How does DMX test the SPS's

Thanks Mike - way more info that I have been able to achieve on my own. Great stuff.

Spawned questions:
*If a test fails against a battery, do the remaining batteries continue to get tested?

*Do battery tests also run against the batteries contained within a DAE POD? If yes, and a battery immediately fails, again, would the second battery get tested? What if that battery too fails?

Thanks,

Hi VMC,

Hmmm, sounds familiar. I just answered the same question for an EMC Field person for one of our customers I don't know of any documentation that describes the battery test, but I can try to explain a little.

In general, every SPS will be tested each month. How often the battery test runs in the system depends on how large the system is. In other words, how many SPS need to be tested in the month.

When the test begins, it first checks for any environmental issues in the system and if any existing problems are found, the test will not run. If all is OK with the system, the individual SPS is forced to go on battery power for a set period of time, and then measurements are taken. If measurements are below a predefined threshold then its marked as bad. It can also be marked as bad if it takes too long to charge back up after the test has completed.

If the test fails the results are logged and the system will call home to the EMC Customer Support Center for investigation.

If the test passes, the results are logged and the system will wait for the next scheduled time to test the next SPS.

Mike

Last one - I promise. Our account team said the test happens once a week and is configurable. You mentioned that it will test once a month. Is either of these two responses the default?

1) If a test fails against a battery, do the remaining batteries continue to get tested? No, not until the "failed" SPS situation is corrected (most likely that would be a replacement). If the first SPS is marked as bad, then the next scheduled run will detect that there is an existing power component problem and will not begin.

2) Do battery tests also run against the batteries contained within a DAE POD? Yes.

3) If yes, and a battery immediately fails, again, would the second battery get tested? No, same as question 1 above. This applies to any SPS in the entire system.

4) What if that battery too fails? I don't think this is applicable if it won't get tested.

Mike

DMX-1 / DMX-2 also had a way of scheduling the test once per week or month etc. But there were far less batteries to test in DMX-1 / DMX-2. With the increased amount of SPS modules to test in DMX-3 / DMX-4 (especially with larger configs), if we only tested 1 per week or month, it could take quite a while to cycle through them all. I do not know a way of scheduling the test like that in DMX-3 / DMX-4.

But remember also that I did not say we run the test once a month. We test every SPS once a month (roughly). So the test will run about as many times per month as there are SPS modules in the system. That's different than scheduling the test to run once per month.

Hope all this helps.

Mike

Hello, primus solution emc192643 is customer viewable and talks about how the SPS's are configured and how they are tested, but it does not mention how often they run.

That is how the SPS on a CLARiiON is tested. It is a weekly test and the time that the test is run is configurable through Navisphere. Maybe your account team had the two confused. The DMX-4 uses the same SPS as the Cx3-80 and the Cx4s I believe.