[jan-jaap]

It's easy to create something that basically lasts forever if you build something low power with few moving parts. But an Octane (and most other SGI systems) puts out a lot of heat. It was not built conservatively but at the edge of what was technically possible. The fact that it works at all 20 years later is a small miracle.

It's not really fair to bash all Octanes as fragile or unreliable because one dies. Statistics on a sample size of one, you know the deal. I think most people will agree with me that the Octane is generally a fairly robust system, but in the end they all have their share of problems:

* Indy: Nidec PSUs die
* Indigo2: the IMPACT PSU's have problems, the older PSUs seem to be more reliable. High/Max IMPACT TRAMs fragile.
* O2: really, where do I begin
* Octane: PSUs, compression connectors
* Fuel: the I2C environment monitoring chips, NMB PSUs.

I'll spare you the problems of the big iron. More parts, more heat, more complexity, more problems.

All of them are reaching the age where parts can die at random, elcos dry out, tantalum caps explode, plastic turns brittle and rubber parts spontaneously turn to sticky snot.

I fear the day when my Tezro develops some random problem because that's going to cost me. I've got a spare 4x 700Mz CPU board for my O350, but putting a spare 4x 1GHz CPU board on a shelf "just in case" is not an option...

[TruHobbyist]

To be honest, a lot of the later systems are fragile. The Fuel for example can be very finicky at times, and I've had issues in the past with mine that only went away when I completely dismantled and rebuilt the thing. Contrast that to earlier systems such as the tank-like Indigo2 that just keeps going and going...

Overall, I think most people would agree that the Octane on average is a more solid system than the Fuel. Having not owned a Tezro, I can't comment on those however.

Oh, ok. I thought it was the other way: later systems would be more robust. Then what shouldI buyifI wanted a machine for every day use (12-16 hours/day) ?

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It's not really fair to bash all Octanes as fragile or unreliable because one dies. Statistics on a sample size of one, you know the deal. I think most people will agree with me that the Octane is generally a fairly robust system, but in the end they all have their share of problems:

Agreed. It was more out of frustration.


Are there any special configurations/models of Octanes that make them more durable?

[jan-jaap]

Are there any special configurations/models of Octanes that make them more durable?

I think the later model Cherokee PSU (747W) is considered better than the earlier Lucent one.
The "bigger" IMPACT graphics of the earlier generation (MXE/MXI/SSE/SSI) run pretty hot, you're better off with a V6 if you care about power consumption.

NB: I've got a spare Octane mainboard I can sell, it's the newer rev ("1467"), has been tested and comes with a 300MHz CPU and 512MB RAM to show you it works. 75EUR + shipping (from The Netherlands, Europe).

[Raion]

The Indy has PSU issues period. We have had six people on the discord have Sony Indy's blow mosfets and other components. No Indy user is safe, it's luck of the draw.

The fuel is objectively the worst SGI ever made. It has the most system faults of any system, it's slower than an Octane2 on anything multithreaded, V12s see getting cooked in them etc. I've given up on fuels. When I rescue them, I part them out even if working. It's a failed design and I don't want to destroy anymore V10 and V12 cards in them.

The Tezro is reliable as long as you stay away from the 1GHz models.

[Irinikus]

What's the failure mode on the Quad 1GHZ Tezro? (There aren't so many of these systems around, so surly it would be hard to tell whether they often fail?)

The only section in my machine that often requires an increase in fan speed is the Odyssey section, but according to L1, the temperature is always stabilized by the increased fan speed.

[gijoe77]

my quad 1ghz tezro always seems to complain about heat - I think that might be the issue. I'm looking into hacking a fan into the side panel right above the CPU, maybe in the future right above the V12 area too

[TruHobbyist]

I think the later model Cherokee PSU (747W) is considered better than the earlier Lucent one.
The "bigger" IMPACT graphics of the earlier generation (MXE/MXI/SSE/SSI) run pretty hot, you're better off with a V6 if you care about power consumption.

Ok, I'll watch out for a Cherokee PSU. Already have a V6.

NB: I've got a spare Octane mainboard I can sell, it's the newer rev ("1467"), has been tested and comes with a 300MHz CPU and 512MB RAM to show you it works. 75EUR + shipping (from The Netherlands, Europe).

Let me first get my hands on another Octane so I can confirm my current problem is a backplane or system module problem, which is not clear to me. Thank you very much for the offer and your help, it`s much appreciated.


On another note, I´ve seen on http://www.sgidepot.co.uk/sgidepot/fuel.html that Ian replaces the original Fuel PSU with a modern PC PSU making it more reliable. Maybe this solves some of the issues with the Fuel experimented by users here on the forum.

[jan-jaap]

my quad 1ghz tezro always seems to complain about heat - I think that might be the issue.  I'm looking into hacking a fan into the side panel right above the CPU, maybe in the future right above the V12 area too

Can't say mine ever did that. Did you upgrade your Tezro to 1GHz CPUs or did it come from the factory like that? You need a fairly late L1 revision to recognize the three extra fans on the 1GHz nodeboard. Irinikus ran into this.

Regarding CPU reliability: I can't remember seeing a dead CPU. Quite a few broken L2 cache chips though, from something as old as an IP15 (dual 40MHz R3000) to my Origin 350 which logs an L2 ECC error on one of it's CPUs every once in a while (mostly in summer).

[gijoe77]

Can't say mine ever did that. Did you upgrade your Tezro to 1GHz CPUs or did it come from the factory like that? You need a fairly late L1 revision to recognize the three extra fans on the 1GHz nodeboard. Irinikus ran into this.

oh hey now what's this?  I upgraded the Tezro with the quad 1ghz nodeboard so I might have to look into this.  I have 6.5.30 installed - was this something that came with the OS like how the o2 PROM gets flashed with newer IRIX releases?

[BackPlaner]

Can't say mine ever did that. Did you upgrade your Tezro to 1GHz CPUs or did it come from the factory like that? You need a fairly late L1 revision to recognize the three extra fans on the 1GHz nodeboard. Irinikus ran into this.

oh hey now what's this?  I upgraded the Tezro with the quad 1ghz nodeboard so I might have to look into this.  I have 6.5.30 installed - was this something that came with the OS like how the o2 PROM gets flashed with newer IRIX releases?

Do the fans on the 1ghz board spin up at all?