[geeks] On Sun Hardware

[Scott Howard]

On Tue, Nov 11, 2003 at 01:19:40AM -0600, Jonathan C. Patschke wrote:
> I was looking for newer firmware for one of work's A1000 disk arrays
> when I ran across an interestingly-titled bug report about corruption
> during long uptimes.  The following text was in the resolution section
> of the report:
> 
>   "To workaround this problem until a more permanent fix becomes
>    available, take the action to power cycle or reboot the array
>    once every 2 years or so."
>
> The fact that such a thing even needs to be said speaks volumes for the
> quality of hardware that Sun makes (or, in the case of the A1000,
> resells).

All software has bugs. As much as we would like to think otherwise, it's
a fact of life that such bugs will exist.

As for this particular bug, on the A1000 at least, it's something you will
only ever hit if you completely ignore all of Sun's recommendations
regarding A1000s.  Having an uptime of > 828 on an A1000 means that you
haven't been keeping up-to-date on firmware, but more importantly means
that you've got an expired battery, which will be having a significant
impact on performance on the A1000 (batteries expire after 730 days,
and require an outage to replace them).

As for the suggestion to reboot every 2 years, this is just an interum
workaround until a real fix can be created.  The patch which fixes this
problem is in progress and should be available soon.

  Scott.