[bjames]

Been trying to install Irix on a blank hard drive and it constantly gets interrupted during the installation phase with errors when reading files. I can’t seem to get through a complete CD without this happening. I have the original media and even cleaned them very well with alchohol and a lint free cloth so they almost look new.

My question is, could the constant read errors have more to do with the drive it’s self and not the cds? I do have a replacement CD-ROM drive inbound. The last time I installed Irix 6.5.8 from the original discs was back in 2009 and there was zero issues.

I should mention that I have written “new”data cds from my windows box and read them on the external CD-ROM without any read errors.

When I was trying to install Irix on an Indy, the CD-ROM would interrupt and say “too much data”. Now with the octane, it just fails to read some files.

[jpstewart]

I had a heck of a time installing IRIX (4.0.5) on my Indigo from CD-R. I tried burning it to another disk and still had the same problems, so began to wonder if the disk image had been corrupted during (or even prior to) download. I tried booting a different OS (either Linux or one of the BSDs; maybe more than one) from CD-R too, and failed. That's when I realized that it was the external SCSI CD-ROM drive that was to blame. Even though it worked great on my PCs and Suns, the SGIs just plain did not like it. This was all several years ago, but I think I was seeing similar or identical errors to what you're reporting.

Fortunately, in my case I had other SCSI CD and DVD drives available. It was a DVD-ROM that worked for me even though that poor old Indigo pre-dated DVD by quite a while! I've got Plextor, Toshiba, and Pioneer drives here. I can't remember what combinations I've tried, and I think I've had different experiences on different SGI machines.

All of which is the long way of saying "yes, it could be the drive itself" or it could be a compatibility problem between the specific drive you have and your SGI(s).

[Jacques]

What CD Rom do you have? Have you got it set to 512 byte blocks?

[bjames]

Its the SGI (Toshiba) CD-Rom drive with the Grey Granite enclosure with HD68 connections.

I do have a replacement SGI/Toshiba drive comming in that I will swap out tonight or tomorrow.

FWIW, I successful installed IRIX last night and only had one 'interrupt' for an illeagal file?.? but I hit continue and did not have anymore errors. I did clean all CD-Roms with alcohol to make sure they were 100% clean.

[Jacques]

The constant error thing sounds like wrong jumper (512 / 2048), dodgy lens or bad CDs. but if you've not changed the jumpers then could be loose connection, maybe dirt on lens? as JP mentioned, some machines don't like certain drives, but I cannot imagine an SGI enclosure and Toshiba drive not working.

Network install FTW.

[bjames]

So this was interesting...

I successfully installed Irix 6.5.12 (fresh install) on the octane. Ran into 1 interrupt, but selected option 3 to continue. The installation finished without issues.

Using the same CD drive and 6.5.12 media to install onto a fresh drive inside an Indy, I was getting tons of nterrupts I.e. scsi. Bus reset, illegal and can’t read archive errors. This was using the exact same media as the octane. Now I am wondering if it has more to do with the scsi bus dropping connection or cable issue. The Indy has a hd50 pin centronics and the sgi CD drive using a hd68. So I’m using an adaptor connected to the Indy, connected to a hd68 cable. So maybe the read errors are due to a bad adaptor or cable.