A FirePOWER Appliance becomes frozen after attempting to boot it into single user mode

Introduction

After you bootup a FirePOWER Appliance using single user mode, it may appear frozen. This document describes how to troubleshoot this.

Symptom

• After booting into single user mode, the system becomes frozen after displaying a message for Fuse init (API Version 7.14).

(Previous messages are truncated)


kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
EXT3-fs (sda5): mounted filesystem with writeback data mode
VFS: Mounted root (ext3 filesystem) readonly on device 8:5.
Freeing unused kernel memory: 488k freed
Adding 1044220k swap on /dev/sda2.  Priority:-1 extents:1
 across:1044220k SS
EXT3-fs (sda5): using internal journal
EXT2-fs (sda1): warning: mounting ext3 filesystem as ext2
EXT2-fs (sda7): warning: mounting ext3 filesystem as ext2
fuse init (API version 7.14)


(no more output)

For instance, here is an output from an appliance that experienced this issue:

• During bootup, a FirePOWER Appliance detects the USB drivers. If the driver load succesfuly, you will notice messages similar to the following:

USB Serial support registered for FTDI USB Serial Device
ftdi_sio 4-1:1.0: FTDI USB Serial Device converter detected
usb 4-1: Detected FT232RLusb 4-1: Number of endpoints 2
usb 4-1: Endpoint 1 MaxPacketSize 64
usb 4-1: Endpoint 2 MaxPacketSize 64
usb 4-1: Setting MaxPacketSize 64
usb 4-1: FTDI USB Serial Device converter now attached to ttyUSB0

If a driver fails to load, the system hangs and displays the following error message:

kernel: usb 5-1: device descriptor read/8, error -110
kernel: usb 5-1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 5
kernel: fuse init (API version 7.14)

Solution

In order to resolve this issue, please follow the steps below:

Step 1: Make sure if a keyboard is properly attached with your FirePOWER System.

Step 2: Use console (keyboard + VGA) to connect to the appliance.

Step 3: Log into the appliance and enter expert mode:

> expert

Step 4: Run the following script to set the console to the VGA port.

admin@FirePOWER:~$ sudo /usr/local/sf/bin/set_console.sh -c tty0

Step 5: Enter yes at the prompt:

Are you sure you want to proceed?
Yes/No (yes/no): yes

Step 6: After running the command above, reboot your FirePOWER appliance to the changes to take effect.

admin@FirePOWER:~$ sudo reboot

Step 7: If the set_console.sh script (on step 4) is unable to fix this issue, please reboot the appliance, and boot to the single user mode from the boot prompt. For example, on an appliance running version 5.2, run the following on the boot prompt:

3D-5.2.0 console=tty0 single

Step 8: If none of the above steps resolve this issue, a reimage would be the next option.