Just a few hours ago my "brand new" Indigo2 Impact arrived :D I feel kinda lucky 'cause i (in german you've got a saying like "buyin the cat in a bag" - i would like to know if this exists in english as well?) took my chances buying this machine from a fellow on ebay who didn't know more about it as it beeing purple. (i just love bad descriptions keeping the price low) It has a few deeper scratches on top :cry: but i just turned it on and it not only actually works but running "hinv" in the PROM it turned out to be equipped with a 250 Mhz R4400, 384 MB RAM and an High Impact Graphics Card 8)
And also the vendor threw in a Software libary package containing IRIX 6.5
So just a few quick questions:
Shouldn't the HD beeing listed in "hinv" or would i assume it's gone?
Apparently i would need to install IRIX but neither of my SGI Computers got an internal CD ROM - my only available external SCSI CD ROM is the NeXT Singlespeed and i don't know if i'd like to do several CDs with that one :lol:
So what would i have to do in order to get the Remote Directory install via ethernet i suppose to work.
holy smokes! Nice :) I've been wanting to get a good SGI system for awhile.
As for that saying, I'm sure we have one similiar, but I just woke up and cannot think of it at the moment.
"Buying the cat in the bag", eh? Not sure it exists in English, but I like that expression. Cool machine.
Sorry I can't answer more of your questions about IRIX, etc. Good luck!
Did some research. Apparently "buying the cat in a bag (my direct translation of: "die Katze im Sack kaufen") is equivalent to "to buy a pig in a poke" - never heard that one before but i also don't know if that dictionary can be trusted :wink:
The closest thing I can think of to that would be referring to something bought "site unseen", or possibly "rolling the dice". Might not be exactly the same, but the same general idea.
Chef
oh! I know!
Thats the equivalent of "taking a gamble". :)
Congratulations.
I just picked up an Indigo2 Impact last Sunday. It is an R10000 at 175 MHz with Solid Impact graphics. Beautiful condition (practically mint condition), which I got for $30US. The original owner had no idea what it was that he had.
Yes, the hard drives should be listed in the hinv even when done in the console from PROM. You'll also know if it is there or not by removing the front case plate. You can download the user manual from
here (
http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi-bin/download.cgi?coll=hdwr&db=bks&docnumber=007-2849-004).
Mine came with a 2 GB drive (which I'll end up replacing) and an internal CD-ROM drive.
More important than the drive being there is that you need the drive sleds to be there. Having sleds for both my Indigos and my Indigo2 is quite helpful as they supply an interface to the SCSI bus. I have a few drive carriages for my Indy, but they aren't nearly as important because the Indy uses the standard 50 pin SCSI ribbon.
While this Indigo2 is going to be fun to play with, I don't see it replacing my Indy any time soon. It may be 2 to three times faster than my Indy (R4400sc at 175 MHz), but because the Indy has both the Indy Video and Cosmo Compression cards it will stay at the top of my SGI collection.
$30? wow... Wish I could find one that cheap :) I'll just keep watching ebay.
It was something I stumbled across on Craig's List (so the person I got it from was less than 15 minutes away from me... no shipping cost! :shock: ).
Yeah, I wasn't thinking I would ever have an Indigo2 as the direct upgrade model from my Indy would be an O2 with the AV option. But at $30, it was hard to pass up.
I've been considering my options with it since I got it... since the Solid Impact is a single card (verses the multiple cards used for the High and Maximum Impact graphics) I have room for more than one. I've been playing with the idea of replacing my Quadra 950 with it's three 21" displays with the Indigo2 with three 20" displays.
:roll:
The only thing I can think of that would be better than playing A-10 Attack on three 21" displays on my Quadra would be to play Flight/Dog on three 20" displays on an Indigo2. :D
I've got an I^2 configured exactly as this first system - congrats, it's a lot of fun. As noted, though, I hope you have one of the 'sleds' on which a hard drive is mounted, or else you'll need to put the hard drive in an external SCSI enclosure and cable it to the external SCSI bus. I haven't looked in quite a while, but I don't think there's a modern WWW browser built for this particular CPU architecture - I've only seen Mozilla built for the R10k I^2's.
The latter system was sold as the "Killer IMPACT" bundle. I haven't looked for I^2 stuff in a long while but you might still be able to run into the 195MHz CPU modules to upgrade the machine, very easy to do.
Note that the Solid IMPACT does not come with any TRAM - though of course I would think your Quadra's graphics doesn't either. TRAM's great for fast realistic graphics, though the TRAM modules are rather hard to find. I can't remember off the top of my head if you have to reinstall the graphics portion of IRIX when going from Solid to High/Max IMPACT...
I did most of my collecting of SGI systems from 2000-2004, which happily coincided with what could probably be called the "Golden Years" for availability of everything from the Personal IRIS up to the Octane (although those were somewhat expensive, >$300), as well as big iron like the PowerSeries, Crimson, and Onyx/Challenge, and accessories.
Nekochan.net, sgistuff.g-lenerz.de, and www.futuretech.blinkenlights.nl/sgi.html are excellent places for info. concerning SGI machines, in addition to SGI's library, techpubs.sgi.com
Cheers,
crimsonRE
Firefox should run on irix on any of those MIPS cpu versions. I had a friend with an indy that ran firefox.
you may have to compile it yourself though.
Quote from: "crimsonRE"Note that the Solid IMPACT does not come with any TRAM - though of course I would think your Quadra's graphics doesn't either. TRAM's great for fast realistic graphics, though the TRAM modules are rather hard to find.
TRAM requires additional boards... and what I like about the Solid Impact is that it is a single board (and they are cheep too).
Like I've said, this isn't a work system, and I don't do anything 3D. If I'm going to drop any real money in a system, it had better have a place in my work flow. My Indy has paid for itself more than a dozen times over. And I could put together an O2 that could do the same.
The only reason I have this Indigo2 is that it cost about as much as a night at the movies... So avoiding TRAM and ending up with three displays (without braking the budget) was the whole point. :D
Yes, of course, you can compile Firefox yourself - I was just referring to the compiled version available on nekochan.net, which is available only for mips4 architecture (R5k & up).
Ok, I looked at Nekochan.net's news and right there, on the home page, is a note about an archive of tardists of excellent SW for mips3 machines, including Firefox 1.5 -
http://www.mechanics.citg.tudelft.nl/~everdij/nekoware/index.php?path=nekoware-mips3/And there's even a new archive of 5.3 & 6.2 SW -
http://jupiterrise.com/tgcware/Hot, diggity dog - guess I'll be jumping back onto my old SGI's; yes, I have been too lazy about building up software for a while now. Ya shoulda seen the gyrations I went through to get Mesa running under IRIX 5.3 on my PowerSeries 4D/120...
Cheers,
crimsonRE
Quote from: "crimsonRE"Hot, diggity dog - guess I'll be jumping back onto my old SGI's; yes, I have been too lazy about building up software for a while now. Ya shoulda seen the gyrations I went through to get Mesa running under IRIX 5.3 on my PowerSeries 4D/120...
That would be a fun system to play with. I came across a 4D/440 VGX for around $75 a couple years ago, but when my wife saw the size of the system she vetoed that purchase. :oops:
Indeed, it's been quite a bit of nerdy fun to have some of these behemoths around, machines used mostly in research settings but more widely known for the part they played in producing graphics for Hollywood in such movies as "Jurassic Park", "The Terminator", and "The Abyss".
I caught, I think, the tail end of the Golden Age of Surplus for these machines, ending up with quite a collection for next to no dollars: the aforementioned 4D/120 Twin Tower with GTX graphics (the first of the PowerSeries systems), a later Diehard single tower, and a Crimson. I've also gotten a bunch of different processor and graphics boards so can use many combinations of CPU's, and the graphics includes GTX, GTXB, VGX, VGXT, and RE (Reality Engine). OS' include 5.3, 6.2, and 6.5.
And how it is I'm allowed to have these 3 giants: no kids (yet), an understanding wife, and a basement...
I've always wanted a huge machine like that. Want to sell one? :P
I don't want to think about what it would take to ship one these (and just think what the cost of shipping a Predator rack would be!). I've been able to go pick them up myself - they do fit in a small SUV fine.
I've been selective in what I've gotten, to have a single example of each chassis. I have gotten the guts (boards, PS, skins) from a couple other machines sent to me. Yup, lots of visceral fun swapping boards in and out to see how they perform, which is a form of enjoyment that you can't much get with NeXT boxes.
The mention I made of running Mesa on the 4D/120GTX was that I just HAD to get some form of OpenGL running on all my SGI's, since SGI developed it, but they didn't release any support for the GTX graphics (just too old). So now I can rotate the little T.Rex at like 1 frame per second... :-)
cheers,
crimsonRE
Quote from: "conrad""Buying the cat in the bag", eh? Not sure it exists in English, but I like that expression. Cool machine.
"Buying a pig in a poke" has to be almost the exact equivalent. It's an old english expression. The word poke(bag) comes from the old northern french "pogue", of germanic origin.
I was inspired - just ran a little search on Craigslist for 'sgi'
It came back with this: :D
Quote1 SGI unix O2 machine (softimage 3D extreme loaded onto it, for those who are in the know!)
1 486
1 laser printer NEC silentwriter
1 Ricoh 410 industrial strength scanner barely used
The scanner was originally $4000: it is probably worth something in the right hands.
The SGI was 11,000!
I would like to just get a little something for it.
30.00 OBO
Now I wait for a call back!!
Slightly OT, I know, but... Zow! $30!
Got several SGIs myself.
An Indy, an Indigo 2, and an Octane 2 on top of my NeXTStation...
Got to admit that UNIX is still not my favorite OS, but IRIX is about the best of the bunch if you ask me...
Don't have my Indigo up and running yet, but the Indy and the Octane are running like a charm.
Got a bunch of Indys for what turned out to be about $10 a piece. Giving two away to a couple of geek friends for Christmas this year. :-)
I have an old Personal Iris 4D/20 sitting under the desk.
I never could get it to boot until some friends at nekochan.net helped me aquire a copy of the software.
Good thing NeXT systems don't use tape as the install media, rotten pinch rollers would then permanantly ruin our copies of NS and OS by coating the tape with sludge :shock: .