Created attachment 490796 [details]
Noisy boot scroll for X4600 M2 with Emulex FC HBA

Description of problem:

Since updating to kernel 2.6.18-238.5.1.el5 boots have become extremely noisy with regard to dealing with the ghost path of an ready/ghost pair of connections to a Sun 2540 disk array.  This happens on all of our Sun X4600 M2 servers with both QLogic and Emulex FC HBAs.

Example output of "multipath -ll":

datavol (3600a0b800038b3e500000224477df1d2) dm-2 SUN,LCSM100_F
[size=1.5T][features=1 queue_if_no_path][hwhandler=1 rdac][rw]
\_ round-robin 0 [prio=100][active]
 \_ 2:0:0:0 sdc 8:32  [active][ready]
\_ round-robin 0 [prio=0][enabled]
 \_ 1:0:0:0 sdb 8:16  [active][ghost]


Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):

kernel-2.6.18-238.5.1.el5


How reproducible:

Every boot.


Steps to Reproduce:
1. Move from kernel 2.6.18-194.32.1.el5 to 2.6.18-238.5.1.el5
2. Reboot
3. Watch scroll
  

Actual results:

Extremely noisy boot when checking ghost path.  Attempt to use various incorrect SCSI drivers for ghost path.  Error on attempting to insmod dm-multipath as it's already loaded, yet still give "Buffer I/O error" when attempting to access said ghost path.  Various worrying "FLOGI" failures.


Expected results:

No noise.  Not only should it not be seemingly trying a succession of drivers for the HBA, it should also have loaded dm-multipath early enough that the "Buffer I/O error on device sdb" should also not be happening.  Appearance of "FLOGI" messages equally disturbing.