Subject: Re: Resurrecting and putting NetBSD in a 5000/200
To: Mauricio Tavares <Mauricio@proedint.com>
From: Simon Burge <simonb@netbsd.org>
List: port-pmax
Date: 07/29/1999 10:45:30
Mauricio Tavares wrote:
> NEWBIE WARNING ----- NEWBIE WARNING ----- NEWBIE WARNING ----- NEWBIE WARNING
>
> Two weeks ago I was given a DEC 5000/200. It came with keyboard, rodent,
> 16MB (My Guess) of RAM, but no monitor or HD. To check it out, I took it
> to work, hid it under my monitor (so now people will think it is a monitor
> base ;), and got a null modem cable so I could connect it to the PC I use
> at work. I got then Tera Term for the PC, told it to look for com2, took
> the PMAG-B card off the DEC, booted it, and this is what I got:
>
> KN02-AA V5.3t
> >>?
> ? [cmd]
> boot [[-z #] [-n] #/path [ARG...]]
> cat SCRPT
> cnfg [#]
> d [-bhw] [-S #] RNG VAL
> e [-bhwcdoux] [-S #] RNG
> erl [-c]
> go [ADR]
> init [#] [-m] [ARG...]
> ls [#]
> passwd [-c] [-s]
> printenv [EVN]
> restart
> script SCRPT
> setenv EVN STR
> sh [-belvS] [SCRPT] [ARG..]
> t [-l] #/STR [ARG..]
> unsetenv EVN
> >>printenv
> boot=5/rz0/vmunix -a
> testaction=q
> haltaction=h
> more=24
> #=7
> console=1
> osconsole=7
> >>
>
> It would seem to me that it was originally configured to boot from HD SCSI
> #0.
This is right - slot 5 is the internal SCSI controller, rz0 is the
first disk (scsi ID 0) and "vmunix" is the kernel name. This should
be changed to "netbsd" quickly :-). "cnfg 5" would show you all SCSI
devices (if you had any attached), and you can use anything except 7 for
a boot disk.
> Does -a mean multiuser?
Yup.
> console and osconsole means nothing to me.
These are used to control which device is the console. Did your machine
come with a graphics card in any of the three expansion slots? A
graphics card would have PMAGxxx marked on the back of it - where xxx
could be a range of things. The 5000/200 doesn't have any on-board
graphics.
> How can I ask it to chec the memory and report how much it thinks it has?
"cnfg" will tell you what the machine has in summary, and usually "cnfg
#" where # is 0, 1 or 2 for the expansion slots and 3, 4, 5 and 6 will
be info on the cpu, memory, disk and ethernet. "t" is the self test.
These machines can use either 8MB or 32MB memory modules.
> I would like to put NetBSD in it. I should have a little 512MB HD I could
> use at least to check the machine out. My problem here is that there are
> *no* other unix boxes at work. I have a Sparc at home but would prefer not
> to have to take one to where the other is and work from there. So, given
> that I have a PC on my desk running win95, how can I put NetBSD in the
> 5000/200?
Does the PC have a SCSI card? If so, you should be able to copy the
diskimage that lives in the release directories to the start of the
harddisk. I don't know how you'd do this - if it were me, I'd put the
netbsd stuff on the PC hard disk, then boot a netbsd/i386 install floppy
to do the copying :-)
Simon.