Hi,
Hi, I have a PCI card with two SATA ports on Sun Ultra 10, so I can use modern SATA discs for / file system. I simply specify the following kernel config:
This is common on lots of architectures since PCI / PCIe cards of all kinds are readily available. Boot firmware, less so.
Unfortunately OpenBoot cannot boot from the SATA card, so I either have to use built-in IDE controller or the PCI SCSI card. Over the years all of the IDE and SCSI discs that I hoarded have gradually failed and nobody manufactures new ones any more.
There are things you can buy which are new. The most common would be an IDE to CompactFlash adapter plus a CompactFlash card, as an example. I use lots of SATA SSDs via SATA-IDE adapters. But your point is taken.
How can I replicate this on CD-RW disc, so that I can boot from it? Is it as simple as creating a bootable iso9660? I found these instructions https://www.netbsd.org/docs/bootcd.html#sparc64image which I'm going to try in the next few days. But if anyone thinks that's not the right way to go, then please let me know.
On systems which are local, making a bootable CD with a kernel with a hardcoded root works. I've done this before with older PowerPC G3 systems before figuring out that an HFS partition can also be used.
On systems where a CD drive isn't accessible (my Sun, Alpha and Amiga hardware is colocated), a CompactFlash or SATA-IDE would be easier.
John