[CLUE-Tech] Linux on Sparc: Need Media

[Nate Duehr]

On Jun 7, 2004, at 5:05 PM, Jed S. Baer wrote:

> On Sun, 6 Jun 2004 19:41:25 -0600
> "Jed S. Baer" <thag at frii.com> wrote:
>
>> My plan is to
>> bring one to the CLUE meeting on Tuesday, to give away as a door 
>> prize.
>
> I have turned on both of these things. Here's the result.
>
> Incorrect configuration checksum
> <snip>
> The IDPROM contents are invalid

On-board battery is dead, most likely.  I think I've seen that one 
before.

Probably won't keep time correctly on reboot...

> Boot device: /sbus/le at 0,c00000 File and args:
> Internal loopback test -- Did not receive expected loopback packet.
> Can't open boot device

That le is "local ethernet" I think -- they're set to boot from 
loopback???  That's just odd.  Probably a side-effect of the above 
problem.  You might need to get the thing to actually save boot 
parameters to EPROM, and it may be unable to do that.  Perhaps someone 
that actually worked on IPX's can chime in, but I have a feeling you 
won't find a whole lot of people that remember them intimately on many 
lists -- hopefully some Net-based documentation can be still Googled.

> ok set auto-boot?=false
> stack underflow

The version of OpenBoot on those machines doesn't understand that 
command, it would appear.

> ok reset-all
> reset-all? (no opportunity to answer here, returned to prompt)

Same problem, looks like.

> ok probe-scsi-all
> /sbus at 1,f8000000/esp at 0,800000
>  Target 3
>   Unit  0 Disk MAXTOR LXT-2BS SUN02074.17

No sign of the CD-ROM on the SCSI bus... or did you say you didn't have 
one?

Oh it's further down.

> Machine 2 has a different disk: HP C2247-300 0BH4, and has a very noisy
> fan. Otherwise the machines are the same, as far as I can tell -- same
> boot messages.

Ok.

> The external CD drive seems non-functional. There are two LEDs, green 
> and
> red. The green LED flashes at about 4hz whenever the shoebox is 
> powered up
> -- the LEDs are part of the shoebox, not the drive itself. Probably
> something disconnected inside the shoebox, but power and the drive 
> cable
> are both plugged in.

Could be that you don't have the SCSI bus terminated properly.  Is 
there a terminator on one connector on the back of that drive?  You do 
have to do old-fashioned SCSI termination on older Suns, of course.  
Those machines are pre-auto-termination.

If it's a Sun drive, it'll probably also have a little window and a 
number with buttons above and below to set the SCSI ID of the CD-ROM -- 
Sun boxes like that set to "6".

The continuous blinking sounds bad... like it thinks there's a disc in 
it when there's not.  It's probably old enough it'll have a hard time 
reading CD-R or RW media also, but you might get lucky there.

> So, this brings up two questions. Is it worth my time to continue 
> messing
> with one of these? And, is it worthwhile to bring on to the CLUE 
> meeting
> to give away (monitor included)? Would anyone want one?

They'll be really slow.  They're typically 40 Mhz processors and 
32-bit, they're not UltraSparc 64-bit machines.

I have an Ultra 1 that's an UltraSparc 64-bit 127 MHz machine and it's 
ancient.  In non-scientific comparison, it compares favorably to 
another Pentium II machine I have here -- they feel about that same 
speed running Debian Linux... with slightly faster I/O to the SCSI 
devices on the Sun box.

Basically the really old Suns can be useful for stuff like DNS servers, 
secondary MX'es, etc... but they're pretty slow for anything CPU 
intensive.  Some people like to netboot them as X terms.  As old as 
those SCSI disks are, I'm not sure I would trust them to anything other 
than easily-replaceable data, though.

> Or, I can give up on the boxes, and bring both monitors to give away.
> They're the "composite synch" variety -- you know, the ones with those 
> 3
> oversize round connectors inside the D-connector.

If you want 'em doing something, don't give up on them yet.  You might 
want to take a peek at :

http://www.ultralinux.org/faq.html

And the parent website.

Also check out the debian-sparc mailing list -- lots of knowledgeable 
Sun/Linux folk there, and low traffic.

Good luck with it.  I enjoyed getting a few different Sparc machines 
(quite a bit newer than the IPX) going on Linux over the last few 
years.  It's never been all that exciting when complete, though -- 
Linux is Linux... it just ends up looking like a slower PC with nice 
sturdy cases and good enough engineering that they just won't die... 
the hardware's incredibly reliable other than the natural death rate of 
older SCSI disks.  (GRIN)

Nate Duehr, nate at natetech.com