Driver for Emulex LightPulse Fibre Channel adapters doesn't load (anymore)

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Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 Service Pack 3

Situation

You are trying to use a Emulex LightPulse Fibre Channel, but the driver fails to load, although it worked with previous version of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. The kernel message after the loading of the driver looks as follows:

<3>lpfc 0000:04:08.0: 0:0:0443 Adapter failed to set maximum DMA length mbxStatus x0 
<3>lpfc 0000:04:08.0: 0:0446 Adapter failed to init (255), mbxCmd x9 CFG_RING,mbxStatus x0, ring 0
<3>lpfc 0000:04:08.0: 0:1477 Failed to set up hba
<6>ACPI: PCI interrupt for device 0000:04:08.0 disabled

Resolution

You need to use the driver parameter

lpfc_use_msi=0

to be able to use these adapters. To permanently enable the option you have to add it to one of the files in /etc/modprobe.d. We recommend to create a separate file for the lpfc driver if it doesn't exist yet. Simply use this command:

echo "options lpfc lpfc_use_msi=0"> /etc/modprobe.d/lpfc

Disclaimer

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