If you use an adapter will the NeXT support a scsi-2 drive? I have a 18.2gb 10k ibm scsi-2 drive I wanted to put in my slab. And is there any size limit? I couldn't find much information on this...
Quote from: "helf"If you use an adapter will the NeXT support a scsi-2 drive? I have a 18.2gb 10k ibm scsi-2 drive I wanted to put in my slab. And is there any size limit? I couldn't find much information on this...
There is no guilty answer about that. I used 68pin and SCA 80pin harddrives. You can buils a max. of 7 partitions, 2 Gig for NS3.3, 4 Gig for OS42.
So the usefuel limits are 18 or 36 gig.
Some drives work, some not. You have to test this. (creating a disktab entry, formatting, transfering the system from a smaller hd via dump or tar)
2gb max? :( ouch. i'll definitely have to upgrade to os4.2.. soo.. do you think trying a sata>ide>scsi adapter won't work? ;)
Quote from: "helf"2gb max? :( ouch. i'll definitely have to upgrade to os4.2.. soo.. do you think trying a sata>ide>scsi adapter won't work? ;)
2 giga per partition, not per harddrive, means 2 x 7 = 18 GB. Adapters? Don't know.
I would like to change the hard drive in my Dimension system.
I have bought a 2.1Gb Quantum Fireball SE drive with the right 50 pin SCSI connector. But I can find no advice or information on the necessary jumper settings to make it work.
I have tried the simple approach of just putting in a termination jumper but the ROM monitor just says "Bad Label" or "SCSI error".
Any help greatly appreciated. And if this is not a good drive to try, can we list here please which replacement drives (and with what settings) really DO work?
Thanks
Q
Quote from: "Quincunx"
I have tried the simple approach of just putting in a termination jumper but the ROM monitor just says "Bad Label" or "SCSI error".
Q
Bad Label, maybe 3 or 4 times could also be a unformatted drive. Just run your OS CD for formatting and installing the OS.
If you have a working harddrive jumper the harddrive lower than the new one, otherwise you have to fiddel with the bootcommands.
bsd (1,0,0)
for example for the second drive
Thanks. This seems to work fine. I forgot how important it is to have the right boot floppy available to trigger the initialisation and fresh install.
I've got the new disk happily installed as sd(0,0,0) now.
For what it's worth it's a Quantum Fireball SE model SE21S012 from //www.ultratech.co.uk. The only jumper needed is on the TE pins to enable termination.
Quote from: "Andreas"Quote from: "helf"If you use an adapter will the NeXT support a scsi-2 drive? I have a 18.2gb 10k ibm scsi-2 drive I wanted to put in my slab. And is there any size limit? I couldn't find much information on this...
...Some drives work, some not. You have to test this. (creating a disktab entry, formatting, transfering the system from a smaller hd via dump or tar)
Is there a tutorial somewhere out there explaining the structure of, and how to create, a new disktab entry for a drive otherwise untested under NEXTSTEP (e.g.
http://deadstart.net/NeXT/disktab/quantumEmpire2100S.html?) I have plenty of drives, and numerous utilities for querying hardware... just not on my slab, at the moment.
Quote from: "fidel"
Is there a tutorial somewhere out there explaining the structure of, and how to create, a new disktab entry for a drive otherwise untested under NEXTSTEP
Not as far as i know, take a look at this harddrive:
http://deadstart.net/NeXT/disktab/ibmDCHS-04U.htmlYou'll see the output of an unknown drive from /usr/etc/scsimodes, know you have to find the values in the disktab entry. You have to alter the same values with the output of your drive.
After that you can use the disk command to create the drive.
Im using 2 4 gig disks I took out of an old compaq server..
COMPAQ ST15150N
COMPAQ ST34572N
Both are partitioned with 2 2gig partitions (hard to belive nextstep had this silly limit.. but I know 650MB disks cost like 5000 back then)
The only catch I have is that the disks seem to take longer than 2 seconds to come live. So I have my cube set to boot over the network, I just interrupt it, and BSD the thing... (boot scsi disk). They work just fine otherwise.
Neozeed-
Hey! I'm trying to make an AVID ST15150N external 4GB drive into an internal bootable HD for my cube. Would you mind telling exactly how you did it? I had to add the following to my /etc/disktab on my current boot HD before I could use BuildDisk:
# SEAGATE ST15150N
SEAGATE|SEAGATE ST15150N|SEAGATE ST15150N 001700:\
:ty=fixed_rw_scsi:nc#3712:nt#21:ns#56:ss#1024:rm#7200:\
:fp#160:bp#0:ng#0:gs#0:ga#0:ao#0:\
:os=sdmach:z0#32:z1#96:hn=localhost:ro=a:\
:pa#0:sa#2097152:ba#8192:fa#1024:ca#8:da#4096:ra#10:oa=time:\
:ia:ta=4.3BSD:\
:pb#2097152:sb#2097152:bb#8192:fb#1024:cb#8:db#4096:rb#10:ob=time:\
:ib:tb=4.3BSD:\
:pc#4194304:sc#194295:bc#8192:fc#1024:cc#8:dc#4096:rc#10:oc=time:\
:ic:tc=4.3BSD:
Then I built the disk with NS3.3 and used Andreas' advice to load other apps with:
dump 0f - /dev/sd0a | restore -rf -
And the disk looked o.k. when I viewed it as an external disk. It had all the NS3.3 stuff the boot disk had and had all the apps on my boot disk. Then when I tried to boot from it by changing the SCSI id to 0, the cube would just report "loading from disk" forever and never boot. Any idea what step I overlooked? How did you get your ST15150N to work? How do you access the second 2 GB partition? From the questions I see posted it appears a lot of folks would like to get boot drives running NS made. Once (if) I get mine working I plan to write a step by step account of how I did it.
Here is my disktab:
st34572n|ST34572N|ST34572N-512|COMPAQ ST34572N:\
:ty=fixed_rw_scsi:nc#6300:nt#8:ns#178:ss#1024:rm#7200:\
:fp#320:bp#0:ng#0:gs#0:ga#0:ao#0:\
:os=sdmach:z0#64:z1#192:hn=localhost:ro=a:\
:pa#0:sa#1994000:ba#8192:fa#1024:ca#32:da#4096:\
:ra#10:oa=time:ia:ta=4.3BSD:\
:pb#2097000:sb#1173650:bb#8192:fb#1024:cb#32:db#4096:\
:rb#10:ob=time:ib:tb=4.3BSD:\
:pc#3270650:sc#900000:bc#8192:fc#1024:cc#32:dc#4096:\
:rc#10:oc=time:ic:tc=4.3BSD:
Now keep in mind this has been the better part of forever since I installed. I also had a nextstep 2.0 650mb disk (whoever owned this prior to me was clearly insane, or rich.. probably both) to do most of the setup. From what Ive read around on here, if you have more than 1 disk handy, dd the install cd to a spare disk & boot off of that. I vaugely recall the install process being able to at least setup the 1st 2 gig partition on its own. If it comes down to it, I think I 'll have to get some more disks & do a re-install and document how to do it... Either way it is tedious with anything larger than 2gig.
Quote from: "idylukewild"Neozeed-
# SEAGATE ST15150N
SEAGATE|SEAGATE ST15150N|SEAGATE ST15150N 001700:\
:ty=fixed_rw_scsi:nc#3712:nt#21:ns#56:ss#1024:rm#7200:\
:fp#160:bp#0:ng#0:gs#0:ga#0:ao#0:\
:os=sdmach:z0#32:z1#96:hn=localhost:ro=a:\
:pa#0:sa#2097152:ba#8192:fa#1024:ca#8:da#4096:ra#10:oa=time:\
:ia:ta=4.3BSD:\
:pb#2097152:sb#2097152:bb#8192:fb#1024:cb#8:db#4096:rb#10:ob=time:\
:ib:tb=4.3BSD:\
:pc#4194304:sc#194295:bc#8192:fc#1024:cc#8:dc#4096:rc#10:oc=time:\
:ic:tc=4.3BSD:
I think your sa & sb are too big. Im going off of memory here, but I belive I had to make mine about 1999mb not the 2048 for ns to actaully boot...
dont forget to install the bootblocks with disk....
Neozeed-
O.k. Now I need some help. I think you have unearthed the ultimate problem I have been having with making a bootable HD. I had the same problem with a Quantum Fireball 2GB drive I removed from my Powermac 8500. I was successful at loading NS3.3 with BuildDisk, and when I changed the SCSI i.d. to 0 and tried to boot, I got the loading from disk icon forever and it never loaded. Same with turbocolor slab as on my cube. Same with Seagate 4GB as with Quantum. The disks show up fine as some other SCSI i.d. when I boot from the internal HD and look at their contents (they appear to have all the NS3.3 files), I just can't boot from them.
So obviously I "forgot" to install bootblocks with 'disk'.
I guess that's something I do from the Unix terminal. The external drive containing the HD I want to make a bootable internal drive is "sd2a". Could you please tell me what you'd do with the disk command to make the drive a boot drive? I think I tried 'disk' once in a desperate attempt to make one of the drives bootable and just got an error message; I think is was something that included the words 'sector' and 'unreadable' or something similar. Sorry, I didn't keep notes in my rush.
Assuming I am successful with 'disk' this time, is there anything else I need to do before setting SCSI i.d. to "0" to try to boot from the drive while it's mounted externally?
Thank you very much for your help! I think I'm getting close to writing up a 'primer for novice' on how to purchase a used SCSI drive and make it the internal boot drive for Black Hardware.
Luke
Yes disk is a unix command. And I might add its not terribly.. friendly.
Also I would try booting from the non graphicalpart of the bios/prom/firmware/whatever..
hit command tilde (ie the ~ and command key at the same time),
then type in bsd at the NEXT> prompt
Ok with that out of the way, this is what I recall about the disk command:
the -b installes the default 'boot' program from /usr/standalone
so the command would be
disk -b /dev/rsd0a
Now here is what I have in my 'notes.txt' file. Apparently this was involved enough for me to write some of this down, but Im sure I found it on google... But then nextstep sites seem to come & go, and sadly take their knowlege with them...
Anyways:
scsimodes /dev/rsd1a
/usr/etc/builddisk sd1
/usr/etc/disk -b /dev/rsd1a
/usr/etc/newfs /dev/sd1a
Thats what I have writendown. From what I can recall scsimodes will dump what nextstep thinks about your disk, and use those #'s to build your /etc/disktab
builddisk isnt even on my computer, so im at a bit of a loss there... however newfs actaully puts down a filesystem. If I remember tomorrow Ill try to dig out some scsi disks & recreate an install on my cube. Although to be honest my biggest fear going forward is that the rom is actually an eprom, and could corrupt/go blank on its own... Ugh.
Good luck!
Great! I'm glad you kept notes! I'll try what you did (with sd2 substituted for sd1, I have a CD-ROM drive for sd1) and post the results when I'm done. It may be day or so before I get to it. Thanks!
Here's some information I found in an old NeXTanswers on setting up large disks. It may or may not apply to very large disks.
NEXTSTEP
Title: Initializing and Partitioning Large Disks
Entry Number: 1533
Creation Date: November 7, 1995
Last Updated: <<Date June 17, 1997>>
Valid For: 3.0, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3
Keywords: initialize, partition, large, install
Question
Why am I unable to partition and initialize my new big disk? It's a 2.7 gigabyte SEAGATE ST43400N. I get errors like "boot block extends beyond front porch."
Answer
There's a bug in the 3.2 and older versions of BuildDisk and /usr/etc/disk when initializing large disks. Basically, they miscalculate the parameters for the partition label on the disk, and use the wrong values for creating file systems on the disk. If you have a large disk (greater than 2 GB), you can partition and initialize the disk using the following procedure.
1 Do a low level format to make sure the drive is in the factory default state:
localhost# sdform /dev/rsd1a
device = /dev/rsd1a block size = 512 capacity = 2777 MBytes
***FORMATTING THIS DISK CAUSES ALL DISK DATA TO BE LOST***
This will take approximately 92 minutes.
Do you wish to proceed? (Y/anything) Y
Disk Format in progress...
***Format Complete***
2 Run /usr/etc/scsimodes to obtain the actual disk parameters:
localhost# scsimodes /dev/rsd1a
SCSI information for /dev/rsd1a
Drive type: SEAGATE ST43400N
512 bytes per sector
99 sectors per track
21 tracks per cylinder
2737 cylinder per volume (including spare cylinders)
9 spare sectors per cylinder
21 alternate tracks per volume
5688446 usable sectors on volume
3 Create an entry in /etc/disktab for the disk:
ST43400N|ST43400N-512|SEAGATE ST43400N-512:\
:ty=fixed_rw_scsi:nc#2737:nt#21:ns#99:ss#512:rm#3600:\
:fp#320:bp#0:ng#0:gs#0:ga#0:ao#0:\
:os=sdmach:z0#64:z1#192:hn=localhost:ro=a:\
:pa#0:sa#4194304:ba#8192:fa#1024:ca#32:da#4096:ra#10:oa=time:\
:ia:ta=4.3BSD:\
:pb#4194304:sb#1493822:bb#8192:fb#1024:cb#32:db#4096:rb#10:ob=time:\
:ib:tb=4.3BSD:
The important things to note here are where to copy the data from the scsimodes output to the disktab entry. The items bolded above (cylinders per volume, tracks per cylinder, sectors per track, and bytes per sector) are copied from the scsimodes info. See the disktab(5) man page for details.
The size of the front porch (fp#) should be 320 for disks formatted with 512 byte sectors and 160 for disks formatted with 1024 byte sectors. The location (block numbers) of first level boot code (z0#, z1#) should be 64 and 192 for disks formatted with 512 byte sectors and 32 and 96 for disks formatted with 1024 byte sectors.
The last 4 lines of the disktab entry define the partitioning of the disk. All partitions must be less than or equal to 2*1024*1024*1024 bytes in size. The pa#0 field says partition a starts at block 0. The sa# field indicates that it contains 4,194,304 blocks (512 bytes each, 2Gb total). In the next set of fields, the starting point (pb#) and size (sb#) for the b partition are defined. Note that the starting point for the b partition is the same as the starting point of the a partition plus its size (0+4194304).
If more than two partitions are required, add a line of the form:
:pc#4194304:sc#1493822:bc#8192:fc#1024:cc#32:dc#4096:rc#10:oc=time:\
:ic:tc=4.3BSD:
Make sure that the partition start and partition size fields all add up to the appropriate numbers. The sum of the sizes for all partitions (pa#, pb#, ...) and the front porch (fp#) should be less than or equal to the usable sectors on the volume.
4 Write the label (partition info) to the disk and initialize the file systems:
localhost# disk -t ST43400N -i /dev/rsd1a
disk name: ST43400N
disk type: fixed_rw_scsi
writing disk label
Writing /usr/standalone/boot
creating new filesystem on /dev/rsd1a
/usr/etc/newfs -n -v /dev/rsd1a
/etc/mkfs /dev/rsd1a 4194303 99 21 8192 1024 32 10 90 4096 t
Warning: 4096 bytes per inode impossible due
to cylinder group size, using 15620 bytes per inode
Reduce cylinder group size to reduce bytes per inode.
Warning: 748 sector(s) in last cylinder unallocated
/dev/rsd1a: 4194303 sectors in 1998 cylinders of 21 tracks, 99 sectors
2147.5Mb in 63 cyl groups (32 c/g, 34.41Mb/g, 2048 i/g)
super-block backups (for fsck -b#) at:
16, 33672, 67328, ...
creating new filesystem on /dev/rsd1b
...
initialization complete
5 Make an entry in /etc/fstab for the new disk like the one below. If you do not, the first partition will mount automatically, but the remaining partitions will not be visible. Refer to the mntent manpage for information on writhing fstab entries.
/dev/sd1a /partition1 4.3 rw,noquota 0 1
/dev/sd1b /partition2 4.3 rw,noquota 0 1
/dev/sd1c /partition3 4.3 rw,noquota 0 1
Quote from: "Nitro"Here's some information I found in an old NeXTanswers on setting up large disks. It may or may not apply to very large disks.
Wow thats some good info! It appears thats for adding a slave, so I would just add the -b flag on the disk command part (disk -b -t ST43400N -i /dev/rsd1a) to make it bootable.
Other than that it really seems to jog my memory.
I found out most Seagate will work, be carefull with 7.200rpm and faster drives in the stations, some people wrote the plastic part of the case could suffer (deform) under the heat. I have one cube with two relatively modern cheetahs, this baby screems :wink: .
IBM drives will work often but not always. What was the company Micro... these drives will work, too.
Old big double size superheavy drives are the best if you start a cube with one inside, it takes endless seconds till the thing gets it's speed and it makes a noise like a starting turbine.
nc
Quote from: "NeXTcube"What was the company Micro... these drives will work, too.
Micropolis. Thats pretty old....
Wow - Information overload. I am savvy on MS and some Solaris Unix OS', but know next to nothing about NeXT systems. Here is my problem and perhaps someone can help me.
1. I have HP Kayak XU6/266 with a Seagate ST32272 2.2GB SCSI Hard disk.
2. I don't have copies of the critical applications software (which runs a piece of semiconductor capital equipment)
3. I wish to make a complete copy of the disk drive so that I have a plug in replacement. (I purchased an identical HDD, another indentical HP Kayak PC, along with identical hardware to avoid any conflicts).
Here is my questions:
1. Can I simply plug in my new SCSI drive and copy the HDD and make it bootable?
2. How is this done with NeXT (UNIX).
3. Are NeXT commands identical to standard UNIX commands?
4. If not, can you recommend a manual which explains NeXT commands?
5. What program will work similar to Norton's Ghost to mirror or ghost the HDD. I saw someone mention Micropolis. Is this shareware or how can I obtain a copy of this?
Very informative forums - thanks for any assistance you can render!
Quote from: "SemiMBA"Wow - Information overload. I am savvy on MS and some Solaris Unix OS', but know next to nothing about NeXT systems. Here is my problem and perhaps someone can help me.
1. I have HP Kayak XU6/266 with a Seagate ST32272 2.2GB SCSI Hard disk.
2. I don't have copies of the critical applications software (which runs a piece of semiconductor capital equipment)
3. I wish to make a complete copy of the disk drive so that I have a plug in replacement. (I purchased an identical HDD, another indentical HP Kayak PC, along with identical hardware to avoid any conflicts).
Here is my questions:
1. Can I simply plug in my new SCSI drive and copy the HDD and make it bootable?
2. How is this done with NeXT (UNIX).
3. Are NeXT commands identical to standard UNIX commands?
4. If not, can you recommend a manual which explains NeXT commands?
5. What program will work similar to Norton's Ghost to mirror or ghost the HDD. I saw someone mention Micropolis. Is this shareware or how can I obtain a copy of this?
Very informative forums - thanks for any assistance you can render!
This page should help you out:
http://www.channelu.com/NeXT/NeXTStep/3.3/nsa/07_Peripherals.htmld/index.html#7aAfter you get the second drive set up and bootable you can use the Unix command "dd" to copy the data from the old drive to the new one. The man page has info on how to use dd (man dd).