White Paper

Introduction
IBM BladeCenter server products provide many advantages over
traditional servers by enabling modular hardware in a compact
form factor. The market trend to Diskless Blades reduces network
management cost and increases availability by consolidating storage
resources and taking advantage of RAID capabilities within a storage
array. Booting from SAN allows blades on a storage network to boot their
operating system directly from a SAN storage device. Boot from SAN
functionality is provided by the boot BIOS contained on the Emulex 4Gb/s
Fibre Channel expansion card for the IBM BladeCenter (IBM: 39Y9186).
When properly confgured, the Emulex expansion card directs the blade
to boot from a LUN within a storage array as if it were a local disk. This
Emulex white paper provides an overview of the steps required to create
a boot from SAN confguration using an Emulex 4Gb/s Fibre Channel
expansion card for the IBM BladeCenter.
Switch Module Confguration
Depending on the switch module used in the BladeCenter chassis, the
user should take care in setting up appropriate switch confguration
settings including zoning, port speed and other parameters. If you have
a QLogic or McData 4Gb/s 10/20 port switch module in your BladeCenter,
you must confgure the switch port associated with the Emulex FC
expansion card to a fxed negotiation speed of 4Gb/s, rather than the
default of Auto. To change confguration settings, obtain the IP address
of the switch module and telnet to it. Appropriate login information is
required to access the switch.

Enabling Emulex Boot from SAN
on IBM BladeCenter
At A glAnCe
More and more system administrators
are migrating to Boot from SAN for
their server networks to reduce system
management costs and increase up-
time. This paper provides a step-by-step
boot from SAN guide for confguring IBMs
Emulex Fibre Channel expansion card with
the IBM BladeCenter products.
ProduCtS
Emulex LightPulse

4Gb/s Fibre Channel

expansion card for the IBM BladeCenter,
IBM Part Number: 39Y9186
IBM BladeCenter Servers
IBM System Storage Arrays

emulex BIoS Confguration

The default confguration for the Emulex expansion card is that the x86 BootBIOS in the Universal Boot Code image is
enabled at startup allowing access to the BIOS utility on power up. Boot from SAN requires that the BIOS also be enabled
at the adapter port level, allowing for proper selection of boot devices during initialization. Press the [<Alt> and E] or
[<Crtl> and E] keys to get into the Emulex BIOS utility menu.
The following example shows setting
port 6 negotiation speed to 4Gb/s:
When fnished modifying port settings,
save confguration changes using
the confg save command on the
command line.
Type exit to terminate the Telnet
session.
The dual-port adapter will appear as
two adapters, representing the frst
and second port. Select the adapter
you wish to confgure.
After the proper adapter is selected,
select 2 to confgure the adapters
parameters.
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From the Confgure Adapters

Parameters menu, select 1 to enable
the BIOS. The default values for all
other options should be satisfactory in
the IBM Blade environment.
This screen shows the BIOS disabled.
Select 1 to enable the BIOS.
The BIOS is now enabled. Press <Esc>
to return to the Confgure Adapters
Parameters menu.
Press <Esc> one more time to return
to the Main Confguration menu. You
are now ready to confgure your boot
devices.

Boot from SAn Confguration

The Emulex adapter supports FC_AL: (public and private loop) and fabric point-to-point. During initialization, the adapter
will determine the appropriate network topology and scan for all possible target devices. The eight boot entries will be zero
by default. Select 1 to confgure boot devices.
A list of eight boot devices is shown.
The primary boot device is the
frst entry shown, and it is the frst
bootable device. Select a boot entry
to confgure. (Select 1 in the example to
confgure.)
tArget deVICe FAIloVer: If the frst boot entry fails due to a
hardware error, the system can boot from the second bootable entry.
If the second boot entry fails, the system will boot from the third
bootable entry and so on, up to eight distinct entries. This provides
failover protection by automatically redirecting the boot device without
user intervention.
Select 1 to confgure the boot devices.
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At initialization, Emulex will scan for all

possible targets or boot devices. If
the HBA is attached to a storage array,
the storage device will be visible. To
view the LUNs select the storage
array controller. The following example
shows two arrays within the entry
feld. Select 01, press enter.
A pop-up window will request entry
of the starting LUN number to display.
Enter 00 to display the frst 16 LUNS.
A listing of the frst 16 LUNs (if
available) is shown. When more than
16 LUNs are defned, only 16 will be
shown at a time. Enter a higher number
LUN in the prior step if another LUN
is desired. Enter the number of the
desired boot LUN. (02 is selected in
the example.)
deVICe SCAnnIng: The adapter scans the fabric for Fibre Channel
devices and lists all the connected devices by DID and WWPN.
Information about each device is listed, for example, starting LUN
number, vendor ID, product ID, and product revision level.

Multi-Port Failover Boot from SAn Confguration

The Emulex expansion card supports port failover at boot
time. In a blade system with both adapter ports confgured
for boot, the boot sequence proceeds from one adapter port
to the next if the fabric or storage connected to that adapter
port is not available. This allows each port to be confgured
with a unique path to the identical storage, thereby providing
adapter failover capability.
In order to take advantage of multi-port failover boot, your
storage controller must have the ability to do automatic LUN
failover, rather than controller level failover. For example, on
IBM DS3000 and DS4000 Storage Subsystems, has a built-
in feature within the controller frmware called Automatic
Volume Transfer (AVT) that enables logical drive-level
failover. AVT is disabled by default and is automatically
enabled based on the failover options supported by the host
Once complete, press x to exit and
save your confguration. Your HBAs
BootBIOS should now be properly
confgured to boot from a SAN on the
attached storage device.
Once the proper LUN is selected,
another menu will prompt you to
specify how the boot device will be
identifed. It is recommended to use
the Worldwide Port Name (WWPN)
for all boot from SAN confgurations.
Select item 1 to boot this device via
the WWPN.
Press y to reboot your system.
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BIoS ConSIderAtIonS: There

may be slight differences within the
System BIOS Confguration and Setup
Utility depending on the BladeCenter
model and BIOS version being used.
Knowledge of BIOS and ROM memory
space usage may be required in certain
situations. Legacy PC architecture
limits ROM image memory space to
128K maximum, and this limit becomes
a concern if more devices that require
ROM space are desired.
Under Devices and I/O ports, do the
following:
1. Disable Planar SCSI
2. Enable Daughter Card Slot 1
3. If it is available, select the IDE/
SAS/SATA confguration menu and
disable primary and secondary
type you specifed. AVT is set by the host type and on a
per-LUN basis. Meaning, heterogeneous support is now
extended across all operating system types. However,
certain operating systems and OS confgurations do not
allow for AVT to be enabled, such as Linux-CL, VMware
and Windows Clustering. In those cases, you will not
be able to use multi-port failover boot. Please refer
to the controller hardware documentation for further
information.
System BIoS Confguration
Once the boot BIOS is enabled on the Emulex expansion
card, youll need to set up the system BIOS within the
Server Blade. This can be accomplished by powering
off or rebooting the Server Blade and pressing the F1
key. The following example is from the IBM HS20 Server
Blade module.
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www.emulex.com
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Upon system reboot, the Server Blade will now be
directed to use the boot device designated on the SAN as
its primary disk. Install the operating system by following
guidelines described in the Boot Code User Manual for
Emulex HBAs, which is available at www.emulex.com.
Keep in mind that this manual provides a general guideline
for confguring boot from SAN, and any effort to create a
remote boot environment should be well planned.
Summary
Emulex HBAs provide a seamless method for creating
diskless servers within IBM BladeCenter confgurations.
Emulex also provide Fibre Channel port failover in a
boot from SAN Confguration. Proper setup saves
administrators valuable time to get boot from SAN
systems up and running with minimal effort. The Emulex
LightPulse 4Gb/s Fibre Channel Expansion Card for
the IBM BladeCenter (IBM: PN 39Y9186) provides fully
interoperable solutions that seamlessly integrate into the
IBM BladeCenter portfolio of products.
This document refers to various companies and products by their trade names. In most, if not all cases, their respective companies claim these designations as trademarks or
registered trademarks. This information is provided for reference only. Although this information is believed to be accurate and reliable at the time of publication, Emulex assumes
no responsibility for errors or omissions. Emulex reserves the right to make changes or corrections without notice. This report is the property of Emulex Corporation and may not be
duplicated without permission from the Company.
From the Start Options menu, select
Daughter Card Slot 1 for the PCI
Device Boot Priority.
Select Save Settings and Exit.
From the main Confguration/Setup
Utility, select Start Options. Verify
that the Startup Sequence Option is
confgured as follows:
1. CD ROM
2. Diskette Drive 0
3. Hard disk 0 (HBA associated
with this Server Blade)
4. Network