VERITAS Volume Manager 3.1 Administrator's Guide

Disk Tasks
Detecting Failed Disks
Chapter 4 175
Detecting Failed Disks
NOTE The Volume Manager hot-relocation feature automatically detects disk
failures and notifies the system administrator of the failures by
electronic mail. If hot-relocation is disabled or you miss the electronic
mail, you can see disk failures through the output of the vxprint
command or by using the graphical user interface to look at the status of
the disks. You can also see driver error messages on the console or in the
system messages file.
If a volume has a disk I/O failure (for example, because the disk has an
uncorrectable error), the Volume Manager can detach the plex involved
in the failure.
If a plex is detached, I/O stops on that plex but continues on the
remaining plexes of the volume. If a disk fails completely, the Volume
Manager can detach the disk from its disk group.
If a disk is detached, all plexes on the disk are disabled. If there are any
unmirrored volumes on a disk when it is detached, those volumes are
also disabled.
Partial Disk Failure
If hot-relocation is enabled when a plex or disk is detached by a failure,
mail indicating the failed objects is sent to root. If a partial disk failure
occurs, the mail identifies the failed plexes. For example, if a disk
containing mirrored volumes fails, mail information is sent as shown in
the following display:
To: root
Subject: Volume Manager failures on host teal
Failures have been detected by the VERITAS Volume
Manager:
failed plexes:
home-02
src-02
To determine which disk is causing the failures in the above example
message, enter the following command: