when possible, run online diagnostics in service mode. online diagnostics perform additional functions compared to standalone diagnostics. running online diagnostics in service mode ensures that the error state of the system that has been captured in nvram is available for your use in analyzing the problem. the aix error log and certain smit functions are only available when diagnostics are run from the disk drive.

    consider the following items before using the diagnostics:

    1 standalone diagnostics can run on systems configured for either a full (or single) system partition or a multiple partitioned system. when running in a partitioned system, the device from which you are booting standalone diagnostics must be made available to the partition dedicated to running standalone diagnostics. this may require moving the device from the partition that currently contains the boot device (for example, the cd-rom or network adapter connected to the nim server that has a standalone diagnostic image) to the partition used to run standalone diagnostics. if you move devices, reboot both partitions. for more information, see “standalone diagnostic operation” on page 88.

    2 when diagnostics are installed, the device support for some devices might not get installed. if this is the case, that device does not display in the diagnostic test list when running disk-based diagnostics.

    3 when running diagnostics in a partitioned system, diagnostics will work only with the resources that were assigned to that partition. you must run diagnostics in the partition containing the resource that you want to test.