Chapter 3. Known Issues

Setting the qla4xxx parameter ql4xdisablesysfsboot to 1 may cause boot from SAN failures.

Installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.3 using the text user interface on a system which already has a Red Hat Enterprise Linux system installed on the disk, and going back to the initial Anaconda installation page (using the Back button) may cause a traceback error.

Installations to a network root device, such as an iSCSI device, do not function properly when using DHCP, preventing the installed system from rebooting. To work around this issue, when installing to an iSCSI root device, you must select the Anaconda installer option Bind targets to network interfaces; do not leave it unselected, as is the default. Additionally, you must use static IP addresses if using a network root device.

To work around this issue when installing via kickstart, add the --iface= option to the iSCSI command, for example:

iscsi --ipaddr 10.34.39.46 --port 3260 --target iqn.2009-02.com.kvm:iscsibind --iface=eth0

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.3 fails to boot when installed without LVM and booted from a Storage Area Network (SAN). To work around this issue, ensure that the /boot partition is using the first partition of multipath, or use LVM (which is the default behavior).

To automatically create an appropriate partition table on disks that are uninitialized or contain unrecognized formatting, use the zerombr kickstart command. The --initlabel option of the clearpart command is not intended to serve this purpose.

Users performing an upgrade using the Anaconda's text mode interface who do not have a boot loader already installed on the system, or who have a non-GRUB boot loader, need to select Skip Boot Loader Configuration during the installation process. Boot loader configuration will need to be completed manually after installation. This problem does not affect users running Anaconda in the graphical mode (graphical mode also includes VNC connectivity mode).

In Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.3, Anaconda allows installation to disks of size 2.2 TB and larger, but the installed system may not boot properly. Disks of size 2.2 TB and larger may be used during the installation process, but only as data disks (that is, should not be used as bootable disks).

On s390x systems, you cannot use automatic partitioning and encryption. If you want to use storage encryption, you must perform custom partitioning. Do not place the /boot volume on an encrypted volume.

The order of device names assigned to USB attached storage devices is not guaranteed. Certain USB attached storage devices may take longer to initialize than others, which can result in the device receiving a different name than you expect (for example, sdc instead of sda).

During installation, verify the storage device size, name, and type when configuring partitions and file systems.

Recent Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 releases use a new naming scheme for network interfaces on some machines. As a result, the installer may use different names during an upgrade in certain scenarios (typically em1 is used instead of eth0 on new Dell machines). However, the previously used network interface names are preserved on the system and the upgraded system will still use the previously used interfaces. This is not the case for Yum upgrades.

The kdump default on feature currently depends on Anaconda to insert the crashkernel= parameter to the kernel parameter list in the boot loader's configuration file.

The firstaidkit-plugin-grub package has been removed from Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.2. As a consequence, in rare cases, the system upgrade operation may fail with unresolved dependencies if the plug-in has been installed in a previous version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. To avoid this problem, the firstaidkit-plugin-grub package should be removed before upgrading the system. However, in most cases, the system upgrade completes as expected.

In some circumstances, disks that contain a whole disk format (for example, an LVM Physical Volume populating a whole disk) are not cleared correctly using the clearpart --initlabel kickstart command. Adding the --all switch—as in clearpart --initlabel --all—ensures disks are cleared correctly.

During the installation on POWER systems, error messages similar to the following may be returned to sys.log:

attempt to access beyond end of device
loop0: rw=0, want=248626, limit=248624

These errors do not prevent installation and only occur during the initial setup. The file system created by the installer will function correctly.

When installing on the IBM System z architecture, if the installation is being performed over SSH, avoid resizing the terminal window containing the SSH session. If the terminal window is resized during the installation, the installer will exit and the installation will terminate.

The kernel image provided on the CD/DVD is too large for Open Firmware. Consequently, on the POWER architecture, directly booting the kernel image over a network from the CD/DVD is not possible. Instead, use yaboot to boot from a network.

The Anaconda partition editing interface includes a button labeled Resize. This feature is intended for users wishing to shrink an existing file system and an underlying volume to make room for an installation of a new system. Users performing manual partitioning cannot use the Resize button to change sizes of partitions as they create them. If you determine a partition needs to be larger than you initially created it, you must delete the first one in the partitioning editor and create a new one with the larger size.

Channel IDs (read, write, data) for network devices are required for defining and configuring network devices on IBM S/390 systems. However, system-config-kickstart—the graphical user interface for generating a kickstart configuration—cannot define channel IDs for a network device. To work around this issue, manually edit the kickstart configuration that system-config-kickstart generates to include the desired network devices.