IT Blog

So I’ve got the following error on Cisco UCS IOmodule it came out of nowhere.

left IOM 4/1 (A) POST failure
Code: F0481

So the fix could be very simple try reseating or resetting the IOmodule that is giving the problem.
Before you attempt to do that make sure that you the other IOmodule in the Chassis is working fine and all the blades in the chassis have other path available when the IOmodule is reseated. If you have only one IOmodule then you would need to power down the blades first.

Here I’ll show how to reset IOmodule from UCSM.

First select the IOmodule that is giving problems and click Reset IO Module

You’ll be prompted to confirm

You should see now that IOmodule is not reachable and one path for Chassis is down.
Also Critical errors and Warnings will be logged.

Wait for the IOmodule to comeback and the errors to clear.

If all is clear then monitor this module for couple weeks or so. If the same Error appears on IOmodule then call Cisco support to get the module replaced. I’ve seen where the error would reappear after 2-7 days. In that case call Cisco support to get IOmodule replaced.

Cisco has release UCS emulator 2.0 last week.
You can grab it here.

Couple days ago Cisco has relesed version 2.0 of software/firmware for UCS.

Cisco Unified Computing System(UCS) is quite new compared to well know server providers like HP, Dell, IBM but during a short period of time it achieved quite a lot.
For anyone who wants to see what UCS is or just simply try out, Cisco has released UCS Emulator.
UCS emulator is pretty powerful tool it allows users to emulate UCS environment. So you can add your chassis, servers, CPUs, RAM, PSUs etc. The other interesting feature is that it allows to import hardware configuration from a live environment. It cannot import everything but is pretty close.
This post will show you how setup and use UCS emulator.
Before you start you’ll need to download UCS emulator also you need to install VMware Player or Workstation on your computer.
http://developer.cisco.com/web/unifiedcomputing/ucsemulatordownload download 7z file (you’ll need Cisco login to download it, just register). The emulator requires 1GB of RAM dedicated to the VM so make sure you have enough memory.
http://www.vmware.com/go/downloadplayer (again you need to login to download)

Extract the files from 7z archive to a new folder.
Install VMware player/Workstation this will require a reboot.
(continue reading…)