Booting And Resetting Npartitions; Overview Of Npartition System Booting - HP Rp7410 - Server - 0 MB RAM Administrator's Manual

5 Booting and Resetting nPartitions

This chapter introduces nPartition system boot and reset concepts, configuration options, and
procedures for booting and resetting nPartitions.
This chapter covers boot details for HP-UX, HP OpenVMS I64, Microsoft® Windows® Server
2003, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and the SuSE Linux Enterprise Server operating systems.
Differences in the nPartition boot process on PA-RISC systems and Intel® Itanium®-based
systems also are addressed in this chapter.
CAUTION:
in nPars boot mode. Likewise, an nPartition on an HP Integrity server cannot boot an operating
system outside of a virtual partition when in vPars boot mode.
For details, refer to
NOTE: For details on boot and reset of nPartitions running vPars software, refer to Installing
and Managing HP-UX Virtual Partitions (vPars).

Overview of nPartition System Booting

This section provides an overview of the nPartition system boot process for HP 9000 servers and
HP Integrity servers.
On cell-based HP servers, system resources are configured into one or more nPartitions. Each
nPartition includes the cells (with processors and memory) assigned to it and the I/O that is
connected to those cells.
An nPartition can boot and reboot independently of any other nPartitions in the same server
complex. Each nPartition runs its own firmware and has its own system boot environment.
nPartitions provide hardware and software fault isolation: a reset, TOC, or MCA in one nPartition
does not affect any other nPartition in most cases.
Each nPartition is effectively an independent system that follows the boot processes outlined in
the following lists.
process on HP 9000 servers (PA-RISC systems).
Servers shows an overview of the boot process on HP Integrity servers (Itanium® 2-based
systems).
Also refer to
Boot Overview for Cell-Base HP 9000 Servers
processors and have the following boot process:
1. PDC Self Test
2. PDC Boot
3. Boot Console Handler (BCH, a menu-driven boot environment)
4. Initial System Loader (ISL)
5. Secondary System Loader (hpux)
6. HP-UX Operating System
Boot Overview for Cell-Based HP Integrity Servers
Itanium® processors and have the following boot process:
1. Processor Abstraction Layer (PAL)
2. System Abstraction Layer (SAL)
3. Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI)
4. EFI Boot Manager (menu-driven boot environment)
An nPartition on an HP Integrity server cannot boot HP-UX virtual partitions when
"Boot Modes on HP Integrity nPartitions: nPars and vPars Modes" (page
Boot Overview for Cell-Base HP 9000 Servers
"Boot Process for Cells and nPartitions" (page 32)
shows an overview of the boot
Boot Overview for Cell-Based HP Integrity
for details.
Cell-based HP 9000 servers have PA-RISC
Cell-based HP Integrity servers have Intel®
Overview of nPartition System Booting
94).
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