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Running the diagnostic programs

Use this information to run DSA Preboot.

To run the DSA Preboot diagnostic programs, complete the following steps:
  1. If the blade server is running, turn off the blade server and all attached devices.
  2. Turn on all attached devices; then, turn on the blade server.
  3. When the prompt <F2 Diagnostics> is displayed, press F2.
    Note
    DSA Preboot might appear to be nonresponsive for an unusual length of time when you start the program. This is normal operation while the program loads.
  4. Select Quit to DSA to exit from the stand-alone memory diagnostic program.
    Note
    After you exit from the stand-alone memory diagnostic environment, you must restart the blade server to access the stand-alone memory diagnostic environment again.
  5. Enter gui to launch the DSA graphical user interface, or type cmd to display the DSA interactive menu.
  6. From the diagnostic programs screen, select the test that you want to run and follow the instructions on the screen. For additional information, see the Dynamic System Analysis Installation and User's Guide, which is available at http://www.ibm.com/ support/entry/portal/docdisplay? brand=5000008&lndocid=SERV-DSA.

Help for DSA is available. For help about the DSA CLI, enter help from the command line. For help about the DSA user interface, press F1. Pressing F1 within a help panel displays additional online documentation.

To determine what action you should take as a result of a diagnostic text message or error code, see the table in Diagnostic messages.

If the diagnostic programs do not detect any hardware errors but the problem remains during normal server operations, a software error might be the cause. If you suspect a software problem, see the information that comes with your software.

A single problem might cause more than one error message. When this happens, correct the cause of the first error message. The other error messages usually will not occur the next time you run the diagnostic programs.

Important
If there are multiple error codes or light path diagnostics LEDs that indicate a microprocessor error, the error might be in a microprocessor or in a microprocessor socket.

If the blade server stops responding during testing and you cannot continue, restart the blade server and try running the diagnostic programs again. If the problem remains, replace the component that was being tested when the blade server stopped.

The diagnostic programs assume that a keyboard and mouse are attached to the BladeCenter unit and that the blade server controls them. If you run the diagnostic programs with either no mouse or a mouse attached to the BladeCenter unit that is not controlled by the blade server, you cannot use the Next Cat and Prev Cat buttons to select categories. All other mouse-selectable functions are available through function keys.

To view server configuration information such as system configuration, memory contents, interrupt request (IRQ) use, direct memory access (DMA) use, or device drivers, select Hardware Info from the top of the screen.