Introduction

The CHARON-AXP product is distributed in the form of a zip file that contains the CHARON-AXP installation executable ("InstallShell.exe"). The InstallShell procedure offers the option to select which modules to install. It is recommended to install all modules (the default).

Before installing CHARON-AXP, please perform all hardware and software host system checks to ensure the host platform meets minimum CHARON-AXP installation requirements

Optionally, create a specific CHARON username with administrative privileges

CHARON-AXP installation steps:

Extract the CHARON-AXP installation procedure files from its archive
Install CHARON-AXP by running the "InstallShell.exe" installer and follow the instructions
Install CHARON-AXP license (hardware dongle or software license)
Configure CHARON-AXP host system, for example, network adapter, disable some Windows features (see Host system preparation further), etc.

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Hardware Requirements

Number of CPU cores

Each CHARON-AXP emulated CPU requires a corresponding physical core. The total number of host CPUs must exceed the number of emulated CPUs since some of the host CPUs must be dedicated to serving CHARON I/O operations and fulfil host operating system needs. If several CHARON instances run in parallel, the required number of CPU cores is cumulative.

The following table shows the minimum and recommended number of CPUs required for each models for one instance (note that each model instance is able to run on 2 CPU cores hosts, but this configuration does not support emulation of all the virtual CPUs):

CHARON-AXP models	Minimum number of host CPU cores	Recommended number of host CPU cores
HP AlphaServer 400 - HP AlphaServer 4100	2	2
HP AlphaServer DS10	2	2
HP AlphaServer DS20	4	4
HP AlphaServer ES40	6	8
HP AlphaServer GS80	10	16
HP AlphaServer GS160	18	32
HP AlphaServer GS320	34	48

When starting, the CHARON-AXP software checks the available number of host CPU cores. Currently, this check is based on the maximum number of AXP CPUs that can be emulated, not on the number of the actually configured AXP CPUs. Therefore the number of host CPU cores recommended for the maximum number of emulated CPUs - as shown in the right column of the table above - must be available. If the available number of host CPU cores is below this number, CHARON-AXP will issue a warning message even if the requirements for the configured number of AXP CPUs are fulfilled. The CHARON-AXP software will work despite this warning if the requirements for the configured number of AXP CPUs are fulfilled.

Hyperthreading must be switched off completely. Disable hyperthreading in the BIOS settings of the physical host or, for a VMware virtual machine, edit the virtual machine properties, select the Resources tab then select Advanced CPU. Set the Hyperthreaded Core Sharing mode to None.

CPU type and speed

Since CHARON-AXP utilizes LAHF instructions in the HP Alpha CPU emulation, please avoid using early (pre-2005) AMD64 and Intel 64 CPUs for the CHARON host system since they lack this capability. AMD Athlon 64, Opteron and Turion 64 revision D processors from March 2005 and Intel Pentium 4 G1 stepping from December 2005 are LAHF instruction capable.

Concerning CPU speed, the general recommendation is that higher CPU frequency is better since it allows better emulated HP Alpha performance. The minimum recommendation is at least 3 GHz.

Operative memory

The minimum host memory size depends on the amount of HP Alpha memory to be emulated and the number of CHARON-AXP instances to be run on one host.
The minimum host memory is calculated according to the following formula:

The minimum host memory = (2Gb + the amount of HP Alpha memory emulated) per CHARON-AXP instance.

Disk storage

The total amount of disk space required for CHARON-AXP can be calculated as a sum of all the disk/tape image sizes plus 50 MB for the CHARON software plus space required for the normal host OS. Temporary disk storage is often needed when setting up a new server, for saveset storage, software installation kits, etc.

Ethernet adapters

CHARON-AXP networking requires dedicated host Ethernet adapters; their number must be equal to the emulated adapters to be configured in CHARON-AXP. One adapter (optionally) can be left to the host for TCP/IP networking etc.

For VMware-based CHARON hosts it is mandatory to use the "E1000" virtual network adapter. Please avoid usage of the "E1000E" adapter since it may lead to problems with some TCP/IP services!

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Software Requirements

Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 Standard and Datacenter Editions, 64 bit version (please notice that only R2 revision is supported)
Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 (SP1) Standard and Enterprise Editions, 64 bit version (please notice that only R2 revision is supported)
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate (SP1) Editions, 64 bit version
Windows 8.1 Professional Edition, 64 bit version
VMware ESXi 5.x and 6.0 (requires a supported Windows operating system on top of a ESXi virtual machine)
Microsoft Hyper-V (requires a supported Windows operating system on top of a Hyper-V virtual machine)

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Host system preparation

All antivirus, screen saver, automatic (scheduled) backup and any other CPU consuming software as well as software that is able to temporarily lock CHARON files (such as automatic indexing) must be turned off, uninstalled and disabled.

The power scheme must be set to "High Performance" with all the "Sleep" and "Standby" modes turned off.

The automatic installation of Microsoft updates must be disabled. MS updates to the CHARON host must be done only in specific service maintenance periods established by the system administrator. Before applying new updates one must shutdown the operating system running on CHARON and stop all the running CHARON instances and services.

If a network-wide license (red dongle or software license) is going to be used, do the following:

On server side (where the network license will reside): open port 1947 for both TCP and UDP
On clients side: open UDP ports 30000-65535
Both on server and client sides: set default gateway

Please consult with Windows online documentation for details.

If stricter firewall rules are required, it is possible to open the ports 30000-65535 and 1947 only for the "Sentinel HASP License Manager" (hasplms.exe) service (installed by CHARON-AXP ).

If any magneto-optical (MO) drive installed on host system is going to be used with CHARON (mapped as "\\.\PhysicalDrive<N>" to CHARON emulated disk controllers) the host "MediaChangeNotification" (MSN) service must be switched off manually for these drives according to the following procedure:

Type "regedit" in the search field under "Start" menu or press Windows+R and enter "regedit"; press Enter to run the program.

Find the "AlwaysDisableMCN" parameter in the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
 + SYSTEM
    + CurrentControlSet
       + Enum
          + SCSI
             + Disk&Ven_DEC&Prod_RWZ53_____(C)DEC    <<< This one depends on Vendor and Model of your MO drive
                + 5&fd233cf&0&000500                 <<< This one depends on hardware connection (SCSI ID of MO drive, location of SCSI HBA on the host's mainboard, etc ...)
                   + Device Parameters
                      + MediaChangeNotification
                         + AlwaysDisableMCN = DWORD:00000000

Change the "AlwaysDisableMCN" parameter to "1", for example: "AlwaysDisableMCN = DWORD:00000001".
Reboot the host system.

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Before installation

Login as the local system administrator ("Administrator") on the host system.
Create a special user for running CHARON-AXP (optional). This user must have all the administrative privileges. Please consult with Windows online documentation for details.

The CHARON installation procedure will create a special group called CHARON-GRP and the current user will be automatically included to this group. Do not remove this group and do not remove any CHARON user from it, otherwise a problem with virtual memory allocation may appear on CHARON startup.
The created user may belong to some domain, but please note that in this case you have to add this user to the CHARON-GRP manually as described in this article, and then reboot the CHARON host.
Stay logged in as local system administrator ("Administrator") or log off and login as the CHARON-AXP user having administrative privileges (if this option has been chosen).
Create a special directory for the CHARON-AXP distribution kit and copy the provided files there.
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Distribution preparation

Extract the contents of the distribution archive to the current directory or copy the contents of the provided distribution directory to the current directory.
Run the "InstallShell.exe" file:
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Installation

The following assumes that this is the first installation of CHARON-AXP on the target host. Installation of additional CHARON products follows the same procedure.

The first dialog box lists the CHARON-AXP product:

Select the CHARON-AXP product by checking the corresponding box.

CHARON-AXP product may be highlighted with a red color. This indicates that the CHARON host configuration does not meet CHARON minimal requirements, so CHARON cannot be installed. To see what requirements are not met, point the mouse cursor on that product and a pop-up box with details will appear.

Press the "Next" button.

Read the license, check "Agree" if you agree and press the "Next" button.

Select a directory to be used for the CHARON installation or use the default. The path can either be entered manually or selected using the "Browse" button. Once done, press the "Next" button.

The CHARON installation procedure will install the software packages required for CHARON-AXP, for example, Microsoft Visual C++ redistributive software and Sentinel HASP Run-time:

Once the packages are installed, the setup procedure will display a dialog for the CHARON-AXP product components:

It is strongly recommended to leave the selection as it is unless you clearly understand what the impact is if you uncheck some modules.

Once done, press the "Next" button to start the installation of the selected components.

During the CHARON installation procedure, you will have to confirm the installation of the CHARON-specific network driver. Press the "Install" button:

Once the installation is done, the following dialog will be displayed:

It is strongly recommended to reboot the CHARON host system immediately: leave the "Reboot computer now" box checked and press the "Finish" button.

Once the host system is up again, you will notice new shortcut that was created, on the desktop, during the installation procedure:

Once the CHARON-AXP license is installed (see below) and the configuration file has been modified to map devices, clicking a shortcut will start the corresponding model of the HP Alpha emulator.

The CHARON installation procedure creates the following structure under the "Start" menu:

The programs in the "Utilities" subdirectory are discussed in detail later in this document.

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CHARON-AXP home directory

By default CHARON-AXP is installed in the "C:\Program Files\CHARON" directory (it may also use "C:\Program Files (x86)\CHARON" directory if CHARON-VAX product has been installed on the host prior to CHARON-AXP). It has the following subdirectories:

Directory	Description
Auxiliary	Contains auxiliary material
Build_XXX\x64	Contains product executables, libraries and templates of the configuration files
Drivers	Contains the CHARON drivers
HASP_X.XX	Contains the Sentinel HASP Run-time installation (already installed)
InstallShell	Contains the CHARON installation procedure executables
Logs	Contains the CHARON installation log
Redistributables	Contains the redistributables needed for CHARON running (already installed)
Utilities_X.X.XXXXX\x64	Contains the CHARON utilities designed for Windows x64
Utilities_X.X.XXXXX\x86	Contains the CHARON utilities initially designed for Windows x86
Virtual Disk Images	Contains the CHARON virtual disk images, for example "idle_vms_pkg_v3.0"

The "Build_XXX\x64" directory contains template configuration files with examples of typical configuration parameters. The template files are used to build the emulator instance. We will focus our attention on this subject in the next chapter.

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License installation

Regular HASP USB dongle

If the CHARON license is a regular USB dongle, just connect it to the host USB port.

If the CHARON host is accessed remotely, please note that the contents of a regular HASP license cannot be displayed using RDP. ILO or iDRAC, some other console-capable program must be used.

Also, CHARON cannot be started manually from an RDP connection. In this case, a workaround is possible to install CHARON as a service. This procedure will be described later.

Network HASP USB dongle

If the CHARON license is a network license (red USB dongle), it is possible to either connect it to the host USB port (to use it locally and provide it to other hosts on local network at the same time) or to install it on a local network "server" for remote access from this particular host.

In case of remote usage:

Copy "hasp_install\Sentinel_LDK_Run-time_cmd_line_X.XX.zip" file from CHARON distributive to the server in any directory, for example "C:\Temp"
Extract the contents of this archive to the same directory.
Login as "Administrator" on the server and open "cmd.exe" from the "Start" menu.
Switch to that directory
Install the extracted file:
Example:
...> cd c:\temp
c:\temp> haspdinst.exe -fr -kp -nomsg
c:\temp> haspdinst.exe -install -cm

Connect the network HASP dongle to the server USB port.

Network HASP (red dongles) licenses have no restrictions with remote access

Software license

If the CHARON license is a software license (SL), it is installed on the host using the following procedure:

Press the Start button, select "All programs", "Charon" then the Charon product/version folder, "Utilities" and run the "License Update Service" program:

The following default dialog window will appear:
Select the "Installation of new protection key" radio-box and press the "Collect Information" button. The following window will appear:

Specify the directory and name of the system "fingerprint" file to be created; press "Save".
The "License Update Service" will save the fingerprint file under the given name and report the status:
Send the resulting file to STROMASYS. In return STROMASYS will provide you with a "*.v2c" file, for example "Your License.v2c"
Copy the received v2c file to the CHARON host in a folder of your choice and select the "Apply License File" tab:
Press the "..." button and browse for the received v2c file.
Example:

Press "Open" to apply the license.
Invoke the system default web browser and enter URL http://localhost:1947 to display "Sentinel Admin Control Center" (ACC) web interface. This interface allows you to view and manage CHARON licenses.
Ensure that the software license appears now in the "Sentinel Keys" menu of the ACC.

Network-wide software licenses have no restrictions with remote access, whereas regular software licenses cannot be displayed or used in this scenario

A "Provisional" (demo) license does not require a collected fingerprint. For its installation start at step 5 in the sequence above

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License validity verification

Check the CHARON license validity. To do that, invoke the "HASP View" utility to make sure that the CHARON license is visible and is correct:

Text of the license is displayed correctly by the "HASP View" utility, no error messages are shown
Content of the license looks correct. For example license number, major and minor versions, minimum and maximum build numbers, CHARON-AXP products and allowed hardware (CHARON-AXP models) should be checked. More details on the license content can be found in the CHARON-AXP Licensing chapter of this Guide.

Troubleshooting

If the CHARON license content cannot be displayed by the "HASP View" utility or it is incorrect, check that the license is available and correctly used:

Invoke the system default web browser and enter URL http://localhost:1947 to display the "Sentinel Admin Control Center" (ACC) web interface.
Click on the "Sentinel Keys" link to open up the "Sentinel Keys Section" page
Make sure that one and only one CHARON HASP or SL license is present.

Problem	Action
No license is displayed	Make sure that all the recommendations above about remote access to the host are fulfilled (if remote access takes place), that the HASP USB key is not broken and its LED indicator is lit (meaning that it is used by the host).
Only one License key / SL is seen and its content is incorrect	Contact STROMASYS to request a new license update.
Several License keys / SLs are displayed	Remove all of them except the one provided by STROMASYS for just installed version of CHARON.

Removing licenses can be done by physical disconnection of the corresponding USB HASP keys from the CHARON host and physical disconnection of the network HASP keys from all hosts on a local network (or by disabling remote access to network licenses from the CHARON host - see detailed explanation below).

Software licenses can also be uninstalled using the "License Update Service" utility (see above) in the following way:

Open up the "Transfer License" tab of the utility.
Press the "..." button beside the "Save recipient information to" message and save the system fingerprint to a directory.
Select the software license you are going to delete.
Press the "..." button belonging to the "Read the recipient information file from" message and specify the fingreprint file you have just collected.
Press the "..." button belonging to the "Generate the license transfer file to" message and enter a name for the license transfer file.
Press "Generate License Transfer File"
Now the selected software license is removed from the CHARON host

It is also possible to disable access to network licenses if only a local license is to be used: Click on the "Configuration" link to open up the "Configuration for Sentinel Manager" page.

Uncheck the "Allow Access to Remote Licenses" and the "Broadcast Search for Remote Licenses" checkboxes from the "Access to Remote License Managers" tab, then press the "Submit" button to apply changes.

It is possible to have several licenses available to CHARON-AXP at the same time. In this case you have to specify it in the CHARON-AXP configuration file what license is to be used.

Example:

set session license_key_id[0]=1877752571

It is also possible to have one "main" and one "backup" license in case the main license becomes inaccessible:

set session license_key_id[0]=1877752571 license_key_id[1]=354850588

CHARON-AXP checks its licenses from time to time starting with the main license. If it is inaccessible, it attempts to access the backup license.

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Network configuration

In most cases, CHARON will use a network. If so, CHARON requires a dedicated network interface with any other protocols including TCP/IP removed at the host level.

Network configuration is done with the "Network Control Center" (NCC) utility:

Start the "Network Control Center" utility and select "Configure NIC" in the first dialog window:

Press the "Next" button, the following dialog will appear:

Select the interface to be dedicated to CHARON (in our example it is Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller with the name "Charon") and press the button "Dedicate adapter to CHARON".

CHARON supports VLAN adapters. If you are going to use them, proceed with their installation and configuration according to the network adapter vendor User's Guide and then select the VLAN interface in the dialog shown above, the same as you would for a regular network interface. There is no difference in configuring a regular network adapter and a VLAN one, so all the provided instructions are fully applicable for VLAN adapters as well.

After a few seconds the chosen interface will be assigned to CHARON:

Note that it is possible to release the interface back to the CHARON host. To do that, select the target interface and press the "Release adapter to HOST" button.

The next step displays text to be included in the CHARON configuration file for the interface dedicated to CHARON. Select the target interface and press the "Next" button. The following dialog will appear:

Selecting the target emulated network interface displays the configuration lines specific for the selected CHARON host network interface. Press the "Copy suggestions to clipboard" button to copy the suggested configuration lines. They can be pasted into the CHARON-AXP configuration file during the next editing session by pressing "Ctrl-V".

Press the "Cancel" button to exit from the "Network Control Center" utility.

Restart the "Network Control Center" utility again and select "Disable TCP chimney offload for CHARON":

Press the "Next" button to apply the "offload" parameters settings.

Press the "Cancel" button to exit from the "Network Control Center" utility.

If you've installed CHARON-AXP Version 4.7 Build 171-01, please do not use the "Disable TCP chimney offload" feature since it may lead to some critical problems relevant to CHARON license checking.This issue is solved starting with Build 171-02 (patch).

If for any reason you have already used this feature proceed with the following:

Run CMD with administrative privileges
Issue the command: netsh interface tcp show chimneyapplications
Then for each installed CHARON executable from the list run the following command: netsh inter tcp delete chimneyapplication "C:\<full path to CHARON executable.exe>"

When the NIC properties are configured in Windows, a reboot of the CHARON host is required for the changes, specifically "offload" parameters, to take effect.

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More information and details on disabling TCP chimney offload...

Operating system Notes Charon version Configuration steps

Windows Server 2019

TCP Chimney offload is disabled by default (deprecated technology)

Charon-AXP/PDP/VAX V4.11 Build 204-03 and above

None

Windows Server 2008 R2

Windows Server 2012 R2

Windows Server 2016

Windows 7

Windows 8 & 8.1

Windows 10

TCP Chimney offload must be disabled.

Note:

TCP Chimney Offload is a networking technology that helps transfer the workload from the CPU to a network adapter during network data transfer.
The commands to enable and disable TCP Chimney Offload for specific applications and ports require that the Windows Firewall service and Base Filtering Engine (BFE) services are running. Before using these commands or the Network Control Center Utility, ensure that the Windows Firewall service and BFE service are running.

Running guests will have to be powered off/on for the new settings to be taken into account.

To check TCP Chimney offload is disabled, use the following commands:

C:\Windows\system32>netsh int tcp show globalQuerying active state...

TCP Global Parameters----------------------------------------------Receive-Side Scaling State : enabledChimney Offload State : disabledNetDMA State : disabledDirect Cache Access (DCA) : disabled

...

To revert back to the original settings manually, use the following command:

C:\Windows\system32>netsh int tcp set global chimney=automatic

CHARON-VAX V4.7 and CHARON-AXP V4.7 Build 171-10 and above (patched)
Charon-AXP/PDP/VAX V4.8 Build 183-02 and above (patched)

Configuration type 1

Older versions of Charon-AXP/PDP/VAX

Do not use the network control center utility to disable TCP chimney offload. Please use only the manual settings described in this chapter

Configuration type 2

Older versions of Windows

Running guests will have to be powered off/on for the new settings to be taken into account

Charon-AXP/PDP/VAX versions supported on these old versions of Windows

Configuration type 3

Configuration type 1

Charon-AXP/VAX V4.7:
- open the Start menu, select "All Programs" then "CHARON", select your Charon product version, "Utilities" then "Network Controler Center version x.xx".
Charon-AXP/PDP/VAX V4.8:

Double click the "CHARON Virtual Machine Manager" icon on desktop or select this utility in the tray menu; select "Host Information and Utilities" section and press "Network Control Center" button.
.

From the "Network Control Center" utility main page, select the "Disable TCP chimney offload for CHARON" option:

Click on the "Next" button.
.
The TCP Chimney offloading will be disabled:

Click on the "Finish" button to exit.

Configuration type 2

Open a command line windows with Admin rights
Issue the following command:
C:\> netsh int tcp set global chimney=disabled
Delete all occurrences of Charon executables in the following table if any as described below:
C:\> netsh interface tcp show chimney...
C:\> netsh interface tcp delete chimneyapplication ^More? application="C:\Program Files\CHARON\Build_16400\x64\as1000.exe"

Configuration type 3

Intelligent packet processing should be switched off for the network adapters dedicated to CHARON-AXP (naming of the parameters depends on the network adapter driver):

Adaptive interframe spacing
Flow control
Interrupt moderation
Interrupt moderation rate
Ipv4 checksum offload
Jumbo packet

Large send offload
Disable Priority and VLAN
TCP checksum offload
UDP checksum offload

To do so, open the "Control Panel", select "Network and Internet" and "Network Connections". Right click on the adapter you dedicated to CHARON, select "Properties" and click on the "Configure" button. Select the "Advanced" tab and disable the properties mentioned in the list above.

Once all parameters have been turned off, click on the "OK" button.

Example:

After installation

If you plan to use local system administrator ("Administrator") or the CHARON-AXP user having administrative privileges no other actions are required.

If the CHARON-AXP user belongs to some domain you have to add this user to the CHARON-GRP group as described in this article and then reboot CHARON host.

Otherwise it is possible to use standard account (both local and domain) for running CHARON-AXP:

Login as the local system administrator ("Administrator") on the host system.
Create a special user for running CHARON-AXP. This user must have administrative or standard privileges (in this case login as Administrator for manging NDIS drivers and running NCC utility). Please consult with Windows online documentation for details.
Add this user to the CHARON-GRP group as it is described in this article and then reboot CHARON host.
Login as the created user.

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Table of contents

Introduction

Hardware Requirements

Number of CPU cores

CPU type and speed

Operative memory

Disk storage

Ethernet adapters

Software Requirements

Host system preparation

Before installation

Distribution preparation

Installation

CHARON-AXP home directory

License installation

Regular HASP USB dongle

Network HASP USB dongle

Software license

License validity verification

Troubleshooting

Network configuration

Configuration type 1

Configuration type 2

Configuration type 3

After installation

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