| Home | Current Systems | Former STK Products | EOL Systems | Components | General Info | Search | Feedback |
| Oracle System Handbook - ISO 7.0 May 2018 Internal/Partner Edition | ||
|
|
||
 |
||||||||||||||||
Solution Type Technical Instruction Sure Solution 1601740.1 : [SPARC T4/T5] Booting primary and guest domains with EFI/GPT labeled Disk
In this Document
Created from <SR 3-7838172231> Applies to:SPARC T5-4 - Version All Versions to All Versions [Release All Releases]Netra SPARC T4-2 Server - Version All Versions to All Versions [Release All Releases] SPARC T5-2 - Version All Versions to All Versions [Release All Releases] Netra SPARC T4-1B - Version All Versions to All Versions [Release All Releases] SPARC T4-1 - Version All Versions to All Versions [Release All Releases] Oracle Solaris on SPARC (64-bit) GoalThe purpose of this document is to discuss how to create a bootable EFI/GPT disk on SPARC T4 and T5 platform SolutionSMI and EFI/GPT Label
In Solaris a disk partition and label is required before a filesystem ( ZFS or UFS ) can be created on a physical raw disk.
Other disk management software like Oracle ASM or Solaris Volume Manager also requires a disk label and partition before the
physical disk can be used by these disk management software.
Solaris currently support 2 types of disk labeling on SPARC ,they are SMI label and EFI/GPT label.
Virtual Table of Contents (VTOC) Label is also known as the Sun Microsystems Inc (SMI) Disk label, The SMI label was the
default disk label used by Solaris when it was originally derived from AT&T SVR V (4.2) UNIX. The Solaris VTOC (SMI) implemention
is similar but not identical to AT&T SVR V (4.2) UNIX VTOC. The SMI label's significant limitation is that SMI label does
not support disk larger than 2TB.
An example of a disk with a traditional VTOC/SMI label will have 8 partitions (0-7)
Example A (Solaris format/partition utility)
partition> p
Current partition table (default):
Total disk cylinders available: 24620 + 2 (reserved cylinders)
Part Tag Flag Cylinders Size Blocks
0 root wm 0 - 90 128.37MB (91/0/0) 262899
1 swap wu 91 - 181 128.37MB (91/0/0) 262899
2 backup wu 0 - 24619 33.92GB (24620/0/0) 71127180
3 unassigned wm 0 0 (0/0/0) 0
4 unassigned wm 0 0 (0/0/0) 0
5 unassigned wm 0 0 (0/0/0) 0
6 usr wm 182 - 24619 33.67GB (24438/0/0) 70601382
7 unassigned wm 0 0 (0/0/0) 0
partition>
GUID Partition Table (GPT) is an industry standard definition for disk partition table, GPT is part of the Unified Extensible
Firmware Interface (UEFI) standard. In Solaris we call this the EFI/GPT label. EFI/GPT label is required to support DISK
greater that 2TB in size, Solaris ZFS uses EFI/GPT labels by default. The EFI label standard can support up to 128 partitions,
Solaris currently supports 7 partitions for disk with EFI/GPT labels.
Example of EFI label with default partition. Slice 0 contains all the usable sector of the disk and slice 8 contains the
alternate sector.
Example B (Solaris format/partition utility)
partition> print
Current partition table (default):
Total disk sectors available: 285673405 + 16384 (reserved sectors)
Part Tag Flag First Sector Size Last Sector
0 usr wm 34 136.22GB 285673438
1 unassigned wm 0 0 0
2 unassigned wm 0 0 0
3 unassigned wm 0 0 0
4 unassigned wm 0 0 0
5 unassigned wm 0 0 0
6 unassigned wm 0 0 0
8 reserved wm 285673439 8.00MB 285689822
partition>
Another example of a disk with EFI label with customize 7 partitions (0-6 ),slice 8 contains the alternate sector.
Example C (Solaris format/partition utility)
partition> print
Current partition table (original):
Total disk sectors available: 285673405 + 16384 (reserved sectors)
Part Tag Flag First Sector Size Last Sector
0 usr wm 34 100.00GB 209715233
1 usr wm 209715234 1.00GB 211812385
2 usr wm 211812386 1.00GB 213909537
3 usr wm 213909538 1.00GB 216006689
4 usr wm 216006690 1.00GB 218103841
5 usr wm 218103842 1.00GB 220200993
6 usr wm 220200994 1.00GB 222298145
8 reserved wm 285673439 8.00MB 285689822
partition>
The quickest way to determine from Solaris if the disk is EFI/GPT labelled is to check the partitions on the disk with Solaris format
utility, an EFI/GPT labeled disk will have partition 8 while an SMI labeled will have partition 7.
The issue with EFI labeled disk is that it could not be configured as a bootable device on SPARC systems. This had not been
a major limitation because the largest bootable internal disk that is qualified on a SPARC T5 is 600GB in capacity (as of November 2013).
System Firmware 8.4+ (SPARC T4) and 9.1+ (SPARC T5) removes this EFI/GPT booting limitation.
Disk Relabeling
The label on the physical disk may be changed by doing the following.
WARNING: Deleting the disk label and relabeling the disk will destroy ALL DATA on the disk.
STEP 1: delete the disk label with "dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/rdsk/cXtXdXsX count=100
Example D
t5-8-a:/dev/dsk# dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/rdsk/c13t4d0s0 bs=512 count=100
100+0 records in
100+0 records out
root@t5-8-sin06-a:/dev/dsk#
STEP 2: Relabel the disk with the command "format -e cXt4XdX "
Example E
root@t5-8-a:~# format -e c13t4d0
selecting c13t4d0
[disk formatted]
FORMAT MENU:
disk - select a disk
type - select (define) a disk type
partition - select (define) a partition table
current - describe the current disk
format - format and analyze the disk
repair - repair a defective sector
label - write label to the disk
analyze - surface analysis
defect - defect list management
backup - search for backup labels
verify - read and display labels
inquiry - show disk ID
scsi - independent SCSI mode selects
cache - enable, disable or query SCSI disk cache
volname - set 8-character volume name
!<cmd> - execute <cmd>, then return
quit
format> label
[0] SMI Label
[1] EFI Label
Specify Label type[1]: 1
Ready to label disk, continue? yes
format>
format> par
PARTITION MENU:
0 - change `0' partition
1 - change `1' partition
2 - change `2' partition
3 - change `3' partition
4 - change `4' partition
5 - change `5' partition
6 - change `6' partition
select - select a predefined table
modify - modify a predefined partition table
name - name the current table
print - display the current table
label - write partition map and label to the disk
!<cmd> - execute <cmd>, then return
quit
partition> print
Current partition table (original):
Total disk sectors available: 285673405 + 16384 (reserved sectors)
Part Tag Flag First Sector Size Last Sector
0 usr wm 34 136.22GB 285673438
1 unassigned wm 0 0 0
2 unassigned wm 0 0 0
3 unassigned wm 0 0 0
4 unassigned wm 0 0 0
5 unassigned wm 0 0 0
6 unassigned wm 0 0 0
8 reserved wm 285673439 8.00MB 285689822
partition>
EFI/GPT boot disk requirement
Booting EFI/GPT boot disk on SPARC T4 and SPARC T5 requires that the following minimum software requirement must be met. Note:The Solaris 11.1 installer will prompt that the disk be relabeled to SMI label if OBP firmware does not support EFI/GPT boot. System Firmware 8.4 and System Firmware 9.1 includes SPARC OBP software enhancement bug 15779737, This enhanced feature has been bundled into OBP build 4.35.3. Bug 15779737 - SUNBT7154725 OBP should support booting from GPT-partitioned devices EFI/GPT Disk OVM SPARC (LDOM) environment
In a guest LDOM environment, the EFI/GPT label disk should be allocated through DIO (Direct I/O). DIO is a way of exposing the PCI
rootcomplex or PCI device endpoints to the Guest Domain.
Assigning and EFI/GPT labeled disk slice as a backend resource to an LDOM virtual disk server will cause solaris to fail during
solaris Guest LDOM installation. This is a known Solaris issue and is currently being fix.
In the example below an EFI/GPT labeled disk is attached to a QLE2562 Fibre Controller on PCIE slot 5. The PCIe rootcomplex pci_8
which control's PCIE slot 5 is assigned as a DIO resource to guest domain (guestdom1).
Example F
Primary Domain
---------------
root@t5-8-a:~# ldm list
NAME STATE FLAGS CONS VCPU MEMORY UTIL NORM UPTIME
primary active -n-cv- UART 16 128G 0.2% 0.2% 23h 43m
guestdom1 active -n---- 5000 128 128G 0.0% 0.0% 17h 16m
root@t5-8-sin06-a:~# ldm list -o physio guestdom1
NAME
guestdom1
IO
DEVICE PSEUDONYM OPTIONS
pci@500 pci_8
pci@500/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e /SYS/RCSA/PCIE5
root@t5-8-a:~#
Example G
Guest Domain ( guestdom1 )
-------------
root@solaris:~# zpool status rpool
pool: rpool
state: ONLINE
scan: none requested
config:
NAME STATE READ WRITE CKSUM
rpool ONLINE 0 0 0
c3t4d0 ONLINE 0 0 0
errors: No known data errors
root@solaris:~#
root@solaris:~# format
Searching for disks...done
AVAILABLE DISK SELECTIONS:
0. c3t4d0 <SUN-CSM200_R-0760-136.23GB>
/pci@500/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e/SUNW,qlc@0/fp@0,0/ssd@w201500a0b811fc24,0
1. c3t4d1 <SUN-CSM200_R-0760-136.23GB>
/pci@500/pci@1/pci@0/pci@e/SUNW,qlc@0/fp@0,0/ssd@w201500a0b811fc24,1
Specify disk (enter its number): 0
selecting c3t4d0
[disk formatted]
/dev/dsk/c3t4d0s0 is part of active ZFS pool rpool. Please see zpool(1M).
FORMAT MENU:
disk - select a disk
type - select (define) a disk type
partition - select (define) a partition table
current - describe the current disk
format - format and analyze the disk
repair - repair a defective sector
label - write label to the disk
analyze - surface analysis
defect - defect list management
backup - search for backup labels
verify - read and display labels
inquiry - show disk ID
volname - set 8-character volume name
!<cmd> - execute <cmd>, then return
quit
format> partition
PARTITION MENU:
0 - change `0' partition
1 - change `1' partition
2 - change `2' partition
3 - change `3' partition
4 - change `4' partition
5 - change `5' partition
6 - change `6' partition
select - select a predefined table
modify - modify a predefined partition table
name - name the current table
print - display the current table
label - write partition map and label to the disk
!<cmd> - execute <cmd>, then return
quit
partition> print
Current partition table (original):
Total disk sectors available: 285673405 + 16384 (reserved sectors)
Part Tag Flag First Sector Size Last Sector
0 usr wm 256 136.22GB 285673438
1 unassigned wm 0 0 0
2 unassigned wm 0 0 0
3 unassigned wm 0 0 0
4 unassigned wm 0 0 0
5 unassigned wm 0 0 0
6 unassigned wm 0 0 0
8 reserved wm 285673439 8.00MB 285689822
partition>
References<NOTE:1012091.1> - Overview of Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) Disk Labels Versus Volume Table of Contents (VTOC) in the Solaris Operating System<NOTE:1594662.1> - [SPARC T3/T4 and T5] OVM SPARC: LDOM: PCI Root Complex Table <NOTE:1017927.1> - Understanding the Disk Label (VTOC) Attachments This solution has no attachment |
||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||