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On a HP DL380e Gen8 with Dynamics Smart Array and SAS RAID installed I try to install Centos, after load the RAID Driver from HP Support Site I can access the RAID and do the installation.

The installation works fine and my new Centos Boot on the HP Proliant Server, but when I take a look into the /var/log/messages there is a lot of (>100 per second) this lines in the log file:

Dec  9 14:03:27 server01 kernel: PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL
Dec  9 14:03:27 server01 kernel: PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL
Dec  9 14:03:27 server01 kernel: PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL
Dec  9 14:03:27 server01 kernel: PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL
Dec  9 14:03:27 server01 kernel: PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL
Dec  9 14:03:27 server01 kernel: PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL

What does this mean?

2 Answers 2

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The solution from the Red Hat paywalled support site says:

  • Issue: message output "PAL Shim AllocRequest returning NULL" iteratively.
  • Environment: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.4 with HP-tools(third-party package)
  • Resolution: Update 'hpvsa' module provided from HP, the above message is suppressed.
  • Root Cause: The 'hpvsa' module from HP is an old version.

So in this case, I should add that the Dynamic Smart Array controller is not a good solution for most environments. It requires a non-standard driver (compared to the traditional CCISS/HPSA that higher-end Smart Array controllers use). I would suggest updating the driver for your system, as that's the cause of the message flood.

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  • Thx for your answer this will solve my problem, but do you know what this mean?
    – kockiren
    Dec 10, 2013 at 8:24
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As ewwhite wrote the problem is an old driver, to update your Dynamic Smart Array Driver try this:

In centos add a new repo, add following file: /etc/yum.repos.d/HP-SPP.repo with this content:

 [HP-SPP]
name=HP Software Delivery Repository for SPP
baseurl=http://downloads.linux.hp.com/SDR/downloads/SPP/RHEL/$releasever/$basearch/current
enabled=1
gpgcheck=0

Now you can update with yum update and the message log will be clean.

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  • I posted the link to the individual RPM file in my answer. That's a safer approach to installing the new driver.
    – ewwhite
    Dec 10, 2013 at 8:28
  • Thx I add this Answer as follow answer, when anyone search for this problem he can resolve it without following any links.
    – kockiren
    Dec 10, 2013 at 9:30

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