4.1Configuration Tools
The configuration tools are preloaded on a flash ROM device embedded on the AMC. A MicroTCA or host carrier CPU can read the code to facilitate booting from SAS drives. The BIOS contains an embedded configuration manager, which you use to configure RAID or other adapter options prior to OS boot. The BIOS integrates with a standard system BIOS, extending the standard
Three types of BIOS are available for the
■Boot BIOS for Intel- and
■OpenBoot BIOS for Solaris SPARC® platforms.
■Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) BIOS for
All of these BIOS images are stored on the flash device located on the AMC.
4.2Boot BIOS Utility
The Boot BIOS utility allows you to change the default (factory) configuration of the AMC. The utility is stored in a flash device located on the AMC module. The sections that follow provide a summary of the BIOS configuration capabilities. A full description of capabilities is published in User’s Guide, Integrated RAID for SAS, available from LSI Corporation, which writes the BIOS used on the AMC.
Note – The Boot BIOS utility is disabled by default on all AMCs. To use it, enable the utility per the instructions in this chapter.
When Boot is enabled, the Boot BIOS scans for SAS hard drive disks (HDDs) connected to the AMC. It sorts which HDDs might be participating in RAID volume definitions. All discovered disks and RAID volumes are enumerated with drive letters and appended to a master list of devices discovered on the host. Upon scan completion, the host serially inspects the master list of devices beginning with drive letter A, and attempts to boot from the first device it finds with a boot record.