>From: "Zach Lowry" <zach@zachlowry.net>
>To: "Curtis H. Wilbar Jr." <bsd@hawkmountain.net>, <port-sun3@netbsd.org>
>Cc: <netbsd-ports@netbsd.org>
>Subject: RE: Port to Sun 386i
>Date: Mon, 2 Jun 2003 22:12:02 -0500
>
> 
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>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: netbsd-ports-owner@netbsd.org
>> [mailto:netbsd-ports-owner@netbsd.org]On Behalf Of Curtis H. Wilbar
>> Jr. Sent: Monday, June 02, 2003 3:06 PM
>> To: port-sun3@netbsd.org
>> Cc: netbsd-ports@netbsd.org
>> Subject: Re: Port to Sun 386i
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> >From: "Zach Lowry" <zach@zachlowry.net>
>> >To: <port-i386@netbsd.org>
>> >Cc: <port-sun3@netbsd.org>, <netbsd-ports@netbsd.org>
>> >Subject: Port to Sun 386i
>> >Date: Mon, 2 Jun 2003 11:21:22 -0500
>> >
>> > 
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>> >Hello!
>> >
>> >I am soon to recieve a Sun 386i, which I notice has not been
>> >ported to yet. Since for the past little bit I've been acquainting
>> >myself with my Sun 3/60 and 3/80s, I feel comfortable saying that
>> >I intend to port NetBSD to this unique machine. 
>> 
>> I have two or three of these... along with the rare 486i.  I think
>> I have 1 386i/150, 1 or 2 386i/250, and 1 486i.
>                                      ^^^^^^^^^^
>                                      So, they DO exist...

Yes they do.  I've confirmed the esitence (by e-mail) of one other
as well.  I doubt many of these made it into the "wild".

By memory I think it has a 486DX25 in it... I was thinking an easy way
to get more HP out of it would be a 486DX2/50 processor... no clock fiddling
:-).  I may not bother though as I will probably elect to keep this 
100% original (although a proc is easy to swap back).

>
>> 
>> >
>> >I'm looking for advice, however, since I've bever done this sort
>> >of thing before. Would it be best to start with the i386 port,
>> >remove all devices except those explicitly available in the 386i
>> >and then merge drivers for Framebuffers and the like from the sun3
>> >port? From what I understand, the normal color and B&W
>> >framebuffers on the 386i correspond to the cg3 and bw2, but
>> >additionally there exists a cg5 card and a VGA card for DOS
>> >emulation under SunOS. 
>> 
>> As the VGA card was only used during emulation, you don't need to
>> worry about that.... it might be more trouble than it is worth to
>> support that.  
>> 
>
>Check.
>
>> >
>> >I'm also aware that there existed memory add-ons in the form of
>> >ISA cards, could anyone clarify on these boards, and would it be
>> >possible to support them?
>> 
>> The only memory boards I am aware of go into special slots.  One
>> has cache memory, the other does not.
>> 
>
>Ah, ok. From my copy of the FEH, it looked like ISA. 

definatly not ISA... 

The 386i has one 8 bit ISA slot, 3 16 bit ISA slots, and 4 P2 Bus slots
The cpu board goes in slot 1, the graphics board in slot 4, and memory
in slots 2 and 3.  Check the FE handbook section on slot assignments for
the breakdown.  (1st memory in slot 3, 2nd memory board in slot 2)

>
>> >
>> >If anyone has any guidance/suggestions/additional hardware, please
>> >let me know. 
>> 
>> I would think since Sun firwmare allows net booting, if the 386i
>> boots using standard protocols, then the first step would probably
>> be a kernel with minimal drivers probably only first support serial
>> console.  Once that is made to work, porting drivers from other
>> NetBSD distros, etc to support that various hardware....
>
>I believe it's just like Sun3 Netbooting, and I've already set that
>up for my 3/60. I'm curious to see how far the i386 kernel will get,
>if it gets anywhere at all. 
>
>> 
>> Though, I've never done this kind of work before, I would think
>> that might be the easier approach ?
>> 
>> Although, you'd have to have a port of the netboot image that 
>> would work with
>> the 386i hardware.... hmmm... not sure what would be easiest.  
>
>Could the boot.net from Sun3 be compiled straight for i386?

I've not looked at boot.net to see how it works.  I'd imagine it must
have to have a certain amount of support for the hardware.  Since the
386i hardware is pretty much completely different (or similar but
attached via a different bus) I think there will be a lot of work to 
do.

My current attempts at bringing over the cg8 graphics driver from the
sun4 tree into the sun3 tree is proving to be quite difficult.... seems
many things are done quite differently.... maybe they were similar at
one time, but have diverged a bit over time ?

>
>> 
>> Other than the Sun 386i uses an intel processor, and has an ISA
>> bus, it has almost nothing in common with a 386 pc.
>> 
>> -- Curt
>> 
>> >
>> >Thanks!
>> >
>> >Zach Lowry || Murfreesboro, TN || www.zachlowry.net
>> >Linux / *BSD / Irix / Solaris / Apple / Unix Network
>> >Administration  
>> >
>> >Registered Linux User #264589
>> >14 Different NetBSD-Supported Machines
>> >
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>> 
>> 
>
>Zach Lowry || Murfreesboro, TN || www.zachlowry.net
>Linux / *BSD / Irix / Solaris / Apple / Unix Network Administration
>
>Registered Linux User #264589
>14 Different NetBSD-Supported Machines
>
>
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