I have a refurbished HP C3750 workstation that my company recently bought. We have a need to be able to retrieve its serial number through software, and I found instructions at HP's Website on how to do this. Unfortunately, the machine does not return a serial number using any of the methods described there.
I am guessing that because we bought this refurbished, the serial number got scrubbed somehow when they re-installed HPUX 11i onto it. Unfortunately, they haven't been very responsive to my inquiries, and I can't seem to find any information on how you would go about setting the serial number, only how to retrieve it.
The other is written somewhere on the box (or inside...) or can be obtained by using the command (as root...) print_manifest (/opt/ignite/bin/print_manifest) look the man pages
But is it installed?
So have you a better solution ( or confirm that print_manifest will always work...)?
Although I believe the b) should do the job unless we got it all wrong, because it was for a HP HW support contract...
I've watched HP techs change serial numbers and they have always done it at the ISL prompt. They all used an app on their laptops to generate a key that verified that had permission to change the serial number.
Oops.. Sorry Vbe.. I forgot to have a look at the link and command he posted (He initially used).. Also, I don't think print_manifest should help him in this case. Perhaps, it might pull up.. Actually, it should. But, it is not showing up serial number on my server. Don't know why..
Lurch,
Below link has lot of such methods to pull out serial number.
I believe, there is a corruption on serial number here and whatever we discuss here are just to pull out the serial number from the server and not to change it..
However, we CAN change the serial number of the server. There is a procedure and a utility to do it. I can, as well.. However, its a HP ONLY stuff and we are not supposed to do it at any chance.
Its strongly recommended to log a case with HP and have a CE sent online to do it. He'd be coming there with the utility and do it. It would not even take that much time I took to type in here.
Moreover, your Serial Number is more important and is being linked to a lot of things, even with a contract if one. So, its not good to change it in any time. Please do call HP is what can say.
Thanks for everyone's replies. Unfortunately, since we bought the workstation refurbished through a 3rd party reseller of used HP computers, and we are not an HP shop, we don't have a contract with HP. So, it sounds like it would be rather expensive to get a maintenance contract just to have an HP technician set the serial number correctly. Oh well, I suppose we'll have to live without it.
DB, correct me:
It is also written in the box no? depending of the machine it could be on the front door, on the side panel or inside etc.. usually a sticker...
Anyway the only time you need this serial number is when you call HP for support/maintenance contact
This was for an inventory project for a client who didn't want a "sneakernet" solution to collect serial numbers (along with other hardware/software attributes) for their HP and other UNIX boxes. We were fortunate to acquire a PA-RISC HP workstation (and a pretty modern one at that) on the cheap, but I guess you get what you pay for...
Did you try to run print_manifest? (You never know...) Nice little box you got here...
addendum
I am saying that because of a serious issue I had before Christmas, where a mains chassis cabling burnt and there is no spare for that... The poor HP support engineer came with spare motherboard PSU etc ( but I told them...).
Since it was sensible production server I offered to strip down another server and because both of us were hungry and willing to go home (friday evening - not cool!), we opted to use the HBAs and internal disks and RAM of the burnt box and put them in the other.
Just tested now
Guess what, print_manifest gives me the serial number of the second although it had no more disks of its own...
#./print_manifest
System Information
Your Hewlett-Packard computer has software installed and
configured as follows.
The system was created January 19, 2009, 15:03:37 EST.
It was created with Ignite-UX revision B.4.4.27.
-------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE: You should retain this information for future reference.
-------------------------------------------------------------
System Hardware
Model: 9000/785/C3750
Main Memory: 1536 MB
Processors: 1
OS mode: 64 bit
LAN hardware ID: 0x00306E49A0BD
Software ID: 2014355092
Keyboard Language: USB_PS2_DIN_US_English
Storage devices HW Path Interface
HP 36.4GMAU3036NC 34732 Mb 10/0/15/1.6.0 SCSI C896 Ultra2 Wide LVD
I/O Interfaces
Class H/W Path Driver Description
lan 10/0/12/0 btlan HP PCI 10/100Base-TX Core
audio 10/0/13/0 audio Built-in Audio
ext_bus 10/0/14/0 side IDE
tty 10/0/14/1/1 asio0 Built-in RS-232C
tty 10/0/14/1/2 asio0 Built-in RS-232C
ext_bus 10/0/14/1/3 SCentIf Built-in Parallel Interface
usb 10/0/14/2 hcd Built-in USB Interface
ext_bus 10/0/15/0 c720 SCSI C896 Ultra Wide Single-Ended
ext_bus 10/0/15/1 c720 SCSI C896 Ultra2 Wide LVD
graphics 10/6/2/0 graph3 PCI Display (103c108b)
Installed Software
Your system was installed with HP-UX version B.11.11.
Your system has the following software products installed and
configured on the system disk drive(s).
Product Revision Description
B8111AA 1.2.2.15.00 Java 2 RTE for HP-UX (700/800), PA1.1 + PA2.0 Add On
[SNIP]
LVM File System Configuration
This system is configured with Logical Volume Manager (LVM) file systems.
Refer to the File System layout section for information on the LVM layout.
JFS File System Configuration
This system is configured with a Journaled File System (referred to
as either JFS or VXFS). Refer to the File System layout section for
information on JFS/VXFS file systems.
Disk layout
LVM disk Device file HW Addr size vol. grp
HP 36.4GMAU3036NC /dev/dsk/c3t6d0 10/0/15/1.6.0 34732 /dev/vg00
File System layout
LVM Device file mount point size fs type
/dev/vg00:
[SNIP]
Swap configuration
type size priority device/location
dev 3072 1 /dev/vg00/lvol2
Kernel Configuration
The following drivers or parameters are configured into your system's
kernel. After installing HP-UX, use the sam(1m) command to configure
the following items into the kernel:
default_disk_ir 1
STRMSGSZ 65535
nstrpty 60
maxswapchunks 1536
System Information
The following parameters were set on the configured target:
hostname: InControl10
IP address: 10.222.22.130
subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
gateway IP address: 10.222.22.1
time zone: PST8PDT
DNS domain name: HQ.INCONTROL
DNS IP address: 10.222.22.124
The serial number is stored in stable storage. That the same place that the boot path, autoboot flag, fastboot setting, etc are stored. It just a eeprom chip.
Thanks perderabo,
Thats what I believed before reading this thread, then I was starting to have serious doubts for I didnt see any reason it would have been affected by reinstall of OS for selling...
Youve made my day...
I went through old notes and found a comment of Bill Hassell :
The majority of HP 9000 computers do not have the serial number stored electronically.
Only the more recent machines such as the rp series and earlier models like N and L
class have this number.."
And wondered about workstation so I just tried:
System Hardware
Model: 9000/785/B2600
Main Memory: 3072 MB
Graphics: HP VISUALIZE-FXE color 1280x1024 48 planes
Processors: 1
OS mode: 64 bit
LAN hardware ID: 0x00306E2B2C1C
LAN hardware ID: 0x00306E370832
Software ID: 2012698290
Keyboard Language: USB_PS2_DIN_US_English
...
.
.
dm2 # echo "sel path system\ninfolog\nexit"|cstm|grep "System Serial Number"
dm2 #
