Sun Fire V210/V240/V250 Systems Pre-Installed With Solaris 9 May Fail to Boot Properly When a USB Keyboard and Mouse Are Added

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Impact

A Sun Fire V210/V240/V250 server pre-installed with Solaris 9 operating system may fail to boot properly when a USB keyboard and mouse are added. As a result, systems will be unable to use any USB devices. This will inhibit the use of a Graphic console display which is dependant upon a USB keyboard and mouse.

Contributing Factors

This issue can occur in the following configurations:

SPARC Platform

• Sun Fire V210 Server with pre-installed Solaris 9 (S9U5+JES1)
• Sun Fire V240 Server with pre-installed Solaris 9 (S9U5+JES1)
• Sun Fire V250 Server with pre-installed Solaris 9 (S9U5+JES1)

This issue only affects Sun Fire V210, V240, and V250 servers with the following part numbers:

Sun Fire V210

• N31-XUB1B1512HA
• N31-XUB2B1204HB

Sun Fire V240

• N32-XUB1B1512HA
• N32-XWB2B1204HB
• N32-XWB2B1808HB

Sun Fire V250

• A50-XUB1-B1-512HA1
• A50-XWB2-B1-202HB1
• A50-XWB2-B1-819HB1
• A50-XUB1-B1-512HA1-IP
• A50-XWB2-B1-202HB1-IP
• A50-XWB2-B1-819HB1-IP

To determine if a system was pre-installed with the S9U5+JES1 operating system, look for the following entry in the "/etc/system" file:

    exclude: drv/ohci

If the above entry exists, the system was pre-installed with the S9U5+JES1 operating system and is vulnerable to the described issue.

Symptoms

If the described issue occurs, the following error will be seen on the console upon bootup:

    Error with console keyboard

The above message will also be found in the "/var/adm/messages" file.

Workaround

To work around the described issue, remove the following line in the "/etc/system" file and reboot the system:

    exclude: drv/ohci

This can be done by using one of the following methods:

1. If the system is configured to boot with the system console as the serial port, just type "boot" at the OBP "ok" prompt. No additional action is required.

2. If the system is connected to the network, telnet or remote login to the system and modify the "/etc/system" file as described above.

3. If the Graphic card has been installed, and, the Open Boot Prom (OBP) input-device is set to "keyboard", the output-device is set to "screen", and the USB keyboard/mouse are connected, the following procedure will allow the system to boot multi-user with a graphical interface (CDE window manager):

1. Boot the system using the "boot -a" command
2. Select the default prompts for everything except system file
3. Enter "/dev/null" for system file
4. Enter root password
5. Edit /etc/system
6. Remove the line "exclude: drv/ohci"

Resolution

The workaround provided above in the "Relief/Workaround" section is the final resolution to this issue.

Modification History




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