SGI: Hardware

I dismantled two CPU modules today, meaning that I removed anything I can use for spares in my deskside or rack. That leaves only a few fillers and the massive backplane in the middle of the box.

Has anyone tried to remove it? Is it hard. I would like to give it a try before I send the remnants to the next world.

Please document the process with camera.. I think its mostly riveted together around the midplane, so yes its difficult.

R.

I remember that the entire XIO card cage slid out when you removed a couple screws so first check to see if that side can be easily opened up first.

I'll have a go at it on Thursday, well see if I give up, swearing and bleeding

I got some time over this yesterday so I decided to try and yank the midplane from the poor CPU modules. It was actually really easy (at least with the kind of rivet mayhem I had in mind). These system are clearly designed with service in mind! And as requested I documented the process:

First you need to remove all Node boards, XIO cards, disk drives and control module. Then you unscrew seven screws that hold the XIO cage in place (encircled in red):

Then pull the cage straight out:

Now it's time to remove the node board card holders, one at the bottom and one at the top. Two screws each:

The bottom card holder is simply lifted out. The top one is held in place with a latch which needs to be firmly pressed in the direction of the red arrow, then pulled gently down:

At last you will have the midplane in full view and you have no less than 14 screws, which are labeled with a encircled cross on the circuit board, to undo. The board is suspended by four knobs. Now give the board support by holding you hand at the bottom edge and take hold of a XIO connector (careful not to touch the compression connector) and wiggle to board out:

And you are done! Here is an empty O2K CPU module from the rear:

And from the front:


I though about making a wiki entry, but I was to lazy to enter the 50 word description of myself

Pontus wrote: It was actually really easy (at least with the kind of rivet mayhem I had in mind).

That is a relief I was worried about rivet mayhem too.

Pontus wrote: I though about making a wiki entry, but I was to lazy to enter the 50 word description of myself

wiki'd here .

R.

Great! Thanks!

Pontus wrote: Great! Thanks!

No problem.

I like your collection. I used to have a VT-131 and was offered a PDP 11/23 in the late 1980s (They used to be used to monitor the backup to the backup for the railway signal switches) but being young and transient I had no where to put it. For shame. I used to own a BeBox once too. I even wrote an article in Dr Dobbs and (phone) interviewed at B e Inc.

R.

PymbleSoftware wrote: I like your collection. I used to have a VT-131 and was offered a PDP 11/23 in the late 1980s (They used to be used to monitor the backup to the backup for the railway signal switches) but being young and transient I had no where to put it. For shame. I used to own a BeBox once too. I even wrote an article in Dr Dobbs and (phone) interviewed at B e Inc.

Thank you, I have put some effort into it. How was the BeBox and BeOS ? is Haiku worth a try?

Pontus wrote:

PymbleSoftware wrote: I like your collection. I used to have a VT-131 and was offered a PDP 11/23 in the late 1980s (They used to be used to monitor the backup to the backup for the railway signal switches) but being young and transient I had no where to put it. For shame. I used to own a BeBox once too. I even wrote an article in Dr Dobbs and (phone) interviewed at B e Inc.

Thank you, I have put some effort into it. How was the BeBox and BeOS ? is Haiku worth a try?

I quite liked B e API programming at the time and wrote a Dr Dobbs Article about a ray tracer I wrote. Work was UNIX device drivers for a storage company and Navy multi-monitor Windows Direct-3D game engines and BeOS seemed to be radical, different and ultra cool . A dual 133MHz 604e wasn't that powerful but back then it was more fuelled by dreams. It seemed to me that release n , of BeOS rocked, then something happened and it became more bloated, buggy and not as good (on the BeBox). I haven't played with Haiku for a long time but I think I wasn't that excited by it at the time that I messed with it.

Original design principles seemed be a lightweight OS with really interesting and very modern ideas.. Some of the things I disliked about B e OS are things I hate about bada. The whole API allocates memory which you have to clean up and the not always orthogonal APIs (the later even more so with bada).

R.

n might hve been release 3.