapter:
    •     i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330.
    •     p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A, and 9133-55A.
  • A problem was fixed that caused erroneous errors during boot on certain slots.  This affects the following systems:
    • i5:  9405-520 and 9406-520 with processor feature code 8325, 8327 or 8330.
    • p5:  9115-505, 9111-285, 9131-52A and 9133-55A.
SF235_206_160

04/18/06

Impact:  Function        Severity:  Hiper 

Fixes that were deferred in earlier levels but are concurrent in this level: 

In firmware levels SF235_180  and SF235_185, there were two fixes that were deferred: 

1.  A fix that affected all p5, i5, and OpenPower systems: 

HIPER:  An incorrect initialization setting in the shared memory interface  (SMI) may cause a system checkstop, which could result in a system or partition crash. This is also known as the "SMI parity error" issue. 

In SF235_206 and higher service packs, this fix is CONCURRENT. 

2.  A fix that affected all p5, i5, and OpenPower systems: 

HIPER:  The initialization settings of the memory buffers were changed to fix an incorrect timeout setting in the non-cacheable unit (NCU).  The current settings may cause a system checkstop, which could result in a system and partition crash.  This is known as the "EMQ hang" problem. 

In SF235_206 and higher service packs, this fix is CONCURRENT.  Also in this release of the fix, the recovery time for the EMQ hang was improved to benefit HACMP configurations. 

System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to interpret a machine condition as requiring special attention handling, where no such special attention existed.  This could result in a system checkstop.  This problem is also know as the "Master Attention Alone" condition.
  • HIPER:   A problem was fixed that might prevent the system from completing memory bit steering on DDR1 DIMMs during runtime.  In this scenario, the system posts an SRC of B120E500, which informs the user to IPL the system to complete the memory bit steering operation.  This fix allows the system to complete the memory bit steering during runtime (with no SRC being posted), and no reboot is required.  (If memory runs out of spare bits to use for steering, the system will post SRC B123E500 as a predictive error, with word 8=xxxxxx8A.)
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  Additional hardware initialization settings were changed to prevent system hangs with B7xx406E reference code. 
  • DEFERRED:  A problem was fixed that caused a dump to stop before completion after a hardware failure with error code B1xxF22A.
  • DEFERRED:  A problem was fixed that caused the system to terminate with an error code of B182901D.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the service processor to perform a reset/reload too frequently, which caused too many dump files to be generated.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing SRC B1xxE500 (with SRC word 8 equal to DD02) when processor runtime diagnostics were called during a dump.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a BA180010 error to be logged when a PCI-X DDR slot was empty.
  • A problem was fixed that caused error codes 11001D60 and 11001D63 to be erroneously generated when powering down the system.
  • A problem was fixed that kept an already-connected uninterruptible power supply (UPS) from being detected correctly after the service processor performed a reset/reload operation. 
  • A problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot if the white power button was pressed within 10 seconds after reaching standby, but before C1802000 was posted on the control (operator) panel.
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code B157F22A to be posted after a main store dump.
    • A problem was fixed that prevented informational errors in the advanced system management (ASM) error logs from being seen by the admin user.
  • The firmware was changed to insure that error log entries related to ambient temperature problems (error codes such as 11007201, 11007203, and 11007205, for example) are sent up to the operating system. 
  • A problem was fixed that was preventing systems and partitions with multiple fiber channel adapters from booting.
  • A problem was fixed that caused a reset/reload to fail with error code B181D13C  when a certain type of hardware attention was being handled.
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 59x, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
 
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A potential server checkstop issue exists in clusters using p5 models p575, p590, and p595, when these models are used to execute compute-intensive applications tuned with the November Power5 Fortran compiler.  Clusters executing applications that are compiled for optimal performance by utilizing the software pre-fetch function are exposed to a server checkstop (B1xxE500). Hardware initialization settings were changed to fix this problem and  the performance tools modified to take these new settings into account. 
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  An initialization problem was fixed that was causing the high-performance switch (HPS) network adapter to hit the adapter error threshold during run-time.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused model 575 nodes to fail to boot with SRC B1817201.
  • HIPER:  On systems with a high performance switch (HPS) network adapter installed, a problem was fixed that caused a checkstop when memory was moved from a partition that did not own an HPS network adapter.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that was causing the power control code to time out when querying the vital product data (VPD) on large system configurations.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused erroneous registry errors with error code B1818A09 to be generated intermittently.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused runtime fail-over to the secondary service processor to fail.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused 11001Dxx error codes to be erroneously logged after a failover to the secondary service processor.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the system to fail to boot, and one of the service processors to become deconfigured.
  • HIPER:  In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused the corruption of registry values on the primary service processor.  This registry corruption was evidenced by the fact that the hypervisor reported the amount of configurable memory incorrectly.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that caused a firmware installation to fail with multiple occurrences of error code B1818A0E.
  • The firmware was enhanced so that control (operator) panel function 30 displays the secondary service processor's IP address as well as the primary service processor's IP address.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing error code B17CE433 to be erroneously generated after an administrative fail-over.
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code HSCL1400 to be generated when a redundant service processor was installed with firmware release SF230 or earlier.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing the secondary service processor to fail after too many write operations into the flash memory.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing the system to reboot continuously while the secondary service processor was attempting to mount a file system.
  • On a system in which a redundant service processor is installed, a problem was fixed that was preventing the system from booting (with error code B155B06F) when one service processor encountered a problem collecting vital product data (VPD).
  • A problem was fixed that caused a system with only a primary service processor installed to report the state of the secondary as "broken" instead of "not installed"; this prevented a firmware installation on the primary service processor.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the error logs to be cleared on the secondary service processor when it was rebooted.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that prevented a service processor fail-over from completing if a hardware error occurred before the fail-over.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing a 11005000 or 11005001 error code to be logged during an administrative failover.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing a partition's time-of-day (TOD) clock to jump forward a large amount of time after a failover to the secondary service processor.  If this problem is encountered after this level of firmware is installed, the partition will have to be rebooted to correct the TOD clock.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was causing an invalid error code (B181E436) to be generated during a concurrent firmware update.
  • In a system with a redundant service processor, a problem was fixed that was preventing the system from being powered on or powered off after a surveillance failover during a power transition (with error code B181E664).
  • A problem was fixed that was preventing a PCI adapter from configuring in a tower after concurrent maintenance on the slot.  If this problem is encountered, the system must be rebooted for the adapter to be correctly configured after the repair.  After this fix is concurrently activated, it will prevent the problem from reoccurring.
  • A problem was fixed that caused some error log entries not to be seen on the HMC.
  • A problem was fixed that caused multiple B176871C error codes to be generated.
  • A problem was fixed that caused an error log entry with error code B1xxE661 to be erroneously generated after an HMC-initiated system firmware installation.
  • A problem was fixed that caused some error codes not to be sent to the control (operator) panel when i5/OS failed; instead, D200C2FF is left in the control panel display.  The terminating SRC can be found in the ASMI error logs.  This problem is only seen on i5 systems in default mode without an HMC attached.
  • A problem was fixed that may be encountered during a reset/reload of the service processor; the symptom is a system failure with a B7000103 error code.  If this problem is encountered, the system must be rebooted to recover.  When this fix is concurrently activated, it will prevent the problem from reoccurring.
  • A problem was fixed that was seen on an HSL Opticonnect cluster when there were more than 10 partitions on either system in the Opticonnect cluster; the failure occurred during a partition boot. 
    •  If you are currently affected by this problem, a server IPL must be performed  to   reactivate the low-level HSL Opticonnect connection between the  servers. 
    • This problem can be avoided by manually starting the partitions individually instead of using "autostart" to start the partitions. 
    • Concurrently activating this fix will prevent the problem from occurring again.
  • A problem was fixed that occurred during server boot on a server with a redundant service processor installed; the server hangs at progress code C700406E. 
    •  If the server is currently hung at C700406E, this level of firmware can be installed disruptively from the HMC, and the problem will be resolved when the system is automatically rebooted after the installation. 
    • If the server is not hung, this level of firmware can be applied concurrently.
System firmware changes that affect model 570 systems with more than one processor drawer:
  • On model 570 systems with more than one processor drawer, a problem was fixed that was preventing enclosure VPD keywords from being changed in the second, third, and fourth processor drawers using the ASMI menus.
  • The firmware was enhanced so that the progress codes that indicate discovery of the secondary service processor are displayed on the control (operator) panel.
System firmware changes that affect p5 and i5 systems not in 24 inch racks:
  • On a system that is not managed by an HMC, progress codes were being displayed on the potential firmware consoles; this caused the console selection message to scroll off the screen.
  • A problem was fixed that caused error code 11002600 SRC to be generated during the power-down sequence, and a failure of the subsequent power-on with error code B150F22A.
SF235_185_160

01/13/06 
 

Impact:  Function        Severity:  Hiper 

System firmware changes that affect models 590 and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:

  • Fixed a problem that was causing error code B1xx100A to be logged when an HMC was disconnected from a managed system.  This problem is much more likely to occur on managed systems that have two or more HMCs attached, but it can also be seen on systems with only one HMC attached.
  • Fixed a problem that caused commands involving LEDs to time out on large, heavily configured systems. 
  • A new function was added to system firmware to allow power code downloads to towers to be enabled and disabled.  On eServer systems with a large number of towers, this allows customers to shorten the downtime after a system firmware installation by disabling the power code download to the towers, then enabling it at a convenient time. 
System firmware changes that affect specific p5 and i5 systems not in 24 inch racks:
  • Supports Double Data Rate (DDR) PCI adapters in DDR PCI slots in the following systems:  9111-520, 9131-52A, 9113-550,  9133-55A, 9111-285, 9405-520, and 9406-520.  Running a DDR PCI adapter in a DDR PCI slot in one of these models with a firmware level prior to this one may result in a potential data error.  IBM recommends that you install this level immediately if using a DDR PCI adapter.
Full DDR adapter performance is not enabled in this level.  Full performance is planned to be enabled in a service pack that will be released in the future.
SF235_180_160

12/06/05

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Special Attention

System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  • DEFERRED   The hardware initialization settings were changed to prevent system crashes at runtime under some circumstances. 
  • DEFERRED   The initialization settings of the memory buffers were changed to eliminate spurious checkstops that were causing system and partition crashes.
  • Fixed a problem that causes the system attention LED to be in the incorrect state. 
  •  Fixed a problem that was causing the system attention light to come on even though no serviceable events had been logged. 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing the SMS menus to hang when the boot list was viewed or changed when two AIX images are on one hard file. 
  • Fixed a problem that caused a 11003114 error code to be generated during power on. 
  • Fixed a problem that caused a null pointer in the virtual I/O (VIO) firmware. 
  • i5/OS only:  Fixed a problem that was preventing an i5/OS partition from booting from an IOA in a DDR slot. 
  • i5/OS only:  Fixed a problem that was causing some adapters to fail to become operational in i5/OS in a DDR (double data rate) slot. 
  • i5/OS only:  Fixed a problem that was causing incorrect error reporting for adapters that do not support extended error handling (EEH) when installed in a DDR slot. 
System firmware changes that affect models 590 and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
  •  DEFERRED   Fixed a problem that prevented a VTERM session from being opened on the HMC in certain network configurations. 
  • Fixed a problem that caused bulk power controller (BPC) connection errors in clustered systems by increasing the NETC SSL time-out value. 
  • Fixed a problem that caused HMC-directed concurrent maintenance actions to fail with the message "CIM client detected:  hard stop or user intervention.  Try again or delay the repair.". 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing platform dumps on large, richly-configured systems to result in an out-of-bounds memory access failure. 
  • A change was made to shorten the time to execute DLPAR memory removal operations.
System firmware changes that affect systems that are not HMC-controlled:
  • A timing issue in the firmware was fixed that was causing firmware installations from the operating system to fail. 
System firmware changes that affect the model 570:
  • On a model 570 systems with 12 or 16 processors, the maximum number of partitions had been erroneously set to 80 in SF235_160; this firmware level sets the maximum back to 120 partitions for 12 processors and 160 for 16 processors. 
  • On the model 570 with three or four processor drawers, fixed a problem that was causing the system to stop with error code A7004713 when installing SF235_160 or higher system firmware. 
SF235_160_160

10/14/05

Impact:  Function       Severity:  Special Attention 

New function: 

  • On i5 systems, added support for booting from a boot device attached to an IOP-less adapter.
  • Added support for the installation of two copies of the AIX operating system on one hard file.  This includes support in the SMS menus for booting from either one.
  • Added support for feature code 1812, the GX Dual-port 4x InfiniBand Host Channel Adapter, on model 52A systems.
  • Added support for feature code 1811, the GX Dual-port 4x InfiniBand Host Channel Adapter, on model 575 systems. 
  • Added support for moving the CUoD resources from one system to another system.
  • Added support for the capability to set up a backup shared ethernet so that the shared ethernet function can fail-over to a standby shared ethernet if the primary fails. This function is part of the virtual IO server.
  • Added support for redundant service processors with dynamic failover in models 570, 590, and 595.
  • Added support for modifying the number of On/Off CoD activations during the active period.
  • Added support for unattended HMC installation over a network, and to back up full HMC disk images onto a network server.
  • Added support for new models:  9131-52A, 9111-285, 9133-55A, 9115-505.
  • Various enhancements to the ASCII version of the Advanced System Management Interface (ASMI) menus were made.
Problems resolved: 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing the user data in a service processor error log entry generated by the bulk power controller to be truncated to 2048 bytes.
  • Fixed a problem that caused unnecessary Service Agent calls because SRC B1816009 was being generated when the white power button was pressed before the power-on sequence was complete.
  • On model 590 and 595 systems, fixed a problem that was causing DDR II memory cards in slots C10 and C12 to fail the memory test during a slow-mode boot.
  • Fixed a problem  that prevents power on and posts a 11002613 error code when AC is lost to one power supply.  This problem exists only in SF230 levels of firmware.
  • Fixed a problem that was causing a platform dump to be incomplete under certain circumstances.
  • Fixed a problem that was causing a hypervisor dump to be corrupted.
  • Fixed a problem that caused the location codes to be incorrect after the planar is replaced in a pSeries 7311-D20 drawer.
  • The timestamp from the bulk power controller was added into the serviceable event log entry.
  • Fixed a problem that prevented the "nvunalias" open firmware command from working.
  • Fixed a problem that kept the physical I/O description field on the HMC GUI from being updated after a "remove FRU and add FRU" operation. 
  • Fixed a problem that caused a service processor dump or a platform dump and SRC B1817201 or B7004400. 
  • Changed the firmware so that a modem attached to a system port will reconfigure to enable call-in following a power failure.
  • Fixed VPD-related command hangs (such as lsmcode, lsvpd, snap)
  • Fixed several problems associated with firmware installations:
    •  SRC B1814008 or B181F131 was generated on reboot
    • A service processor dump occurred during a firmware installation
    • "lsmcode -c" command displayed all zeros for the firmware level on the T side after an installation 
 
SF230
SF230_158_120

09/25/06

Impact:  Function       Severity:  Hiper 

System firmware changes that affect systems using HSL Opticonnect

  • A problem was fixed that caused a system in an Opticonnect cluster to crash with SRC B182E500 when partitions were activated.
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 590, and 595, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems
  • HIPER:  On model 575, 590, and 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused a memory failure with SRC B123E500 after the concurrent repair of a CEC DCA. 
  • On model 590 and 595 systems, the FRU callouts were enhanced to improve system reliability after an uncorrectable memory error was repaired.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing enhanced error handling (EEH) error codes to be erroneously generated on 7040-61D I/O drawers when certain adapter card configurations were heavily stressed by the application code.
System firmware changes that affect certain p5, i5, and OpenPower systems
  • HIPER:  On model 561, 570, 590 and model 595 systems, a problem was fixed that caused memory to be deconfigured due to an erroneous memory controller failure, with SRC B121E500 and word 8 = 00EA0035.
  • On model 561 and 570 systems with more than one processor drawer, a problem was fixed that was preventing enclosure VPD keywords from being changed in the second, third, and fourth processor drawers using the ASMI menus.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the service processor to run out of memory with SRC B110F139.
System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused prevented correctable L3 errors from being recovered, with the result that an error threshold was reached, and an erroneous FRU callout was made.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that caused the system or partition to crash when corruption was detected in low memory.
  • HIPER:  A problem was fixed that was preventing AIX system dumps with SRC D200A200 after a partition hang.
  • A problem was fixed that caused dynamic logical partitioning (DLPAR) operations to intermittently hang partitions running Linux.
  • A problem was fixed that caused AIX to incorrectly report errors that occurred during booting, and were then passed to the AIX error log.
  • A problem was fixed that caused the "ping" command in the system management services (SMS) to fail during a NIM installation.
  • A problem was fixed that caused multiple B7005190 SRCs to be generated when virtual Ethernet adapters were configured.
  • A problem was fixed that kept an already-connected uninterruptible power supply (UPS) from being detected correctly after the service processor performed a reset/reload operation. 
SF230_156_120

04/03/06

Impact:  Function       Severity:  Hiper 

Two fixes that were deferred in earlier levels are concurrent in this level:

1.  In firmware level SF230_150, there was a deferred fix that affects all p5 and i5 systems: 

HIPER:  The initialization settings of the memory buffers were changed to eliminate spurious checkstops that were causing system and partition crashes. 

In SF230_156, this fix is CONCURRENT. 

2.  In firmware level SF230_153 (which is also part of ECA 823), there was a deferred fix that affects model 59x systems: 

HIPER:  The hardware initialization settings were changed to fix an incorrect timeout setting in the non-cacheable unit (NCU). The current settings may cause a system checkstop, which could result in a system or partition crash.  This is also known as the  "EMQ hang" problem. 

In SF230_156, this fix is CONCURRENT.  Also, the recovery time for the EMQ hang was improved to benefit HACMP configurations. 
 

System firmware changes that affect all p5 and i5 systems:

  • HIPER: An incorrect initialization setting in the shared memory interface  (SMI) may cause a system checkstop, which could result in a system or partition crash. This is also known as the "SMI parity error" issue. 
  • HIPER:  Fixed a firmware problem that caused the system to interpret a machine condition as requiring special attention handling, where no special attention existed. This could result in a system checkstop (with error codes B181F647 and B110F139).  This problem is also known as the "master attention alone" issue.
System firmware changes that affect the model 575, 59x, other HMC-controlled servers, and clustered systems:
 
  • DEFERRED and HIPER:  A potential server checkstop issue exists in clusters using p5 models p575, p590, and p595, when these models are used to execute compute-intensive applications tuned with the November Power5 Fortran compiler.  Clusters executing applications that are compiled for optimal performance by utilizing the software pre-fetch function are exposed to a server checkstop (B1xxE500). Hardware initialization settings were changed to fix this problem and  the performance tools modified to take these new settings into account.
  • HIPER  On systems with a high performance switch (HPS) network adapter installed, fixed a problem that caused a checkstop when memory was moved from a partition that did not own an HPS network adapter. problem was fixed that prevented I/O towers from being concurrently added to i5 systems.
  • A problem was fixed that was preventing partitions with large amounts of memory from booting successfully.
  • The firmware was changed so that the time it takes to remove a large amount of memory from a partition using a DLPAR (dynamic LPAR) operation is reduced.
  • A problem was fixed that was causing enhanced error handling (EEH) error codes to be erroneously generated on 7040-61D I/O drawers when certain adapter card configurations were heavily stressed by the application code.
System firmware changes that affect p5 systems not in 24 inch racks:
  • On p5 systems that are not managed by an HMC, the timeout for firmware installations performed by the operating system ("in-band" installations) was increased.
SF230_150_120

11/02/05

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Special Attention 

Attention: An IPL is required to activate a deferred fix, the system must be powered off via the HMC, (i.e. HMC state=Power OFF) and then powered back on. 

  • DEFERRED Changed the initialization settings of the memory buffers to eliminate spurious checkstops that were causing system and partition crashes.
  • DEFERRED  On model 590 and 595 systems, fixed a problem that was causing DDR II memory cards in slots C10 and C12 to fail the memory test during a slow-mode boot. 
  • DEFERRED  Fixed a problem that was not allowing the system enclosure serial number to be rewritten using the ASMI menus.
  • DEFERRED  Fixed a problem that causes the default boot list and the stored boot list to be swapped in the system management services (SMS) firmware when booting an AIX or Linux partition. 
  • Several problems were fixed that caused a failure to boot with SRCs B1817201, C1001014 and/or C1001020.
  • On an HMC, fixed a problem that caused a blank screen when reopening a VTERM after closing it.
  • Fixed a problem that was causing a platform dump to be incomplete under certain circumstances.
  • Fixed a problem that caused a "no connection" state between the HMC and the service processor after the service processor attempted a dump operation.
  • Added support for ARP (address request protocol) to the System Management Services (SMS) firmware for AIX and Linux partitions.
  • Fixed a problem in the server firmware that was allowing the HMC to allocate more memory to a partition than was available.
SF230_147_120

10/27/05 
 

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Special Attention 
  • Fixed a problem that caused system processors to get into a locked state.
  • Changed the initialization settings of the memory buffers to eliminate spurious checkstops that were causing system and partition crashes.
SF230_145_120

08/24/05

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Special Attention
  • Fixed a problem on i5 systems with 5074 I/O towers that causes a partition to hang with SRC B6000255 when an I/O adapter in the 5074 is moved using dynamic LPAR.
  • Fixed a problem on i5 and p5 systems that causes a continuous stream of phantom interrupts on partitions with shared processors.
SF230_143_120

08/09/05

Impact:  Serviceability        Severity:  Special Attention 

Attention: An IPL is required to activate a deferred fix, the system must be powered off via the HMC, (i.e. HMC state=Power OFF) and then powered back on. 

  • DEFERRED  On model 575 and 59x systems in which an IBM High Performance Switch (HPS) is installed, fixed a problem that was causing an invalid high performance switch adapter failure to be reported after a switch failure. 
  • DEFERRED  On model SR110000 systems only, fixed a problem that was causing the I/O in the CEC not to show up after an IPL. 
  • DEFERRED  On systems that are managed by an HMC, a problem was fixed that was causing concurrent firmware update to fail with error code ACT01724 on the HMC. 
  • DEFERRED  Fixed a problem involving correctable and uncorrectable memory errors that may have resulted in memory being deconfigured during a slow mode IPL on 9119-59x systems with F/C 7814 (4 GB memory cards) installed. 
  • Support for 16-way model 575 systems was added to the SF230 release. 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing the firmware to erroneously report a failure of the High Performance Switch (HPS) adapter card (with error code B181F62A) in a 16-way model 575 system. 
  • On model 59x systems, a memory leak was fixed that could cause the system to reset during boot.
  • Fixed false error code B1812033 introduced in code level SF230_120 on all p5 and i5 systems model 570 and lower. The B1812033 error code may still be valid on 575 and 59x systems. 
  • Fixed intermittent boot problem introduced in code level SF230_120 on all p5 and i5 systems model 550 and lower. Error codes related to this boot problem include B1701004, B181F12E or B150F22A. 
  • On model 575 and 59x systems in which an IBM High Performance Switch (HPS) is installed, a problem in the system firmware was fixed that was causing duplicate errors for the same problem to be reported in the service processor error log and the HPS Network Manager error log. 
  • On model 575 and 59x systems in which an IBM High Performance Switch (HPS) is installed, a problem in the system firmware was fixed that was causing some switch network interface (SNI) adapters to fail a wrap test. 
  • On systems that are managed by an HMC, fixed a problem that was preventing some types of errors that were logged in the service processor's error log from being sent to the HMC. 
  • Fixed a problem that caused a very early reset/reload of the service processor with error codes of B1817201, B1817209 or similar after a firmware update. 
  • On systems that shipped with a firmware level that begins with SF210, a problem was fixed that was causing the firmware installation to the T side to fail with error code B1817201. 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing platform system dumps to be corrupted. 
  • Fixed a problem that was causing concurrent firmware maintenance to fail.
SF230_126_120

06/16/05

Impact:  Function        Severity:  Hiper 
  • Fixed a problem that causes the media bay to lose power, which makes the DVD drives in the bay inoperable on 9117-570 and 9406-570 systems.
  • Fixed most problems introduced in SF230_120 that causes the white power on/off button to intermittently fail to boot the system, terminating with error codes B181F12E, B1701004 or B150F22A, on 9111-520, 9113-550, 9405-520, 9406-520 and 9406-550 systems.
  • Fixed a problem that causes various types of planar and RIO cable failures in the 7040-61D I/O subsystem to be reported on 9118-575, 9119-590, 9119-595 and 9406-595.
SF230_120_120

06/03/05

Impact:  Function        Severity:  Hiper 

New function: 

  • Adds code to notify the user when the VPD card is not in its original system, and to prevent that system from booting. 
  • Adds support for i5/OS hosting virtual Linux and AIX partitions on i5 systems that are not managed by an HMC. 
  • Adds support for F/C 7910 on model 9118-575 systems the switch network interface  adapter, which provides the interface to the pSeries high performance switch (HPS). 
  • Adds support for F/C 7817 on 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595 systems, the switch network interface (SNI) adapter, which provides the interface to the pSeries high performance switch (HPS). 
  • Adds support for concurrent firmware maintenance on systems managed by an HMC. 
  • Adds support for 32GB memory cards on 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595 systems. 
  • Adds support for F/C 7894, 8GB (4x2GB) feature (2GB DDR2 DIMMs, CCIN 30F3) on machine type 9117-570.
Problems resolved: 
  • LEDs on GX bus adapter cards remain on after the node is powered off for 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595 systems. 
  • The service processor is not able to place a "call home" through a modem. 
  • On systems 9118-575, 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595: a firmware upgrade from SF222_075 to SF225_096 fails with error code ACT01724 on the HMC. 
  • Fixed a problem that causes the default boot list and the stored boot list to be swapped in the system management services (SMS) code when booting an AIX or Linux partition. 
  • Fixed a highly intermittent problem that causes the service processor to perform a dump when an SRC is displayed on the control panel. 
  • On  9118-575, 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595 systems, updates the firmware so that the system will continue to boot when certain types of failures occur on bus adapter cards. 
  • Fixed a problem on  9118-575, 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595 systems which caused a reboot to fail with error code B7006900 under certain conditions. 
  • Fixed a problem with moving a CD-ROM device between two logical partitions using DLPAR commands on the HMC. 
  • On 9117-570 and 9406-570 systems:  fixed a problem a that causes a DMA_ERR with error code 1000 0003 on the integrated Ethernet port. 
  • DS8000 storage subsystem:  multiple firmware fixes. 
  • Fixed a problem that causes the system clock to revert to December 31, 1969 and the system to crash with error code B7000103. 
  • On 9119-590 systems, fixed a problem that keeps large configurations (12 or more I/O drawers with both planars installed) from booting. 
  • Fixed a problem that prevents the 'lscfg -vp' command from reporting platform-specific data on all p5 systems.
  • Fixed a problem that intermittently causes a partition or the system to hang when the lsvpd or lscfg command is run on all p5 systems.  Also, 'the lsmcode' command may return "NOT DETERMINABLE".
  • If two power supplies are installed, the system may fail to power on if one power supply fails in the 9110-510, 9111-520, 9113-550, 9117-570, 9123-xxx, 9124-xxx, 9405-520, 9406-520, 9406-550, 9406-570 systems.
  • Fixed a problem that prevents a virtual SCSI client from connecting to a virtual SCSI server adapter on 9118-575, 9119-590, and 9119-595 systems.

  •  
 
SF225
SF225_096_096

03/12/05

Impact:  Function   Severity:  Hiper 
  • Fixed a problem in the service processor firmware that made it look like the T-side image was being lost after a "reset to factory configuration" was done using the ASMI menus. 
SF225_080_080

02/18/05

Impact:  New        Severity:  New 
  • Added support for 9118-575, 9110-510, and 9123-710.
 
SF222
SF222_081_081

02/07/05

Impact:  Function   Severity:  Hiper 
  • Fixed a problem that caused FSCSI errors to show up erroneously in the AIX error log when an I/O adapter failed.
  • Fixed a problem that caused the processor runtime diagnostics to call out the wrong DIMM (or other memory component) when a memory failure occurred.
  • Fixed a problem that caused a platform dump to run out of storage space.
  • Fixed a problem that prevented the LEDs on I/O drawers from identifying or "rolling up" to the frame enclosure LED.
  • Fixed a problem that caused the service processor to generate error log entries every few seconds when attempting to service a recoverable CEC hardware error on systems that have processors with no memory associated with them.
SF222_075_075

12/17/04

Impact:  Function   Severity:  Hiper 
  • Fixed a problem with the AMSI menu option that allows system VPD keywords to be set.
  • Fixed a problem that kept the system from continuing to boot when an 8GB memory DIMM is deallocated because an uncorrectable error was generated by the DIMM during boot.
  • Fixed a problem that caused a partition's time to appear to drift (approximately 15 seconds/month) following a system IPL.
  • Support for partitions running i5/OS on p5 systems was added.
  • Fixed a problem that caused the default boot list and the stored boot list in the SMS menus to be swapped.
SF222_071_071

11/24/04

Impact:  New        Severity:  New 
  • Added support for systems 9119-590, 9119-595, and 9406-595.
 
SF220
SF220_051_051

11/01/04

Impact:  Function   Severity:  Hiper 
  • Fixed a problem that kept feature code 1827, a UPS sense cable, from being detected. 
SF220_049_049

09/28/04

Impact:  Function   Severity:  Hiper
  • Fixed a problem that kept the serial ports on the processor drawer from functioning in 9117-570 and 9406-570 systems with multiple processor drawers.
  • Fixed a problem that kept the user from accessing the advanced system management interface (ASMI) via the web interface.
SF220_046_046

09/13/04

Impact:  Function   Severity:  Hiper
  • Fixed a problem that caused the kept the service processor from getting to standby when an Ethernet cable was not plugged into it.
SF220_045_045

08/03/04

Impact:  Function   Severity: Hiper 
  • Various corrections and updates.
SF220_043_043

08/31/04

Impact:  New       Severity:  New 
  • Added support for new models:  9111-520, 9113-550, 9406-550, 9124-720, and 9117-570.