Conference 7.286::fddi

1963.0. "DEFEA VMS does'nt recover after powerfail" by CLUSKI::MAGENC () Wed Feb 21 1996 07:05

			hello !


	A customer uses 3 Alpha stations (2 2100 and 1 2000) plugged in
	the sams dec hub 900 ; they all use the same FDDI controller
	(DEFEA).

	- 1 a2100 runs vms 6.1 , decnet IV, lat 
	- 1 a2100 runs osf v3.2c , ip
	- 1 a2000 runs vms 6.2, decnet iv , lat , used to run vms 6.1
          last week .

	A week ago, there have been some electrical problems on
	the HUB (powerfails) ;

	Both alpha stations running VMS experimented the same pb :
	after power recover , LAT and DECnet did't work anymore.
	The alpha station running OSF had no problems.

	The device FEA0 had error count = 0
	ncp>show line FEA0 counters showed no errors ; 
        OPCOM messages gave : circuit down FEA-0 , line synchronization lost
	circuit up ...

	The customer did : ncp>set circuit FEA-0 stat off
	                   ncp>set line FEA-0 stat off
	                   ncp>set line FEA-0 stat on
	                   ncp>set circuit FEA-0 stat on

	After this, LAT and DECnet worked properly again.    

	- This same problem occurred 3 times in 4 days (the HUB
	  has been repaired) ; the 2 last time this "power fail"
	  occurred, the a 2000 had been upgraded to VMS 6.2:
	  only the a 2100 running VMS 6.1 experimented the decnet/lat
	  problem . 	

	This makes be think the DEFEA driver for OpenVMS 6.1
	may have a problem such that after power failure/power
	recover, it is unable to "realize" that normal
	operations can be re-entered.
	I think that ncp>set line stat off/on is the way
	to "force" things to work.

	Is this a "known" problem ? Thanks for any advice/input,

	Best regards ,

	Michele. 

	PS : The customer is going to try to unplug/re-plug the FDDI
	     cable from the DEFEA on an Alpha station running VMS/decnet
	     in order to check wether this problem is reproducible at will.
	     Since I dunno when customer will be able to try this,
	     I'll post the results when available. 

    hello,
    
    I work with Michele on this problem ......
    after further investigations done on site by the customer,the problem
    is exactly the same with VMS 6.2..so not only VMS 6.1........
    It seems that this interface DEFEA has some problems when the equipment
    at the other end of the FDDI cable is powered off.......
    
    The problem does'nt exist with the same machine running OSF.Only
    OPENVMS.......what about the driver??any help appreciated?
    
    Best regards 
    Lionel
    

Can you send me the output from a SHOW LAN/FULL after the
failure?

Thanks.

- Dick

    Dick,
    I was in vacation and will be on site the next week
    I will post a SHOW LAN/FULL as requested .Thank you 
    for your help
    LIOnel