Getting Started, Documentation, Tips & Tricks

I have the Irix 6.5 foundation set and a couple overlay to get to 6.5.29 for my Octane, is there anything more needed for the Onyx 2? I'm thinking there is. I've spent quite a bit of time looking for this info...I'm currently going through the tech pub for installation but a quick search of "onyx" in the pdf doesn't come up with anything.

Vladio wrote: I have the Irix 6.5 foundation set and a couple overlay to get to 6.5.29 for my Octane, is there anything more needed for the Onyx 2?

nope, just fire it up

foetz wrote:

Vladio wrote: I have the Irix 6.5 foundation set and a couple overlay to get to 6.5.29 for my Octane, is there anything more needed for the Onyx 2?

nope, just fire it up

Thanks, foetz....I'm hoping to have it up and running tonight. I procrastinated getting an adapter for the semi-odd video connector SGI used and that should be here tomorrow. Right now I'm setting it up through serial connection. Thanks again!

Vladio wrote: I procrastinated getting an adapter for the semi-odd video connector SGI used and that should be here tomorrow.

ah, for additional video hardware what comes with irix might indeed not be enough. it depends on what sort of video gear you have. some need specific drivers supplied by the manufacturer

Right now I'm setting it up through serial connection. Thanks again!

no prob at all and for installing it, unlike the workstations, you need to do it via serial anyway

foetz wrote: ah, for additional video hardware what comes with irix might indeed not be enough. it depends on what sort of video gear you have. some need specific drivers supplied by the manufacturer

I have an extra 24" Samsung LCD I was going to use. I did a bit of reading on what should be needed and didn't find anything other than needing a 13w3 adapter.

Vladio wrote:

foetz wrote: ah, for additional video hardware what comes with irix might indeed not be enough. it depends on what sort of video gear you have. some need specific drivers supplied by the manufacturer

I have an extra 24" Samsung LCD I was going to use. I did a bit of reading on what should be needed and didn't find anything other than needing a 13w3 adapter.

In SGI-land, video and graphics are two separate things. Graphics is display on a monitor, video is .. well, video

hamei wrote: In SGI-land, video and graphics are two separate things. Graphics is display on a monitor, video is .. well, video :)

An interesting bit of history re: SGI+video:

At the same time, Silicon Graphics did not have a real recordable video output board yet. DiaQuest proposed a stand-alone product containing a rack mount PC and Truevision Targa board. DiaQuest worked closely with SGI and WaveFront (a leading 3D graphics company along with competitors Alias and SoftImage) to market rendering output devices to VTR.

DiaQuest provided a crucial element for SGI by developing frame-accurate products for real-time capture and layoff, both standard def and HD. DiaQuest worked closely with the SGI engineering team to develop the tight timing standards needed to guarantee absolute frame accuracy.
DiaQuest ported their Animaq editing product to Irix for the SGI platform to support the expanding animation market.

I wonder what timeframe that was? Before the VideoFramer, possibly? I have a Mac DiaQuest board, it was designed for an interesting use case. When recording to tape, you have to synchronize the video out exactly to the tape movement. The workstation's graphics and the VTR both have to be genlocked to the same master, obviously, but you also need to begin the frame at the time the recorder expects it. So there are 10 different signal cables that go to the various video decks to make them all sync up to do on-line editing. The SGI boards like the Galileo don't have anything quite as sophisticated, so either they just didn't support on-line editing, or there was some other option that added it.

I installed Irix on the Onyx yesterday and seem to have found something odd.... I installed 6.5, haven't installed 6.5.29 overlay yet so it's just the base 6.5 with NFS. I booted it up via serial and have a command prompt. I "setenv DISPLAY XX.XX.XX.XX:0.0" with no problems but on the next command "toolchest" I get "invalid command" or something to that effect, I'm at work and didn't write it down last night. It's basically saying "toolchest" is a syntax error. I've never seen this, should I do a reinstall?

Maybe /usr/bin/X11 isn't in your PATH?

robespierre wrote: Maybe /usr/bin/X11 isn't in your PATH?

That's what I thought..."toolchest" isn't in the X11 directory.

toolchest doesn't start the window manager, xsgi does, see here: http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?coll=0650&db=man&fname=/usr/share/catman/u_man/cat1/X11/Xsgi.z

foetz wrote: no prob at all and for installing it, unlike the workstations, you need to do it via serial anyway

Actually that statement is incorrect. You can and should install OS without serial cable on a ONYX2 (assuming it has Infinite Reality card set) to get the Xserver properly setup.

Got it sorted, I was clicking off on a conflict that I shouldn't have.

I got 6.5 installed with Overlay/installation disk 1 and 2, foundation 1 and 2, Applications and NFS...this is the base 6.5. I then tried to install 6.5.29 and have 174 conflicts. Did I jump too far up from 6.5? I believe I have 6.5.11 and another, maybe 6.5.5. I've never got that many conflicts during an install.

rosehillbob wrote:

foetz wrote: no prob at all and for installing it, unlike the workstations, you need to do it via serial anyway

Actually that statement is incorrect. You can and should install OS without serial cable on a ONYX2 (assuming it has Infinite Reality card set) to get the Xserver properly setup.

well, at least for a rack onyx2 you have no other choice but serial

Vladio wrote: Got it sorted, I was clicking off on a conflict that I shouldn't have.

I got 6.5 installed with Overlay/installation disk 1 and 2

which overlays?

foetz wrote: which overlays?

You know, maybe this is the problem... I have the set 6.5 base, foundation.... whatever the first iteration of 6.5 is. Mine has two disks labeled overlay/installation 1 and disk 2. Then I have a bunch of others in that set - foundation 1, foundation 2, NFS, Dev, Apps, freeware...... I'm starting to think that they shipped this with the wrong disks...maybe? Let me check this when I get home this afternoon. I'm thinking that I'm missing the first disk or two that should of shipped with base 6.5. I then have 3 other sets/overlays. Again, I'm not home but if I remember correct I have 6.5.5, 6.5.11 and 6.5.29.

Overlays were for 6.5.x point releases... And there is additionally the problem that there were two "streams" of point releases, (f)eature and (m)aintenance. You couldn't switch streams without reinstalling. At a certain point that distinction was removed, and they were all effectively feature releases.

Vladio wrote: I have the set 6.5 base, foundation.... whatever the first iteration of 6.5 is. Mine has two disks labeled overlay/installation 1 and disk 2.

it seems your 6.5 base set has additional cds. the actual 6.5 base has nothing called "overlay". in doubt skip those.

foetz wrote:

Vladio wrote: I have the set 6.5 base, foundation.... whatever the first iteration of 6.5 is. Mine has two disks labeled overlay/installation 1 and disk 2.

it seems your 6.5 base set has additional cds. the actual 6.5 base has nothing called "overlay". in doubt skip those.

It's actually missing disks, namely Installation tools. It appears the owner that I bought the Octane from didn't have the base sets "Installation" disk so he included 6.5.5's 2 overlay disks. As I erroneously understood, I had to install the base 6.5 set first then upgrade with overlays thereafter. When I tried to install 6.5.29 I got 174 conflicts. Upon searching I found that without patching my 6.5.5 install first I would end up with a huge amount of conflicts. I also realized that I didn't have to install 6.5.0 first then update to a later revision so I used 6.5.29's overlay set 1-3 & Application disk along with 6.5.0's Foundation disk 1 & 2 and the NFS disk. I installed these together on a clean disk and ended up with 6.5.29 and 2 conflicts. It works great and I was able to connect a monitor for the first time last night and use the Graphics Unit/IR3. This marks the completion of the Onyx 2 installation...now it's time to play.

Thank you to everyone that helped me save this machine and get it running!

glad it worked out. that's a great box you have there, i hope you'll have tons of fun