Accessing BIOS/Booting from CD on Proliant 5000 w/OUT Smartstart CD? 1

[PapaBobDole]

Hello all,

I recently found quite a deal on a Compaq Proliant 5000 server at the Boeing surplus store. It was $75, and had 4 x PPro 200 512k proccessors, 512mb RAM, and an assortment of other goodies. I got the thing up and running, and much to my dismay, I am not able to access the bios! I've tried all the usual hotkeys during the splash screen, DEL, F2, F10, and all in any combination with ALT, CTRL, or both. No luck.

I am also getting a lot of errors on bootup from EISA stuff not matching the volatile memory config, so I clear the config via jumper. Fine. Unfortunately, the server will not allow me to boot to a CD to install an OS (I've tried SME 5.5 (ie Redhat 7.2)) and it didn't detect it as a valid bootup CD. I am only able to boot to floppies that I've created with the ROMpaq utitilities.

Now, being further intwined with my hate for proprietary technology, I discover that the BIOS supposedly can only be accessed by booting to a Smart Start CD, which I do not have. (And would cost 21.95 to acquire)

Does anyone know any way around this to just access the BIOS straight up, or to at very least install my OS without messing with it? It appears that to add / configure my hardware I am going to need to access the BIOS. Please help!

 

[Sunny79]

The BIOS on these Old Proliant systems is on the BIOS chip but the partition youre talking about is called the SCU (system configuration utility), which resides on the first 39 MB of the harddrives. That is what you access when you press F10 at POST. This SCU is installed on the server during your first setup of the OS with the smart start setup process.
If you don't have an F10 (SCU) installed on the server, then you use the SCU floppies to access the SCU On the server. These floppies are downloadable as SP14381.EXE from the HP.com website.
The best way to do your install is with the smart start CD, but if you do not have one and still want the SCU on the server, so ahead and get these SCU Floppies. When fully booted to the floppy you will see an option to install the SCU on the server, at that moment go ahead and install. After the install of the SCU you will have a 36 or 39 MB partition on your drive.
Now go ahead and install your OS, but avoid installing on the first 39MB partition you just created.
You should be OK if you follow this setup. Im not a RedHat Expert so can't go on further than this, but im positive about the SCU and how that works.
If you have any more question please ask.
Good Luck.

 

[Sunny79]

The BIOS on these Old Proliant systems is on the BIOS chip but the partition youre talking about is called the SCU (system configuration utility), which resides on the first 39 MB of the harddrives. That is what you access when you press F10 at POST. This SCU is installed on the server during your first setup of the OS with the smart start setup process.
If you don't have an F10 (SCU) installed on the server, then you use the SCU floppies to access the SCU On the server. These floppies are downloadable as SP14381.EXE from the HP.com website.
The best way to do your install is with the smart start CD, but if you do not have one and still want the SCU on the server, go ahead and get these SCU Floppies. When fully booted to the floppy you will see an option to install the SCU on the server, at that moment go ahead and install. After the install of the SCU you will have a 36 or 39 MB partition on your drive.
Now go ahead and install your OS, but avoid installing on the first 39MB partition you just created.
You should be OK if you follow this setup. Im not a RedHat Expert so can't go on further than this, but im positive about the SCU and how that works.
If you have any more question please ask.
Good Luck.

 

[Sunny79]

sorry about the double post

 

[PapaBobDole]

Thank you Sunny! I've since discovered this the hard way, I had posted on HP's forums also and one of the techs helped me find the Softpaq for the SCU disks and I did things that way. Unfortunately, one of the CPU's died and in my process of looking for a replacement on the trader boards, I found a gentleman who will provide me with a CD as well as another CPU. Now my problems go on to be more OS related, as most linux distros will not recognize the correct amount of memory due to the bios misreporting it. ??? Oh well, past the first hurdle. Thanks again!