Avoiding server downtime from hardware errors in system memory with HP Memory Quarantine

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Avoiding server downtime from hardware errors in

system memory with HP Memory Quarantine

Technology brief

Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 2

Error recovery with HP Memory Quarantine ............................................................................................ 3

Application isolation ......................................................................................................................... 4

Virtual machine isolation ................................................................................................................... 4

Error logging ................................................................................................................................... 5

OS/hypervisor support ......................................................................................................................... 6

Hardware support ............................................................................................................................... 6

Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................... 6

For more information ............................................................................................................................ 7

Summary of content (7 pages)

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Avoiding server downtime from hardware errors in system memory with HP Memory Quarantine Technology brief Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 2 Error recovery with HP Memory Quarantine ............................................................................................ 3 Application isolation...............................................................................................
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Introduction IT administrators often measure the resiliency of a server by its reliability, availability and serviceability (RAS). The reliability of a server is its ability to avoid errors and faults. The availability of a server relates to its continued operation in spite of failures or errors. The serviceability of a server is its capability to self-heal and the ease in which it can be maintained. Memory RAS is key to defining the resiliency of a server in dealing with hardware errors.
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Error recovery with HP Memory Quarantine HP Memory Quarantine allows a server to recover from uncorrectable errors that would otherwise crash the system. It is supported on HP ProLiant servers using the Intel® Xeon® 6500 and 7500 series or E7 family of processors when running MCA Recovery-aware operating systems (OSs) or hypervisors.
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Application isolation HP Memory Quarantine allows MCA Recovery-aware operating systems to avoid complete system shutdown by isolating the impact of a hard memory error to an application. A hard memory error occurring in a location used by an application (red x in Figure 2) will result in the operating system shutting down that application and then restarting it, avoiding the use of the bad memory location. No other application is affected.
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Error logging During the boot sequence following an uncorrectable memory error, the ROM BIOS will display an error message similar to that shown in Figure 4. Figure 4: Error logging by the ROM 4 Processor(s) detected, 40 total cores enabled, Hyperthreading is enabled Proc 1: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E7- 4870 @ 2.40GHz Proc 2: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E7- 4870 @ 2.40GHz Proc 3: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E7- 4870 @ 2.40GHz Proc 4: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E7- 4870 @ 2.40GHz QPI Speed: 6.
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OS or hypervisor support The following operating systems support MCA Recovery and HP Memory Quarantine: • Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.1 • Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP1 The following hypervisors support MCA Recovery and HP Memory Quarantine: • VMware ESXi 5.
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For more information Visit the URLs listed below if you need additional information. Resource description Web address Memory Technology Evolution: An Overview of System Memory Technologies http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportMan ual/c00256987/c00256987.pdf?jumpid=reg_R1002_USEN Scale-Up HP ProLiant Server Solutions http://h20195.www2.hp.com/V2/GetPDF.aspx/4AA30600ENW.pdf Send comments about this paper to TechCom@HP.com Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.