Monday, June 20, 2011

Disk drive in BYP (disk bypass) status

What are Drive Bypass Events?

fcal link_stats report BYP status.

Example:
localhost> fcstat device_map
Loop Map for channel 4a:
Translated Map: Port Count 28
7 29 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 45 44
43 42 41 40 39 38 37 36 35 34 33 32
Shelf mapping:
Shelf 1: 29 BYP 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16
Shelf 2: 45 44 43 42 41 40 39 38 37 36 35 34 33 32


This means that the disk id 28 has been bypassed.

Drive bypass events are situations which cause the ESH to bypass a drive port thus making it inaccessible by the host and isolating the drive from the loop. There are primarily two different kinds of drive Bypass Events:
Threshold Bypasses - Situations where the ESH detects that a certain kind of error is occurring for a specific period of time and the determination is made to bypass the port because of accumulated errors over time or over the amount of data flowing through the loop.
Policy Bypasses - Situations where the ESH detects a critical problem and bypasses a drive in order to maintain the integrity of the loop. This might be a "situational" problem which later clears, but once a drive is bypassed, it will remain bypassed until manually cleared by removing and reseating the drive, or by power cycling of the shelf.
Self Bypasses - The hard drive electronics determine that the internal circuitry cannot function properly anymore. Thus the drive itself calls to be removed from the loop.