Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Hello people. From which version of AIX is MPIO a default feature?
Also in which version(s) of AIX MPIO must be configured explicitly?
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Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

MPIO is an AIX enhancement.

These links may help
http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/systems/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.aix.baseadmn/doc/baseadmndita/devmpio.htm

http://et.aset.psu.edu/working_notes/storage/iSCSI/docs/IBM_iSCSI_multi_path.pdf
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Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Thanks Jeffrey. Your post was informative. Frankly speaking i am new to AIX OS. I wanted to procure AIX OS. If i install AIX 5L 5.2, will MPIO feature be automatically configured or should i seperately install the MPIO Drivers?
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Originally posted by: jvk

Why do you want to use that old AIX OS level which IBM doesn't support any more? In base AIX 5.2.0 (if i remember right) there was parallel SCSI Disk support only. Later on, in some TL of AIX 5.2, IBM added FC disk support and then added other functionalities later on.
So I would suggest to use AIX 5.3 or 6.1 with one of very latest TLs. You can get them here for AIX 5.3 and here for AIX 6.1.

Next it's important what kind of storage do you use... and if you install its ODM support (provided by the disk vendor) or not.
Without any ODM support disks should come something like "other MPIO FC disks".
With non-mpio ODM support you'll not get MPIO disks (MPIO respects non-MPIO ODM support).
With mpio ODM support you'll see them like "EMC MPIO FC disks" with right disk parameters set.

MPIO comes with base AIX installation in AIX 5.3 or AIX 6.1. The "lsdev -Cc disk" should show you MPIO disks, the "lspath" theirs paths etc.
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Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Thanks jkv.
I have few doubts in your post.

Quote from your reply:
1) "Without any ODM support disks should come something like "other MPIO FC disks".
2) "With non-mpio ODM support you'll not get MPIO disks (MPIO respects non-MPIO ODM support)."

Which means for 1 and 2 scenarios, those Hard Disks will not be MPIO-ed. If i am wrong please correct me. Also are there any document that gives in detail description about ODM and commands that could be used to get HardDisk and Path details which are MPIO-ed?

Note: I will be using AIX 6.1 version.
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Originally posted by: jvk

Wrong.

"Other MPIO FC disks" ARE still real MPIO disks. They're with default disk attributes set by AIX. Better is to use also a right ODM support supplied from the disk vendor to set these disk attributes (under "lsattr -El disk#) to the vendor recommended values however one can live also w/o ODM support...

Regarding ODM and MPIO is enough to know that one needs a right ODM support (for MPIO or for "traditional" multipathing) supplied by the disk vendor and that's it. A disk vendor may have some more docs and info.

With AIX 6.1 you'll get by default MPIO disks. At least this is true for disks from IBM, EMC, HP, Hitachi and other devices if they do support "reserve_policy" and "algorithm". On top of this install MPIO ODM support, reconfigure disks and it's done.

With MPIO disks use AIX cmds like lspath, chpath, mkptah, rmpath.
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Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

Thanks JKV. I got an idea about the "other MPIO FC disks". When i go through "lspath" command, IBM documentation gives the following description for "lspath -F" option: "For path display, column names from the CuPath object class can be specified. For path attribute display (the -A flag is specified), column names from the PdPathAt and CuPathAt object classes can be specified."

Is there any command that could be executed to find what are all the column names present in the "PdPathAt" and "CuPathAt" class.?

Also is there any command that could be executed to find which subsystem is that Hard Disk connected?
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Originally posted by: SystemAdmin

use the odmshow command to get the names of fields in an ODM object class. For example:

odmshow CuPathAt
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