Installation guide

HP-UX version 11.00.03 5-1
5
Administering Fault Tolerant Hardware 5-
This chapter describes the duties related to fault-tolerant hardware administration. It
provides information about physical and logical hardware configurations, how to
determine component status, and how to manage hardware devices and MTBF
statistics. In addition, it provides information about error notification and
troubleshooting.
Fault Tolerant Hardware Administration
Continuum systems are designed for maximum serviceability. You can replace many
devices on site without special tools and without bringing down your system. Devices
are classified into two categories:
■ Customer-replaceable unit (CRU)—system devices that you can install or replace
on site. Most devices in a Continuum system, such as suitcases or CPU/memory
boards, I/O controller or adapter cards, power supplies, disk drives, tape drives,
and CD-ROM drives are CRUs.
■ Field-replaceable unit (FRU)—system devices that only trained Stratus personnel
can install or replace on site.
When the system boots, it checks each hardware path to determine whether a CRU or
FRU device is present and to record the model number of each device it finds. The
system automatically registers each device with its hardware path and initiates
on-going device maintenance. Maintenance includes the following:
■ attempt recovery, if the device suffers transient failures
■ respond to maintenance commands
■ make the device’s resources available to the system