Managing Systems and Workgroups: A Guide for HP-UX System Administrators

Configuring a System
Adding Peripherals
Chapter 3 255
Adding Peripherals
To add peripherals to your system, consult the following documentation:
• The hardware installation manual that came with the peripheral.
• For PCI OL* information, see the manual Interface Card OL*
Support Guide. For PCI OL* information on nPartition-able systems,
see the manual HP Systems Partitions Guide: Administration for
nPartitions.
PCI OL*, previously known as OLAR, is the ability to add or remove
a PCI card without needing to completely shutdown the entire
system. The system hardware combined with operating system
support allows per-slot power control. Instead of turning off the
entire system, you can turn off and on power to a specific PCI slot.
PCI latches and doorbells refer to physical latches and buttons on the
system itself that allows for enabling and disabling power to a PCI
slot.
The procedures for PCI OL* can be performed through a GUI, such
as pdweb or the Partition Manager, or through HP-UX commands,
such as rad (olrad as of 11i v2). All are documented in the preceding
manuals.
CAUTION Before attempting these procedures, please read the manuals
mentioned above. Turning off power to certain PCI slots can have
disastrous effects; for example if the PCI slot connects to an
unmirrored root or swap disk, the system will crash. Further, the I/O
card itself needs to be checked for OL* functional compatiblity as
well as compatibility to the specific PCI slot; for example, you cannot
insert a 33 MHz card to a slot running a 66 MHz bus.
• For general peripherals, see the manual Configuring HP-UX for
Peripherals.
• See the HP-UX 11i Release Notes for the titles of documents that may
be relevant to installing peripherals. Such documents may contain
specific information on the software driver and the device special file
for communication with particular peripherals.