[German]I'm going to post an issue here in the blog that came to my attention recently. It concerns the HP Aruba/HP 1930 switch, where there may be connection issues. If I'm interpreting it correctly, this is probably a software error which means that devices on certain connections (ports) can't get a connection. There are now various reports about this on the Internet.
Advertising
Found a post on Facebook
A while ago, I came across a crude error description while checking Facebook via a post in a Facebook group for network specialists. An IT employee had replaced a switch in a company and discovered that a connected heating bridge (10Mbit half duplex) was no longer working reliably.
A short ping test showed approx. 80-90% packet losses. Swapping network cables, setting a fixed port speed etc. did not help in this case. When searching the Internet, he found the information that "every second switch from this manufacturer has the problem that ports 1 and 2 work, ports 3 and 4 work incorrectly, ports 5 and 6 work again, and ports 7 and 8 don't work either".
The IT employee then tested this and the connected heating bridge was able to communicate again without any problems. The person in question asked on Facebook whether anyone had a technical explanation, as he lacked the imagination for something like this?
What he also mentioned was that it was an Aruba/HP 1930 switch running the latest firmware. These switches are devices for corporate use, which are offered in models with different numbers of ports (8 ports, 24 ports).
Advertising
The assumption of various forum members that a "broken chip" was the cause could be refuted, as a second replacement device showed the same error pattern. The same chips were also installed in all ports, wrote the person concerned. He suspects a software bug in the firmware. In the comments, the advice "better stay away from this provider" also was given.
Observation of the error confirmed in forums
The post then made me curious, was it an anecdote "from the IT trainee pool" or does this error description really exist on the Internet. A quick search for "Aruba/HP 1930 switch port not working" then threw up several hits.
On reddit.com there is the two-year-old entry Aruba Instant On 1930 – Einige Geräte funktionieren an bestimmten Ports nicht. The person concerned writes that he has encountered a strange problem. He had several of the 1930 switches in use, and certain devices were not working on certain ports. The ports showed activity as if they were connected, but cannot communicate with other devices on the switch (same error pattern as described above).
This user also confirms this: If he connects the device in question to another port of the switch, the communication works without any problems (i.e. similar findings as above). Even stranger: He states that he can also connect another device (e.g. his laptop) to the port in question and has connectivity without any problems.
He writes that it looks to him as if the MAC address table is having problems updating. The error pattern shows up on more than one switch, so he rules out a hardware problem. The affected devices are running software 2.8, he wrote.
I found a reference in a forum about disconnections that the "EEE energy saving option" was the cause. After this was switched off, there were no more connection problems.
On June 26, 2023 Martin Rogers posted the article New 1930 Switch VLANs not working in the HP Enterprise Forum. There he describes connection problems between two computers on ports 2 and 3 in the VLAN when using "tagging". Tagging is explained in this forum post. But whether it explains the above problem is not clear to me. Has anyone ever experienced something like this or has an explanation?
Advertising
