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POST Codes SR870BN4 Error Reference Guide

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7. POST Codes

In order to indicate progress through BIOS POST, and in special cases where errors are

encountered during BIOS POST, there are three common mechanisms which shall be

employed by the SR870BN4 BIOS. The first method is to display port 80/81 codes to a I

adapter connected to the processor baseboard. The second common method is the use of beep

codes, encoded beep sequences emitted by the PC speaker when an error is encountered.

Beep codes are employed only before the display screen is enabled, and generally indicate fatal

errors. Beep codes are coupled with special port 80 error codes. The final method is to display

an error message to the display screen.

7.1 North and South Port 80/81 Cards

In the case of the SR870BN4 server, this port 80 card is a custom device attached to I

C ports

in two different places on the server. One port 80 device serves the north flash ROM and the

other serves the south flash ROM.

7.2 POST Codes

7.2.1 POST Codes Module Map

The SR870BN4 server employs a novel post code scheme. Post codes assigned make use of

the fact that the SR870BN4 utilizes port 80h and 81h. This gives the SR870BN4 16 bits to

encode. The following rules apply to the post code encoding:

Bit 15: 1 – IA64 code being executed, 0 – IA-32 code being executed

Bit 14: 1 – system stopped due to known failure, 0 – progress indication

All other module bits remain unmodified.

Bit 13: 1 – fault or trap (no change in module numbers), 0 – normal execution

In case of fault or trap, only bit 13 is set and other bits are left on modified. This allows

us to detect which module produces the fault.

Bit 12: Reserved

Bit 11-4: Module type

Bit 3-0: Sub module type

The module number and sub module number are a in 4-bit boundary to allow us to decode

quickly by the numbers. The module number identifies the major module such as memory, PCI,

ACPI, etc. The sub module identifies the sub function such as SPD read in progress, ECC error,

and DIMM mismatch for memory module.

Module names and numbers are listed in the following tables.

1 2 ... 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 ... 43 44

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Dell PowerEdge 7250 User's Guide Page 24