NS3000/iX Operations and Maintenance Reference Manual (36922-90039)

Chapter 4 59
Troubleshooting Process
To Identify Problems
6. If more than one user is involved, does the problem affect all users?
The entire node? If so, has anything changed recently? Some
possibilities are:
• New software and hardware installation.
• Same hardware but changes to the software. Has the
configuration file been modified? Has the MPE/iX configuration
been changed?
• Same software but changes to the hardware.
7. Do you suspect hardware or software?
It is often difficult to determine whether the problem is hardware or
software related. Symptoms that mean you should suspect the
hardware are:
• Bad LAN card or PSI dumps.
• Link level errors, either returned to the user or logged to the
console. This includes CI errors, NMERR errors, power fails, and
link shutdowns.
• Lost data—data is sent but not received at the link destination.
(This could also be caused by a software problem.)
Symptoms that mean you should suspect the software are:
• Logging messages at the console.
• Network Services errors returned to users or programs.
• MPE/iX file system (FSERR) or command interface (CIERR)
errors (except “Remote Not Responding” errors).
• Data corruption.
• Terminal hangs.
• Intermittent errors.
• Network-wide problems.
To Identify the Cause of Problems
The type of investigation that you use to identify the possible causes of
a problem depends on whether the problem affects one user or an
individual situation, or if the problem is node-wide. Once you have the
answers to the questions listed previously, use the flowchart in Figure
4-1 as a guide and see Chapter 5, “Common Network Problems,” for a
problem resolution strategy.