Description
This incidence indicates the OSA/Avocent IPMI (Intelligent Platform Management Interface) driver is either not installed at all or not installed properly on a Windows system.
The OSA/Avocent IPMI driver communicates with the BMC (Baseboard Management Controller) on many IBM systems. The BMC is an IPMI compliant service processor. IPMI is one of the leading industry standards for server platform management.
Service processors, sometimes also called management controllers or management processors, are used not only to monitor system health but also to manage systems. IBM RSA-II (Remote Supervisor Adapter II) is another kind of service processor that IBM offers. Often, these management controllers also provide out-of-band management capability, which allows systems to be managed remotely even if the OS is absent or the system is not fully powered on.
The OSA/Avocent IPMI driver is a required component for the OS or applications to communicate with the BMC and access its platform management functionality. Many IBM platform management tools also require this driver to be in place. Such tools include ASU (Advanced Settings Utility), DSA (Dynamic System Analysis), ESA (Electronic Service Agent), Director Agent, and Hardware Management Pack for Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007.
See the "Additional information" section below for the download location of the OSA/Avocent IPMI device driver.
Causes
The OSA/Avocent IPMI device driver is not installed at all or not installed properly.
Note that on Windows Server 2008 or later, the native Microsoft IPMI driver is used in place of the OSA/Avocent IPMI driver. The OSA/Avocent IPMI device driver should be uninstalled and should not be installed on Windows Server 2008 or later.
Implications
For a Windows Server 2003 system (or earlier) running on an IBM platform that includes a BMC, when the OSA/Avocent IPMI driver is missing, hardware component instrumentations by the BMC will not be available for systems management software (for example, IBM Director or Microsoft Operations Manager).
However, if an RSA-II (Remote Supervisor Adapter II) and its software stack are properly installed on the system, systems management software supported by IBM Director Agent will still be able to perform platform management through RSA-II. However, you should install the driver so that other IBM platform management tools can also take full advantage of the built-in management functionality that comes with IBM systems.
Resolutions
1. Follow the steps provided in the "Additional information" section below to download the latest version of the OSA/Avocent IPMI device driver. Then follow the instructions to install the driver.
2. As an alternative, consider installing an IBM RSA-II on the system to enable system management functionality without requiring a device driver. See "Additional information" for more information about IBM RSA-II.
Additional information
To download the latest OSA IPMI device driver, the latest BMC firmware, or both, visit the "IBM System x support search" Web site, select "Download" for "Task", and then select the "Product Family", "Machine type", and "Operating system" values of interest. Then, to download the latest device driver, select "OSA IPMI" in the "Refine results" list; to download the latest BMC firmware, select "Baseboard Management Controller (BMC)" instead. In the result list, click the appropriate link. For BladeCenter x86 blade servers, visit the IBM BladeCenter support search Web site and follow similar steps.
To troubleshoot issues with the OSA IPMI device driver or the BMC, visit the "IBM System x support search" Web site, select "Troubleshooting" for "Task", and then select the "Product Family", "Machine type", and "Operating system" values of interest. Then, for "Refine results" select either "OSA IPMI" or "Baseboard Management Controller (BMC)". In the result list, follow the appropriate links, and then read through the articles and follow the applicable instructions. For BladeCenter x86 blade servers, visit the IBM BladeCenter support search Web site and follow similar steps.
For the compatibility matrix between IBM System x systems and Windows, consult IBM ServerProven System x and xSeries compatibility - Microsoft.
For complete product information about IBM RSA-II, visit IBM Remote Supervisor Adapter II. To plan for systems management upgrades with RSA-II, consult IBM ServerProven System x System Management Upgrades.
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