I have a NeXTstation. I made some corruption on my hard disk:
When i boot, i get:
SCSI Block in error = 696; Partition a F.S. sector 188
vfs_mountroot : error = 5
Panic: (cpu 0) ... cannot mount root
I made a bootdisk from Apple support site but when i tried it i got a lot of:
bad checksum
bad label
etc.
Do you know where i can find a rescue disk for nextstep3.3 that is working fine? Thanks. :?:
Try the ones from this site, as I have also had troubles with the ones from apple.com.
http://www.shawcomputing.net/resources/next/hardware/boot_floppies/boot_floppies.htmlChef
Thank you for the link. I successfully created a boot disk and it works.
But...
When i boot on floppy, i got:
NeXT> bfd
boot fd (0,0,0)
Searching for CD-ROM drives
No CD-ROM drives are attached to this computer
Can't load blk0 boot
I don't have CD-ROM drive. I just have a floppy drive and a corrupted harddrive (very little damage but unable to boot). I would like to run fsck from a diskette and repare my hdd with a rescue diskette. Is it possible?
Thanks
Quote from: "russianmountain"I don't have CD-ROM drive. I just have a floppy drive and a corrupted harddrive (very little damage but unable to boot). I would like to run fsck from a diskette and repare my hdd with a rescue diskette. Is it possible?
Thanks
I have never heard of a 'rescue diskette' for NeXT.
Why do you need a floppy or a CD anyways?
You can run this if you boot into 'single user' mode immediately after you power the machine on.
Enter the ROM monitor and to boot into single user - type: bsd -s [and hit the return key]
When the text on the screen stops - type:
fsck -y [and hit the return key]
Do it again several times if necessary, and [hopefully] it will correct itself.
Quote from: "russianmountain"
harddrive (very little damage but unable to boot). I would like to run fsck from a diskette and repare my hdd with a rescue diskette. Is it possible?
Ummm, the error you're getting:
Quote
SCSI Block in error = 696; Partition a F.S. sector 188
vfs_mountroot : error = 5
Panic: (cpu 0) ... cannot mount root
is
NOT a "very little damage" type of error. It's seemingly a hard error (physical media defect) and worse, for you, it's most likely in a very sensitive area of the disk (probably filesystem root blocks), which pretty much renders the parition unmountable.
It
might be possible to recover it if you have appropriate software that will re-read that block a whole bunch of times. I recommend
SCU (
http://home.comcast.net/~SCSIguy/SCSI_FAQ/RMiller_Tools/scu.html), although it's some down-right intimidating piece of software (from a UI perspective). I also recommend you run it in a Linux box after having installed the NeXT SCSI disk on that box.
Quote from: "russianmountain"
I don't have CD-ROM drive. I just have a floppy drive and a corrupted
Unfortunately the boot floppy that you got
requires a CDROM from which to continue booting, and then take you into single-user mode (if you specified the -s boot argument/parameter). Then you can fix filesystem erros with the
fsck tool.
Only way around a CDROM is if you have another NeXT hard disk, and boot that into single user mode. This STILL does not help you though, because even if you do, fsck will not really be able to help you with your error...
You need luck on your side this time... so good luck!
Quote from: "kenjay"
I have never heard of a 'rescue diskette' for NeXT.
That's right, because one does not exist. The closest is the "floppy & CDROM booting into single user mode" solution.
Quote from: "kenjay"
Why do you need a floppy or a CD anyways?
He didn't know that there's no rescue diskette available, so he thought he could boot a floppy disk and do some disk fixing from there.
Quote from: "kenjay"
You can run this if you boot into 'single user' mode immediately after you power the machine on.
...if he could only mount a partition (his hard disk, which is not possible, or CDROM, which he doesn't have) from which to enter single user mode.
Quote from: "kenjay"
Enter the ROM monitor and to boot into single user - type: bsd -s [and hit the return key]
When the text on the screen stops - type:
fsck -y [and hit the return key]
Unfortunately none of that will work without a mountable partition...
Quote from: "kenjay"
Do it again several times if necessary, and [hopefully] it will correct itself.
I recommend he pray several times, and [hopefully] it will correct itself. :)
Or try to force fate using some tool like SCU...
Thanks for your expertness and your help.
I was very happy when i received my NeXTstation last week. After 15 years, my dream became true. A very beautiful design. I will try very hard to fix it.
1) I think that the easiest way for me to solve my problem is to buy another harddrive with NS or Openstep on it. But it's hard to find...
2) I don't have a lot of time but i will try to find or make a scsi pc with linux and chain scsi drives to run fsck or SCU on the dammaged one.
3) Or pray for that Apple will transform the licence of NeXTSTEP 3.3 for Black hardware from ABANDONWARE to FREEWARE without support.
Quote from: "russianmountain"3) Or pray for that Apple will transform the licence of NeXTSTEP 3.3 for Black hardware from ABANDONWARE to FREEWARE without support.
I can not speak for everyone here, but as far as I am concerned if you have a piece of black hardware then you own a license for NS. The licensing is different than Microsoft, which licenses the OS itself with no regard really to the hardware you install it on. Check out the thread below for more information.
http://www.nextcomputers.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=638Chef
Did somebody ever made a clone system (or an emulator) that is able to run original NeXTSTEP for Mach?
If the answer is no, there is no matter that Apple be against free ftp download of old versions of NeXTSTEP for Black because that piece of software cannot run with any other computer. And if you own a blackbox, you own the licence of NeXTSTEP, but probably unable to get CD or diskettes of NeXTSTEP.
@russianmountain:
You're welcome. Now, what Nextchef said is pretty much your best avenue: you're allowed, by Apple, to have a copy of NeXTSTEP for your machine (read the thread he pasted). So, grab a copy of NeXTSTEP User CDROM image (be resourceful), do the same with the floppy disks. Next step (pun intended) is to get either another SCSI hard disk (they're cheap and plenty these days), or blow away the one you currently have (sometimes zeroing out the disk, in Linux for example, a bunch of times will make the errors go away (temporarily?), or in the worse case, low level format the thing and see what happens). Re-install the OS.
Good luck.
Thanks for your ideas... For now, i bought an used scsi controler (10$) for my PC and i installed a slave IDE hard disk too. I plan to install Debian on it. And after, i will connect a third HD (NeXT) on my SCSI card and try to mount and run fsck on it from Debian.
If i will succeed to fix my NeXT HDD, i will let you know how.
Regards
russianmountain
Quote from: "russianmountain"And after, i will connect a third HD (NeXT) on my SCSI card and try to mount and run fsck on it from Debian.
Be careful:
1) Debian (or Linux) fsck will not be able to check or fix a NeXT disk, as it's a different filesystem. Linux uses ext1/2/3 or ReiserFS or XFS or or or... NeXT uses a (modified?) UFS file system.
2) Your problem is
not a file system problem. It's a media defect, most likely physical. Try re-read my first post and ask me to explain if something doesn't make sense.
Quote from: "russianmountain"
If i will succeed to fix my NeXT HDD, i will let you know how.
That would be a good day ;)
I have downloaded FreeBSD. It supports UFS if partitionning is not too different than BSD. I hope that NeXT follows BSD standards.
Anyway, i have bought a new hard drive from Rob Blessin on Ebay with Openstep 4.2 on it. But Rob seems very busy ... I think that i will have a lot of time to fix my NeXTstep hard disk before receiving my Openstep hard disk...
When i will get a working hard drive, i will backup it as soon as possible...
Quote from: "russianmountain"I have downloaded FreeBSD. It supports UFS if partitionning is not too different than BSD. I hope that NeXT follows BSD standards.
BSD is the standard when it comes to UFS, but I don't think NeXTSTEP's UFS is fully compatible with BSD.
But once again, I think you're missing the point: your problem does not seem to be a
file system problem. It seems to be a media error.
Quote from: "russianmountain"
Anyway, i have bought a new hard drive from Rob Blessin on Ebay with Openstep 4.2 on it. But Rob seems very busy ... I think that i will have a lot of time to fix my NeXTstep hard disk before receiving my Openstep hard disk...
Yes, he's infamous for that (search him in the forum posts)
Quote from: "russianmountain"
When i will get a working hard drive, i will backup it as soon as possible...
Always a good idea. In fact, that's the first thing you can try to do when you hookup the drive on your Linux/BSD box: dd if=/dev/sdX of=/tmp/backup_of_NeXT_disk_on_my_big_drive_tmp_dir bs=1k