Release Note for systems built with IBM Storage Virtualize

This is the release note for the 8.7.3 release and details the issues resolved in between 8.7.3.0 and 8.7.3.1. This document will be updated with additional information whenever a PTF is released.

This document was last updated on 19 May 2025.

  1. What's new in 8.7.3
  2. Known Issues and Restrictions
  3. Issues Resolved
    1. Security Issues Resolved
    2. APARs Resolved
  4. Useful Links

Note. Detailed build version numbers are included in the Concurrent Compatibility and Code Cross Reference in the Useful Links section.


1. What's new in 8.7.3

The following new features have been introduced in the 8.7.3.0 release:

The following features are no longer supported from 8.7.1.0 and later:


2. Known Issues and Restrictions

Note: For clarity, the terms "node" and "canister" are used interchangeably.
Details Introduced

IBM SAN Volume Controller Systems with multiple I/O groups are not supported.

This restriction will be lifted in the next long-term support release.

 8.7.1.0

Systems configured with a data reduction pool are not supported on 8.7.3 at this time.

This restriction will be lifted in the future by SVAPAR-156976.

 8.7.3.0
The following restrictions were valid but have now been lifted

Upgrade to 8.7.3.0 was not supported on FS5200 (32GB cache per node) with two iWARP adapters and FS5300 (32GB cache per node) with one or more iWARP adapters and FS5300 (128GB cache per node) with 2 iWARP adapters.

This restriction has now been lifted in 8.7.3.1 by SVAPAR-155824.

 8.7.3.0

3. Issues Resolved

This release contains all of the fixes included in the 8.7.2.0 release, plus the following additional fixes.

A release may contain fixes for security issues, fixes for APARs or both. Consult both tables below to understand the complete set of fixes included in the release.

3.1 Security Issues Resolved

Security issues are documented using a reference number provided by "Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures" (CVE).
CVE Identifier Link for additional Information Resolved in
CVE-2025-0160 7184182 8.7.3.0
CVE-2025-0159 7184182 8.7.3.0

3.2 APARs Resolved

Show details for all APARs
APAR Affected Products Severity Description Resolved in Feature Tags
SVAPAR-156849 All HIPER Removing a replication policy from a partition operating in single location mode following a failover of Policy-based High Availability may leave an incorrect residual state on the partition that may impact future potential T3 recoveries. For more details refer to this Flash (show details)
Symptom Data Integrity Loss
Environment Systems configured with Policy-based High Availability
Trigger Removing a replication policy from a partition operating in single location mode following a failover of Policy-based High Availability
Workaround Create the partition again, if necessary, then assign a new replication policy using the same preferred management system
8.7.3.1 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-157007 All Critical On heavily loaded systems, a dual node warmstart may occur after an upgrade to 8.7.3.0, 8.7.0.3, or 8.6.0.6 due to an internal memory allocation issue causing brief loss of access to the data. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment None.
Trigger Upgrade to 8.7.3.0, 8.7.0.3, or 8.6.0.6
Workaround Upgrade to a later PTF which contains a fix for this issue.
8.7.3.1 System Update
SVAPAR-157355 All Critical Multiple node warmstarts under very heavy work-loads from NVMe over FC hosts. (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment Systems with NVMe over FC hosts
Trigger Heavy workloads
Workaround None
8.7.3.1 NVMe Hosts
SVAPAR-157593 All Critical Mapping an HA volume to a SAN Volume Controller or FlashSystem is not supported. This may cause loss of access to data on the system presenting the HA volume. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment Systems using policy-based high availability, with a host that is a SAN Volume Controller or FlashSystem.
Trigger Mapping an HA volume to a SAN Volume Controller or FlashSystem
Workaround None
8.7.3.1 Hosts, HyperSwap, Policy-based High availability, Storage Virtualisation
SVAPAR-146576 All High Importance When a quorum device is disconnected from a system twice in a short period, multiple node warmstarts can occur. 8.7.3.1 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-148364 All High Importance Systems whose certificate uses a SHA1 signature may experience node warmstarts. LDAP authentication using servers returning an OCSP response signed with SHA1 may fail. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems with an externally-signed system certificate that uses a SHA1 signature. Systems using LDAP servers returning an OCSP response signed with SHA1 (OCSP stapling).
Trigger Upgrading to 8.7.0.0 or higher with an affected system certificate or LDAP server, or installing a new certificate or LDAP server on 8.7.0.0 or higher
Workaround none
8.7.3.1 LDAP, Security
SVAPAR-158915 All High Importance A single node warmstart may occur if a host issues more than 65535 write requests, to a single 128KB region of a policy-based replication or HA volume, within a short period of time. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems using policy-based replication replication or HA with 8.7.1 or later software.
Trigger More than 65535 write requests to a single 128KB region of a volume
Workaround None
8.7.3.1 Policy-based High availability, Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-155824 FS5200 Suggested FS5200 and FS5300 systems with iWARP adapters and 8.7.0.3 or 8.7.3.0 software may experience an out-of-memory condition. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment FS5200 and FS5300 systems with iWARP adapters and 8.7.0.3 or 8.7.3.0 software
Trigger Upgrade to 8.7.0.3 or 8.7.3.0
Workaround None
8.7.3.1 Reliability Availability Serviceability
SVAPAR-156586 All Suggested Cloud callhome stops working after downloading software directly to the system, or upgrading to 8.7.0.2 or later. (show details)
Symptom Error in Error Log
Environment Systems using a proxy with a certificate
Trigger Downloading software or the list of available patches from IBM Fix Central. The latter is done automatically every 24 hours at 8.7.0.2 and later.
Workaround Re-configure the proxy certificate
8.7.3.1 Call Home
SVAPAR-157700 All Suggested Systems on 8.7.3 may be unable to establish a partnership for policy-based replication or high availability, with systems on lower code levels that have volume group snapshots. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment One system running 8.7.3 and the partner system on a lower code level with volume group snapshots.
Trigger Trying to create a partnership for policy-based replication or high availability.
Workaround Upgrade all the systems to 8.7.3 or remove the volume group snapshots from the systems that are in the lower code level.
8.7.3.1 Policy-based High availability, Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-164082 All HIPER When configuring 3-site replication by adding a policy-based HA copy to an existing volume that already has DR configured, any writes that arrive during a small timing window will not be mirrored to the new HA copy, causing an undetected data corruption. (show details)
Symptom Data Integrity Loss
Environment Systems running 8.7.3 and higher
Trigger Adding a HA copy to an existing volume which is already configured with asynchronous replication
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability, Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-164838 All HIPER When asynchronous policy-based replication operates in a mode for low-bandwidth, data on the recovery volumes may by inconsistent until the replication next operates in mode for low-latency. For more details refer to this Flash (show details)
Symptom Data Integrity Loss
Environment Systems using policy-based asynchronous replication
Trigger None
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-147906 SVC Critical All nodes may warmstart in a SAN Volume Controller cluster consisting of SV3 nodes under heavy load, if a reset occurs on a Fibre Channel adapter used for local node to node communication. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment SV3 nodes running software versions 8.6.0.5, 8.7.0.x, or 8.7.1.0
Trigger A Fibre Channel adapter resetting.
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Inter-node messaging
SVAPAR-148504 All Critical On a system using asynchronous policy-based replication, a timing window during volume creation may cause node warmstarts on the recovery system. (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment Systems with policy-based replication running 8.6.2 or later software
Trigger Volume creation
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-148987 SVC Critical SVC model SV1 nodes running 8.5.0.13 may be unable to access keys from USB sticks when using USB encryption (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment 2145-SV1 or 2147-SV1 nodes running 8.5.0.13 with USB encryption enabled.
Trigger None
Workaround Encryption key servers are unaffected by this issue, and can be used instead of USB encryption
8.7.3.0 Encryption
SVAPAR-149983 All Critical During an upgrade from 8.5.0.10 or higher to 8.6.0 or higher, a medium error on a quorum disk may cause a node warmstart. If the partner node is offline at the same time, this may cause loss of access. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment All systems with NVMe drives.
Trigger Upgrading the system from 8.5.0.10 or higher to 8.6.0 or higher.
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 System Update
SVAPAR-151285 All Critical In a system with multiple I/O groups and a Data Reduction Pool, multiple nodes may warmstart (causing loss of access to data) if all thin or compressed volumes are deleted in one of the I/O groups, and a new volume is then created. This can only happen if the I/O group's node hardware has been upgraded to a different model. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment Systems with multiple I/O groups and DRP, where the node hardware has been upgraded
Trigger Deleting all thin/compressed volumes in an I/O group, then creating a new thin/compressed volume
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Data Reduction Pools
SVAPAR-151639 All Critical If Two-Person Integrity is in use, multiple node warmstarts may occur when removing a user with remote authentication and an SSH key. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment TPI enabled with LDAP authentication
Trigger Attempt to remove a user defined with remote authentication while TPI is enabled
Workaround If Two-Person Integrity is enabled, do not remove a remote user unless privilege escalation has been granted.
8.7.3.0 LDAP
SVAPAR-152118 All Critical Large FlashCopy dependency chains with lots of mappings stopping at the same time could cause a loss of access to data on systems running 8.7.0 (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment Systems on 8.7.0 releases having over 50 dependent flashcopies
Trigger None.
Workaround None.
8.7.3.0 FlashCopy, Snapshots
SVAPAR-155437 All Critical When enabling replication for a volume group, there is a very low probability that the DR system might detect an invalid state, due to a timing window between creation of the volume group and the volumes. If this happens, both nodes at the DR system might warmstart at the same time. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment None
Trigger Addition of a replication policy to a volume group
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-155568 FS9500, SVC Critical On FS9500 or SV3 systems, batteries may prematurely hit end of life and go offline. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Redundancy
Environment This is specific to the battery type used in FS9500 and SV3 only.
Trigger There is no trigger for this issue, but systems with a cooler ambient temperature will likely hit the issue before systems with a warmer ambient temperature.
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Reliability Availability Serviceability
SVAPAR-155656 All Critical Multiple node asserts when removing a VDisk copy (or adding a copy with the autodelete parameter) from a policy-based replication recovery volume (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment Policy-based replication recovery system
Trigger Removing a VDisk copy from a replication recovery volume, or adding a copy with the autodelete parameter
Workaround Do not remove VDisk copies and do not add VDisk copies with the autodelete parameter on replication recovery volumes
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability, Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-146591 All High Importance Single node asserts may occur in systems using policy-based high availability if the active quorum application is restarted. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems with policy-based high availability
Trigger Quorum application restart
Workaround None.
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-147361 All High Importance If a software upgrade completes at the same time as performance data is being sent to IBM Storage Insights, a single node warmstart may occur. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems running 8.5.3 or higher and using Call Home with cloud services to send information directly to IBM Storage Insights.
Trigger Performing a system software upgrade.
Workaround Storage Insights via Call Home with cloud services could be paused during the upgrade.
8.7.3.0 Call Home, System Monitoring
SVAPAR-147647 All High Importance A 32Gb Fibre Channel adapter may unexpectedly reset, causing a delay in communication via that adapter's ports. (show details)
Symptom None
Environment Systems with 32Gb Fibre Channel adapters.
Trigger None
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Fibre Channel
SVAPAR-148032 All High Importance When using policy-based high availability, a specific, unusual sequence of configuration commands can cause a node warmstart and prevent configuration commands from completing. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems using policy-based high availability
Trigger The sequence of configuration changes that causes the broken state is:
  1. Creating a volume in a partition with an HA policy but which doesn't have HA established (e.g. during the initial synchronization after applying the policy or during the recovery from a disconnection)
  2. Deleting the volume
  3. Creating an non replicated volume which gets the same ID as the previous volume
  4. Making the new volume async-dr replicated either by moving it into a volume group with an async replication policy or applying an async-dr replication policy to the volumegroup it's in
Workaround Consult support to provide the correct steps to fix the broken state.
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-148495 All High Importance Multiple node warm-starts on systems running v8.7 due to a small timing window when starting a snapshot if the source volume does not have any other snapshots. This issue is more likely to occur on systems using policy-based replication with no user-created snapshots. (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment Systems running v8.7
Trigger Starting a snapshot (including a replication triggered snapshot) on a source volume where there are no other snapshots
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based Replication, Snapshots
SVAPAR-150832 All High Importance Upgrading a FlashSystem 5200 to a FlashSystem 5300 may fail if policy-based replication is enabled. The first node to upgrade may assert repeatedly, preventing a concurrent upgrade. (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment MES upgrade of FlashSystem 5200 to 5300
Trigger MES upgrade of FlashSystem 5200 to 5300
Workaround Stop host IO to any replicated volumes, and stop the partnership
8.7.3.0 Reliability Availability Serviceability
SVAPAR-152379 All High Importance When using policy-based high availability with multiple partitions, where partitions are replicating in both directions, it is possible to see a single node warmstart on each system. This is due to a deadlock condition related to I/O forwarding, triggered by a large write or unmap spike at the non-preferred site for the partition. (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment Policy-based high availability with multiple partitions
Trigger Very large unmap or write workload going to both sites simultaneously.
Workaround Set all partitions to have the same preferred management system
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-152925 All High Importance The lsfabricport command may fail to return output, if a remote Fibre Channel port has an unknown port speed. In 8.7.2, this will prevent configuration backup from completing. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems with Fibre Channel attached hosts
Trigger FDMI data from external device's Fibre Channel port which says the port speed is unknown
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Command Line Interface
SVAPAR-154100 All High Importance A node warmstart may occur to clear the condition when Fibre Channel adapter firmware has started processing a target I/O request, but has failed the request with status "Invalid Receive Exchange Address". (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems with Fibre Channel adapters
Trigger None
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Fibre Channel
SVAPAR-154399 All High Importance Policy-based high availability may be suspended and unable to restart after an upgrade to 8.7.2.x, due to a timing window. (show details)
Symptom Loss of Redundancy
Environment System using Policy-based high availability
Trigger Upgrading to 8.7.2.x
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-154502 All High Importance A single node warmstart may occur on systems with a very large number of vdisk-host maps, caused by a timeout during host Unit Attention processing. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems with many vdisk-host maps
Trigger None
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Hosts
SVAPAR-154963 All High Importance On systems with 8.7.2 software, a single node assert may occur due to a race condition when deleting volumes, hosts or host mappings that are part of a policy-based high availability partition. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment 8.7.2 systems using policy-based high availability
Trigger Deleting volumes, hosts or host mappings that are part of a policy-based high availability partition.
Workaround Avoid deleting volumes, hosts or host mappings that are part of a policy-based high availability partition until an upgrade to a version with the fix is done.
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-156155 All High Importance Repeated node warmstarts may occur if an unsupported direct-attached Fibre-channel host sends unsolicited frames to the nodes. (show details)
Symptom Multiple Node Warmstarts
Environment Unsupported direct-attached Fibre-channel host.
Trigger Unsupported direct-attached Fibre-channel host sending unsolicited frames to the nodes.
Workaround Remove the connection(s) from the unsupported host.
8.7.3.0 Fibre Channel
SVAPAR-156168 All High Importance A single node warmstart may occur after running the svcinfo traceroute CLI command. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment None.
Trigger svcinfo traceroute CLI command
Workaround None.
8.7.3.0 Inter-node messaging
SVAPAR-156332 All High Importance Using the GUI to create a clone or thin-clone from a snapshot may fail with an CMMVC1243E error, if the snapshot is in an HA partition. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems using policy-based high availability
Trigger GUI creation of a clone or thin-clone from a snapshot in an HA partition
Workaround Use the CLI to create the clone or thin-clone.
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability, Snapshots
SVAPAR-156345 All High Importance A node warmstart on a system using policy-based replication has a low probability of causing another node to also warmstart. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems using policy-based replication
Trigger Node warmstart
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-156522 All High Importance Compare and Write (CAW) I/O requests might be rejected with a SCSI Busy status after a failure to create volumes in the second location of a PBHA partition (show details)
Symptom Loss of Access to Data
Environment Policy-based High Availability
Trigger CAW I/O requests submitted by hosts after a failure to create volumes in the second location of a PBHA partition (4100 error may be logged in the eventlog)
Workaround Resolve the 4100 error
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-145892 All Suggested An unfixed error might display an incorrect fixed timestamp (show details)
Symptom Error in Error Log
Environment Systems with an unfixed error in the eventlog
Trigger A new unfixed error is logged and it re-uses an eventlog entry of an old fixed error
Workaround Clear the error log
8.7.3.0 Reliability Availability Serviceability
SVAPAR-145976 FS7300 Suggested On FlashSystem 7300, fan speeds can vary at 3 second intervals even at a constant temperature 8.7.3.0 Reliability Availability Serviceability
SVAPAR-148287 All Suggested On FS9500, FS5xxx or SV3 systems running 8.7.x software, it is not possible to enable USB encryption using the GUI, because the system does not correctly report how many USB devices the key has been written to. The command-line interface is not affected by this issue. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment FS9500, FS5xxx and SV3 hardware
Trigger Attempting to set up USB encryption on 8.7.x software
Workaround Enable encryption using the CLI.
8.7.3.0 Graphical User Interface
SVAPAR-152076 All Suggested The GUI may notify the user about all new releases, even if the system is configured to notify only for Long-Term Support releases. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems running 8.7.0.0, 8.7.0.1 or 8.7.0.2
Trigger None
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Graphical User Interface
SVAPAR-152472 FS5000 Suggested Volume group details view in the GUI might show a blank page for FlashSystem 5045 systems running 8.7.1 (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment FlashSystem 5045 using volume groups.
Trigger None
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Graphical User Interface
SVAPAR-152912 All Suggested The finderr CLI command may produce no output on 8.7.0, 8.7.1 or 8.7.2. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems running 8.7.0, 8.7.1 or 8.7.2.
Trigger Running the finderr CLI command
Workaround Use the following alternative command: lseventlog -message no -order severity -count 1 -nohdr
8.7.3.0 Command Line Interface
SVAPAR-153310 All Suggested Adding an HA policy to a partition may fail with a CMMVC1249E error. This will only happen if a DR partition in a 3-site configuration is deleted, a new partition is created with the same ID, and the user attempts to add an HA policy to that partition. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems using policy-based high availability with DR
Trigger Attempt to create an HA partition after deletion of a DR partition.
Workaround No Value
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability, Policy-based Replication
SVAPAR-156141 All Suggested Fibre Channel host ports might ignore PLOGI requests for a very short duration after port startup (show details)
Symptom None
Environment Systems using Fibre Channel
Trigger PLOGI requests arriving a small number of milliseconds after a host port start up
Workaround The host or controller usually retries automatically after 20 seconds
8.7.3.0 Fibre Channel
SVAPAR-156142 All Suggested Persistent reservation requests for volumes configured with Policy-based High Availability might be rejected during a small timing window after a node comes online (show details)
Symptom None
Environment Systems with Policy-based High Availability and hosts using persistent reservations
Trigger Hosts sending persistent reservation requests during a small timing window after a node comes online
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Policy-based High availability
SVAPAR-156146 All Suggested The GUI's encryption panel displays "Encryption is not fully enabled" when encryption is enabled but the encryption recovery key has not been configured. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Systems running 8.6.2.0 or higher and using encryption.
Trigger Enabling encryption and not configuring an encryption recovery key.
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Encryption, Graphical User Interface
SVAPAR-156174 All Suggested A single node warmstart may happen due to unexpected duplicate OXID values from a Fibre Channel host (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Systems with Fibre Channel hosts
Trigger Duplicate OXID (Originator Exchange ID) values in Fibre Channel frames
Workaround No Value
8.7.3.0 Fibre Channel
SVAPAR-156179 All Suggested The supported length of client secret for SSO and MFA configurations is limited to 64 characters. (show details)
Symptom Configuration
Environment Use of SSO/MFA solutions like NetIQ Access Manager/Okta
Trigger Use of Access Managers which generates a SSO string of length more than 64 characters.
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Security
SVAPAR-156182 All Suggested A single node warmstart has a low probability of occurring on a system using policy-based high availability, if another node goes offline. (show details)
Symptom Single Node Warmstart
Environment Any system with policy-based high availability
Trigger A node going offline
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 No Specific Feature
SVAPAR-156358 All Suggested A temporary failure to download the list of available patches may cause a 4401 event ("Patch auto-update server communication error") to be logged. (show details)
Symptom Error in Error Log
Environment 8.7.0 and later systems
Trigger Temporary failure to retrieve the list of available patches
Workaround None
8.7.3.0 Call Home

4. Useful Links

Description Link
Product Documentation
Concurrent Compatibility and Code Cross Reference
Support Information pages providing links to the following information:
  • Interoperability information
  • Product documentation
  • Configuration Limits
IBM Storage Virtualize Policy-based replication and High Availability Compatibility Cross Reference
Concurrent Compatibility and Code Cross Reference
Software Upgrade Test Utility
Software Upgrade Planning
IBM Storage Virtualize IP quorum application requirements