SUMMARY: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

From: Andrew Patrick (andrew@calvin.dgbt.doc.ca)
Date: Fri Oct 30 1992 - 03:47:37 CST


Here are the responses I received to my question about OpenWindows not
running after a motherboard replacement. My comments are in square
brackets [].

The bottom line is that after trying numerous things suggest by various
sun-managers, OW 2 or OW 3 will not run on this machine. I have
requested a new replacement board from Sun, and it should arrive in the
next few days (he says hopefully from a VT100 terminal).

--------
>From mrh@sciences.sdsu.edu Tue Oct 27 19:35:56 1992
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 92 16:35:51 -0800
From: mrh@sciences.sdsu.edu (Mike Halderman)
Subject: Re: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Run a complete memory test. Might be a bad simm.

        [Both a home-made memory test (does mallocs and then reads and
        writes) and Sundiag report no memory errors. Also, the
        problem persists when I run only 16 M, and I have tested 2
        sets of 4 X 4M SIMMs.]

--Mike Halderman

--------
>From SOMEONE AT SUN
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 92 18:21:31 PST
From: SOMEONE AT SUN
Subject: Re: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 wo

I would suspect some sort of problem with the CPU, not software. I
checked ECO's and see no problems with revisions of hardware. It's a
long shot, but I have seen memory problems that cause strange problems
like this. I see from your boot message that there is 64Mb of memory
in the system. I would try to reduce it to 4 SIMM's (16Mb) and see
what happens. If the problem remains, swap out the 4 SIMMS with
different SIMM's.

        [As mentioned above, the problem does persist when running only
        16 M, and I have tested 2 sets of 4 X 4M SIMMs.]

--------
>From @yonge.csri.toronto.edu:lee@sqarc.sq.com Tue Oct 27 23:15:20 1992
Date: Tue, 27 Oct 1992 23:12:00 -0500
From: lee@sq.com (Liam Quin)
Subject: Re: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

No idea what's causing the problem, but do check /etc/ethers since your
ethernet address (not your IP address) will have changed.
If you use NIS, the master should be updated accordingly.

        [I don't have an /etc/ethers. I tried rebuilding NIS from
        scratch, and the problem persists. NIS is running fine.]

I can't think of anything else offhand.

Oh, and install OpenWindows 3, it's scads better :-)

        [OK, I installed it. I get the same problems. It starts up,
        but crashes as soon as a few applications are started.]

Lee

-- 
Liam Quin, lee@sq.com, SoftQuad, Toronto, 416 239-4801; the barefoot programmer
 lq-text (Unix text retrieval package) mailing list: lq-text-request@sq.com
 HexSweeper NeWS game/OPEN LOOK UI FAQ & program list/Metafont list/XView ports

-------- >From eckhard@ts.go.dlr.de Wed Oct 28 06:59:00 1992 Date: Wed, 28 Oct 92 12:56:24 +0100 From: Eckhard.Rueggeberg@ts.go.dlr.de Subject: Re: Replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Sometimes the permissions of /tmp or /usr/tmp are mangled. This can cause OW not to come up.

[I checked these permissions and they are fine. I also tried running OW as root, and the problem persists.]

Did you try it with less memory ? In my experience, 64 MB are not as helpful for a 1+ as for faster machines.

[The problem persists with both 16 MB and 48 MB.]

Eckhard R"uggeberg eckhard@ts.go.dlr.de

-------- >From fmc@key.amdahl.com Wed Oct 28 10:34:41 1992 Date: Wed, 28 Oct 92 07:34:17 PST From: fmc@key.amdahl.com (Frederick Curiel) Subject: Re: Replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Try deleting /tmp/.X11-unix and /tmp/.NeWS-unix.

[Tried. Does not help.] fmc

-------- >From Michael.Meyers@Corp.Sun.COM Wed Oct 28 11:54:34 1992 Date: Wed, 28 Oct 92 08:47:54 PST From: Michael.Meyers@Corp.Sun.COM (Michael Meyers) Subject: Re: Replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 wo

You might try removing the sockets in /tmp or setting your DISPLAY environment variable to machine:0.0 so that it uses tcp/ip. Sometimes the sockets get corrupted and simply removing them and restarting OW will help.

[Tried removing the directories from /tmp, and setting the DISPLAY variable. Problem persists.]

Mike

-------- >From ups!kevin@fourx.Aus.Sun.COM Wed Oct 28 07:43:59 1992 From: ups!kevin@fourx.Aus.Sun.COM (Kevin Sheehan {Consulting Poster Child}) Date: Wed, 28 Oct 1992 23:24:52 EST Subject: Re: Replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Any chance that the flakey board corrupted bits and pieces?

[It is a chance, but I can't find any evidence of it. I reinstalled OW from the CD-ROM, and yet the problem persists.]

l & h, kev

-------- >From rms@aplcomm.jhuapl.edu Wed Oct 28 15:30:57 1992 Date: Wed, 28 Oct 92 15:30:39 EST From: rms@aplcomm.jhuapl.edu (Simms Ronald M. F2C x8930 ) Subject: Re: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Why in the world would anyone want to run OpenWindows 2 by choice? If you have access to OpenWindows 3 I strongly recommend upgrading. OW-3 is much more robust and smoother operating then 2.

[The OW 3 software came in just as these problems started happening. I did not want to confound an OS/Windows change with the hardware problems I have been seeing. However, I did try installing OW 3 and I get the same problems.]

... I have had this exact error!! It was driving me crazy for several months. I tried all the things you did without any success.

... The problem I had was with OW-3 exibiting the same symptoms you described. However I was able to correct the problem by reloading OW as you said you did. In addition I did a newfs on the partition that contained OW before I reloading it. It seems that some files were corrupted.

The easiest thing to do is mount OW from another system on your network and see if that works. If you are not connected to an EtherNet than there are some special modifications you have to do for OW-2 with no network connnection.

[This is a great idea, so I tried it. I mounted a complete /usr parition from a system with a known working version of OW 2. And... I get the same problem.]

Again the best thing you can do is install or mount OW-3, you will wonder how you ever got along without it. Here at APL most people stuck with Sunview because OW-2 crashed alot.

... I have never seen hardware cause problems like this. It is most likely software. You may want to reload your /usr partition also.

... I hope this is of some help, at least you know your not the only one to have seen this problem. By the way I belive that OW-3 was distributed free of charge to persons who purchaseed 4.1.1 CD with OW-2 on it. Check with your local sun rep on that.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ___ _____ ___ Ron Simms | Everywhere /__/\ /____/\ /_ /| rms@aplexus.jhuapl.edu | is walking / _ \ \ | __ \/| | | | | distance, / /_\ \ \ | |__)|/ | | |__ THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY | / ___ \ \ | ___/ | |/__/| APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY | if you have /__/ \__\/ |_|/ |_____|/ Laurel, MD 20723 | time. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-------- >From ups!kevin@fourx.Aus.Sun.COM Wed Oct 28 07:43:59 1992 From: ups!kevin@fourx.Aus.Sun.COM (Kevin Sheehan {Consulting Poster Child}) Date: Wed, 28 Oct 1992 23:24:52 EST Subject: Re: Replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Any chance that the flakey board corrupted bits and pieces?

[There is always a chance, but the rest of the OS seems to be fairly stable.]

l & h, kev

-------- >From rms@scope.jhuapl.edu Thu Oct 29 09:45:20 1992 Date: Thu, 29 Oct 92 09:45:11 EST From: rms@scope.jhuapl.edu (Ron M. Simms) Subject: Re: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Sounds pretty bad. The only other thing I can think of is to get a backup tape (if you have it) of the system prior to the board swap and when all was functioning normaly.

Then reformat your disks and do a "newfs" on all the partitions and reload it back to its original state.

If it still fails I would again talk to the vendor and let him know what you have done. It has to be a motherboard REV level problem or perhaps a ROM problem or possibly memory.

You might (if you have one) dump you system to tape and try loading it on another 1+ and see what happens. If it does not crash then put it's mother board in your system using your video card and memory and any other sbus cards on the new mother board and see what happens. If it does not crash now, you definitely have a bad mother board and I would let that vendor know it.

This will take the better part of a day but some times you have to trouble-shoot these yourself to get the parts you need. You will probably save yourself time and money.

[I think mounting a new /usr from a working machine covers this.]

Good Luck ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ___ _____ ___ Ron Simms | If God had /__/\ /____/\ /_ /| rms@aplexus.jhuapl.edu | wanted us to / _ \ \ | __ \/| | | | | have elections, / /_\ \ \ | |__)|/ | | |__ THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY | he would have / ___ \ \ | ___/ | |/__/| APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY | given us /__/ \__\/ |_|/ |_____|/ Laurel, MD 20723 | candidates. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-------- >From westhawk!thp Thu Oct 29 13:01:50 1992 Date: Thu, 29 Oct 92 16:38:42 GMT From: westhawk!thp (Timothy H Panton.) Subject: Re: replaced mother board, now OpenWindows 2 won't run

Have you changed framebuffers during the upgrade (eg from CG3 to GX). I get : > Oct 16 15:34:55 westhawk vmunix: cgthree0 at SBus slot 3 0x0 pri 7 when I boot up, so you can tell what your machine thinks it has. Tim.

[I did not change frame buffers, and am using the monochrome buffer.]

-- Andrew Patrick, Ph.D. Communications Research Centre, Ottawa, CANADA andrew@calvin.dgbt.doc.CA For a good time, run "telnet debra.dgbt.doc.ca" and login as "chat".



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