[kokoboi]

Anyone has 4D/35 with IRIX 3.3 and would like to share his disk dump ?
I would like to bring a 4D/35 in VME factor back to life.

[jan-jaap]

According to the SGI hardware FAQ, it won't work:

Code:

Subject:   -11- What OS versions are supported on which platforms?
Date: 20 Dec 1996 00:00:01 EST
[...]
  V/20, VIP10: 4.0.1+VIP10, IRIX 4.0.5A+V20_35. End of lifetime.
[...]
  V/30, V/35, VIP12: 4.0.1+VIP12, 4.0.2+V35, IRIX 4.0.5A+V20_35. End of
  lifetime. [Might have supported one other release.]

Even the regular Personal IRIX 4D/45 has a PROM version 4.0, and IRIX 3.3 support was a 'backport' with the help of a special "4D/35 Support" tape.

I can provide the 3.3. installation media including the supplemental 4D/35 installation tape, dev tools etc. You'd need to do a network installation.

Honestly, I think your best bet would probably be an early 4.0.5 release, 4.0.5C maybe. I've never seen any of these 4.0.x + VIPnn releases in the wild, and the later 4.0.5 releases were Indigo/RealityEngine only and I can tell you from personal experience they don't work on e.g. PowerSeries.

[kokoboi]

I gave it a try. 3.3 tapes are on internet and include 4D35-support-1.0-tape1.
Booted over a network, partitioned the disk, then started the install. So far so good.
However I got this each time

Code:

Manual> from

Read software from where? (guest@192.168.0.135:/usr/local/boot) guest@192.168.0.135:/usr/local/boot/4d1-3.3-eoe-tape1
Reading product descriptors from guest@192.168.0.135:/usr/local/boot/4d1-3.3-eoe-tape1:

Can't read product descriptor.

Manual> from

Read software from where? (guest@192.168.0.135:/usr/local/boot/4d1-3.3-eoe-tape1) guest@192.168.0.135:/usr/local/boot/4d1-3.3.1-tape1
Reading product descriptors from guest@192.168.0.135:/usr/local/boot/4d1-3.3.1-tape1:

Can't read product descriptor.

Manual>

Any ideas what does this mean ?

[jan-jaap]

Code:

Can't read product descriptor.

Any ideas what does this mean ?

Yes, the person who provided the installation media was probably full of good intentions but never tried his tape backups.

The program 'distcp' (or was it mkboottape?) which is used to extract installation tapes to disc has an interesting 'feature': it doesn't work like 'dd', but writes out product descriptor files in it's own version format. So if you extract an IRIX 3.3 tape with a system running IRIX 4.0 or 5.3, you will end up with installation images that the 3.3 'inst' chokes on.

The product descriptor file is the short file from each installation image, the one without file extension:

Code:

-rw-r--r-- 1 janjaap users     6540 Nov 15  1994 eoe1             <<--- product descriptor file
-rw-r--r-- 1 janjaap users   666418 Nov 15  1994 eoe1.idb
-rw-r--r-- 1 janjaap users  3242732 Nov 15  1994 eoe1.man
-rw-r--r-- 1 janjaap users 88115456 Nov 15  1994 eoe1.sw

If you were to look at it with a hex editor, you'd see:

Code:

$ hexdump -C eoe1 | head -10
00000000  70 64 30 30 31 56 35 33  30 50 30 30 00 07 c4 00  |pd001V530P00....|
00000010  01 07 c3 00 06 00 04 65  6f 65 31 00 21 49 52 49  |.......eoe1.!IRI|
00000020  58 20 45 78 65 63 75 74  69 6f 6e 20 45 6e 76 69  |X Execution Envi|
00000030  72 6f 6e 6d 65 6e 74 20  31 2c 20 35 2e 33 00 50  |ronment 1, 5.3.P|
00000040  2e c7 fa 6b 00 00 00 02  00 58 00 03 6d 61 6e 00  |...k.....X..man.|
00000050  24 49 52 49 58 20 45 78  65 63 75 74 69 6f 6e 20  |$IRIX Execution |
00000060  45 6e 76 69 72 6f 6e 6d  65 6e 74 20 4d 61 6e 20  |Environment Man |
00000070  50 61 67 65 73 00 02 00  0f 3c e3 f3 c4 00 00 00  |Pages....<......|
00000080  03 08 50 00 04 64 6c 70  69 00 18 44 4c 50 49 20  |..P..dlpi..DLPI |
00000090  45 78 65 63 75 74 69 6f  6e 20 4d 61 6e 20 50 61  |Execution Man Pa|

The pd001V530P00 is the product descriptor version ID and it's at the core of the problem.

For an IRIX 4.0.5 installation image:

Code:

$ hexdump -C eoe1 | head -10
00000000  70 64 30 30 31 56 34 30  30 50 31 35 00 07 c4 00  |pd001V400P15....|
00000010  01 07 c3 00 06 00 04 65  6f 65 31 00 23 45 78 65  |.......eoe1.#Exe|
00000020  63 75 74 69 6f 6e 20 4f  6e 6c 79 20 45 6e 76 69  |cution Only Envi|
00000030  72 6f 6e 6d 65 6e 74 20  31 2c 20 34 2e 30 2e 35  |ronment 1, 4.0.5|
00000040  00 50 2a 5b 52 9f 00 00  00 02 00 58 00 03 6d 61  |.P*[R......X..ma|
00000050  6e 00 12 65 6f 65 31 20  44 6f 63 75 6d 65 6e 74  |n..eoe1 Document|
00000060  61 74 69 6f 6e 00 02 00  0f 3b f6 5a 5b 00 00 00  |ation....;.Z[...|
00000070  04 08 52 00 05 61 75 64  69 6f 00 24 53 74 61 6e  |..R..audio.$Stan|
00000080  64 61 72 64 20 41 75 64  69 6f 20 53 6f 66 74 77  |dard Audio Softw|
00000090  61 72 65 20 4d 61 6e 75  61 6c 20 50 61 67 65 73  |are Manual Pages|

And finally, IRIX 3.x:

Code:

$ hexdump -C eoe1 | head -10
00000000  07 c4 00 01 07 c3 00 06  00 04 65 6f 65 31 00 2d  |..........eoe1.-|
00000010  34 44 31 2d 33 2e 33 2e  32 20 45 78 65 63 75 74  |4D1-3.3.2 Execut|
00000020  69 6f 6e 20 4f 6e 6c 79  20 45 6e 76 69 72 6f 6e  |ion Only Environ|
00000030  6d 65 6e 74 20 28 70 61  72 74 20 31 29 00 50 27  |ment (part 1).P'|
00000040  ad e6 83 00 00 00 02 08  58 00 03 6d 61 6e 00 2a  |........X..man.*|
00000050  45 78 65 63 75 74 69 6f  6e 20 4f 6e 6c 79 20 45  |Execution Only E|
00000060  6e 76 69 72 6f 6e 6d 65  6e 74 20 31 20 64 6f 63  |nvironment 1 doc|
00000070  75 6d 65 6e 74 61 74 69  6f 6e 00 02 00 0f 3b e7  |umentation....;.|
00000080  21 13 00 00 00 02 08 52  00 08 72 65 6c 6e 6f 74  |!......R..relnot|
00000090  65 73 00 19 57 6f 72 6b  73 74 61 74 69 6f 6e 20  |es..Workstation |

See the difference?

Now, I'm pretty sure that when you have a look at the product descriptor files of your IRIX 3.3 distribution, you will be greeted with something like pd001V530P00. This is the handywork of distcp and doesn't belong there.

The solution is simple: cut the first 13 bytes from the product descriptor using dd. Repeat for all images, e.g. eoe1, eoe2, nfs, dev, ...

The affects only the product descriptor files, not the other files of the sw distribution (the .idb files, the .man, .sw, etc etc).

[kokoboi]

I tried this yesterday but instead of cut the descriptor I zeroed it, which is obviously wrong. Could you send me your dumps, just in case if they don't contain the wrong descriptor?
Thanks!

[jan-jaap]

PM Sent.

Would be nice to see this system in action. Please share some pics with us!

[kokoboi]

Thanks for the tape dumps. This time I was able to make the installation.
As I'm not familiar with IRIX3 I would require more assistance to set up it properly.

Nothing is printed below this message on console after the startup.

Code:

IRIS's Internet address is the default. Using standalone network mode.

so I booted it into single user and edited the hosts file and then I'm able to login via telnet.
"/etc/getty  ttyd1 console" displays the login prompt on console, however:

Code:

IRIS console login: root
No utmp entry.  You must exec "login" from the lowest level "sh".

Here is the hinv output

Code:

1 36 MHZ IP12 Processor
FPU: MIPS R2010A/R3010 VLSI Floating Point Chip Revision: 4.0
CPU: MIPS R2000A/R3000 Processor Chip Revision: 3.0
Data cache size: 64 Kbytes
Instruction cache size: 64 Kbytes
Main memory size: 32 Mbytes
Integral Ethernet controller: Version 0
Disk drive: unit 7 on SCSI controller 0
Disk drive: unit 6 on SCSI controller 0
Disk drive: unit 5 on SCSI controller 0
Disk drive: unit 4 on SCSI controller 0
Disk drive: unit 3 on SCSI controller 0
Disk drive: unit 2 on SCSI controller 0
Disk drive: unit 1 on SCSI controller 0
Integral SCSI controller 0: Version WD33C93A

No idea why the disk drive is replicated on all LUN

And here is the photo of the VME board https://i.ibb.co/jTr4NXx/vme.jpg

[jan-jaap]

No idea why the disk drive is replicated on all LUN

You probably set the SCSI ID of your system disk to the ID of the controller (ID #0). In SGIs the system disk is normally SCSI ID #1.

Could it be the system is waiting for graphics to initialize or something like that?

[kokoboi]

Code:

You probably set the SCSI ID of your system disk to the ID of the controller (ID #0). In SGIs the system disk is normally SCSI ID #1.

Didn't know that. I'll set the ID to 1.

Code:

Could it be the system is waiting for graphics to initialize or something like that?

The machine is headless. I've should gotten the graphics option when I had chance.
Is there an option to configure it without the frame buffer ?

[jan-jaap]

Code:

Could it be the system is waiting for graphics to initialize or something like that?

The machine is headless. I've should gotten the graphics option when I had chance.
Is there an option to configure it without the frame buffer ?

It's got to be possible. Not so long ago I sorted out all my old Personal IRIS parts and I ran an IP10 mainboard with nothing but the power connector attached (and serial console). Did you check the PROM environment variables? Try:

Code:

setenv console d
setenv nogfxkbd 1