[Info-vax] rx2620 power supplies / VRM voltage low

[Scott Dorsey]

George Cornelius <cornelius at eisner.decus.org> wrote:
>We have been through all that, and, yes, the codes are there
>at the front panel - sometimes.   The manual states that
>if you have an iLo MP the front panel status LEDs are
>disabled (all the information is in the error logs
>you can get to via the ILo) but if your system hits one
>of these fatal errors you can eventually get it to show
>up on the lights as well (pressing the halt button
>or something).

The codes are interesting.... but use the meter, and the meter will tell
you what is really going on.

>I suppose there have been four failures since last
>June, and if he had been sending back the old supply
>each time he would have been getting the replacements
>for free - until the vendor got tired of sending more
>supplies.  But it's time to swap in the spare motherboard,
>or to do what Hoff (and I) suggested and buy a 2nd
>system to swap the parts into.

Might be, but the meter will tell you if that's useful or not.  If the
supply rail values all look good, by all means swap in a new motherboard.
If the supply rails are sagging, it's time to find out why.

> o A thread in the HP forums with the same error
>   codes, which someone decoded with an, apparently,
>   HP internal tool called IPF2.  This second person
>   was corrected and told the system in question was
>   not IPF2 so the decoding would not apply.  Thread
>   was resurrected maybe a year later - maybe 2008 -
>   with someone claiming to have an _rp_ 2620, and
>   that is when the same responder was asked to _not_
>   supply information using the IPF2 tool and the
>   poster told to call field service.
>
>   What we would have been able to obtain if the
>   thread continued was the decoding of the field
>   that specified _which_ voltage sensor was
>   returned the bad reading.
>
>   One remark, maybe in response to the first
>   problem, was that the message indicated the
>   sensor itself was bad, thus muddyng the
>   waters even further.

This may well be the problem.  THIS is why the first thing you need to do
is measure the actual rail voltages.  If the voltages are good, the sensor
is bad and the motherboard should go (or at least the shunt resistors on
the motherboard should be checked).

[random blathering removed here]

>Spares are easy to come by.  My experience is, however, that
>bureaucracies and eBay just don't play well together, and
>that makes it all more difficult and expensive.

Spares that have been sitting on the shelf for a decade are apt to have 
problems resulting from years of sitting on the shelf.  That includes 
just about any rubber parts failing, thermal grease hardening up, and 
electrolytic capacitors going bad.  You don't want spares from random
sources if you can help it, you want spares that have been gone over and
refurbished by competent technicians.
--scott
-- 
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."