Patent ID: 7469361

Claim:
A method for detecting and removing possibly malfunctioning devices attached to a storage switch during initialization of the devices when the devices are connected in a loop, comprising: sequentially starting a loop down timer for each device as an initialization start command is propagated to each device in the loop; sequentially resetting the loop down timer for each device in the loop if an initialization end command is propagated to the device, the initialization end command being propagated to each device in the loop if there are no malfunctioning devices in the loop; and sequentially bypassing each device whose loop down timer reaches an end count without being reset, each bypassed device representing a possibly malfunctioning device, and re-connecting the loop to include only those devices that have not been bypassed, until all malfunctioning devices have been bypassed and the initialization end command is able to propagate to each remaining device in the loop and reset the loop down timer for each remaining device in the loop.