SGI: Hardware

Hi! New here. New to SGI. I recently acquired a beautiful Indigo which I would like to get working. I have Irix 6.5 downloaded and I have an external Apple SCSI CDROM (i hope it works).

Anyways, I'm in need of a hard disk for the machine. I'm reluctant to pay for a 20+ year old SCSI disk from eBay. Are there any alternative, affordable, methods of using an SD or CF card adapted to the 50-pin SCSI which will work? If not, what about adapting to an IDE disk?

I've seen some adapters online, ranging from $70 to $90. I'm hoping to find something a little closer to $10 or $20, though.

Bonus Q: Can I use my Sun mini din-8 keyboard and mouse with an SGI?

The keyboard and mouse are both rs-232, like Sun used, but they are not directly compatible. The pinout is different for starters, and the Indigo connector is mini-din-6. The voltages and baud rates are also different, as are the key codes.

None of the scsi-to-ide adapters are what I would consider affordable. They cost from $150-250 generally. What you can get are cheap adapters that allow using 68-pin or 80-pin scsi disks in an 8-bit scsi machine like the Indigo. This is a much preferred solution because the computer will actually talk directly to the drive. ultra160 scsi disks are still available NOS for reasonable prices.

Your Apple CDROM will only work if it is able to switch to 512-byte-per-sector mode. I don't know if that's the case. The types of readers that are typically used on these machines are Toshiba/Plextor, which all (IIRC) do have that capability.

Edit: looks like you may be in luck:
http://www.pimpworks.org/sun/suncds.html

If you can't get a true Indigo keyboard, I think you need an adapter like this
http://www.ebay.com/itm/SGI-Indigo-Onyx ... 23474743e2

This converts standard PS/2 keyboard and mouse for Indigo use. Incorrect keyboard and mouse can damage keyboard (and computer).
I haven't tried it myself.

As for the disk, you might get one of these working
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ACARD-AEC-7720U ... 3aad232ad3
but it is not so cheap as robespierre says.

An old SCA disk and one like this
http://www.ebay.com/itm/SCA-80F-IDC-50M ... 1c5451b71a
is much cheaper.

FoothillsGeek wrote: Anyways, I'm in need of a hard disk for the machine. I'm reluctant to pay for a 20+ year old SCSI disk from eBay. Are there any alternative, affordable, methods of using an SD or CF card adapted to the 50-pin SCSI which will work?

SCSI card readers do exist (or at least they did). Several years ago I picked up a SCSI card reader that has xD, Memory Stick, SD/MMC CF, Smartmedia, and PCMCIA I/II slots. Came in a dual-bay external case with a 40/12/40S Plextor PlexWriter (which was the primary reason I bought it).

Never got around to any in-depth testing on the card reader, so I have no idea if IRIX will play nice with it, *especially* if you're hoping to be able to boot from media in one of the slots.

Welcome. Which Apple CD-ROM? I use a 300 with my Indy and that's enough to make it bootable and load the miniroot, though I don't know if it'll work with the Indigo.

FoothillsGeek? As in, 210 Foothill Fwy Foothills?

Another thing, you didn't specify if your have an R3000 or an R4000 indigo. The R4000 Indigo can run up to Irix 6.5.22, but the R3000 Indigo isn't supported after Irix 5.3

I second using SCA drives and adapters. I have two SCSI drives in my Indigo2 like this, consisting of a 36GB 15K drive, and a 300GB 10K data drive. Both work fine and are nice and quiet.

I was admittedly lucky that we've been decommissioning a number of servers at work with SCA drives in them, so I've hoarded around 30 working drives as a result. On the plus side for yourself, the fact that plenty are coming into the market still does mean you can pick them up fairly cheaply online, and the SCA ones are a lot newer than 20 years old!

Do note, not all SCA drives will work with older SGI machines. I have found a number of drives that work fine in my O2 and Fuel, but which won't work in the Indigo 2. Hence, if you're thinking of getting one, best to check the model number first.

I sent the below in response to a PM, but then felt I'd post it publicly just in case it's of any use to anyone...

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I've tested the following drives with success in my Indigo2:

36GB, 15K, ST336754LC (Moderate noise)
36GB, 15K, ST336753LC (Low noise)
36GB, 15K, ST373455LC (VERY Low noise) - my current Indigo2 system drive

73GB, 15K, ST373454LC (Moderate noise)
73GB, 10K, ST373207LC (Low noise)
73GB, 10K, BD07285A25 (Quite noisy, I use one of these as an OS clone disk for my Indigo2)
73GB, 10K, ST173404LCV (1.8" high, noise level unknown as it was provided as an original OS clone disk with my system).

146GB, 15K, ST3146855LC (VERY Low noise)

300GB, 10K, ST3300007 (Moderate noise)
300GB, 10K, BD3008A4B6 (An HP re-badged Seagate Atlas 10K V) (Low noise) - my current Indigo2 data drive

Like I say, just in case anyone finds it remotely useful...

Trippynet wrote: Do note, not all SCA drives will work with older SGI machines. I have found a number of drives that work fine in my O2 and Fuel, but which won't work in the Indigo 2. Hence, if you're thinking of getting one, best to check the model number first.

AIUI this is a U320 issue rather than a SCA issue - backwards compatibility with a narrow bus having been dropped from the spec after U160, though some U320 drives may retain it (and some even have a "force narrow" jumper, though maybe not on the SCA variants - my U320 drives are all 68pin).

Indeed, a fair point. Almost all those drives above are U320 FWIW. I think it would be good to put a fuller list together at some point, and also include noise etc. The difference I've found between the quieter drives and the noisy ones is incredible.

Trippynet wrote: I sent the below in response to a PM, but then felt I'd post it publicly just in case it's of any use to anyone...

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I've tested the following drives with success in my Indigo2:

36GB, 15K, ST336754LC (Moderate noise)
36GB, 15K, ST336753LC (Low noise)
36GB, 15K, ST3146855LC (VERY Low noise) - my current Indigo2 system drive

73GB, 15K, ST373454LC (Moderate noise)
73GB, 10K, ST373207LC (Low noise)
73GB, 10K, BD07285A25 (Quite noisy, I use one of these as an OS clone disk for my Indigo2)
73GB, 10K, ST173404LCV (1.8" high, noise level unknown as it was provided as an original OS clone disk with my system).

146GB, 15K, ST3146855LC (VERY Low noise)

300GB, 10K, ST3300007 (Moderate noise)
300GB, 10K, BD3008A4B6 (An HP re-badged Seagate Atlas 10K V) (Low noise) - my current Indigo2 data drive

Like I say, just in case anyone finds it remotely useful...

The 36GB and 146GB 15k disks have the same model number

I almost universally use Seagate 15K.3 and newer series. They have FD bearings which are durable and quiet. They run much cooler than the disks originally supplied with most SGI systems. I usually use SCA versions with an adapter for 50pin systems.

They are not expensive.

Indyboy wrote: The 36GB and 146GB 15k disks have the same model number

Fixed.

Although in doing so, I've found something interesting. The drive in question from my spares cupboard is out of an AS400. Now the model number definitely matches the 146GB drive (it wasn't a mistake), but it also has an IBM sticker on it with 36GB listed as the capacity. Maybe the IBM sticker is wrong, I'll have to test it. If it's actually a super-quiet 146GB drive then I'm not complaining!

Incidentally, I then pulled the system drive out my Indigo2, and that did have a different model number, which I've reflected above.

Another option to use a SD Card with a SCSI device may be this:

http://shop.codesrc.com

They are currently out of stock, but perhaps you're lucky and can find one of these on ebay. However, as you stated, they are not in the 20 $ range. But I doubt that you'll find any something2SCSI converter in the 20 $ range.

Trippynet wrote: Now the model number definitely matches the 146GB drive (it wasn't a mistake), but it also has an IBM sticker on it with 36GB listed as the capacity. Maybe the IBM sticker is wrong, I'll have to test it. If it's actually a super-quiet 146GB drive then I'm not complaining!

There used to be a guide on Seagate's website explaining how to decode their model numbers. I can't find it anymore, and only remember parts of it. The first digit was a code for physical size, and the rest of the digits represented capacity. Maybe the last digit was the generation.

So ST3146855LC is definitely a 146GB drive; maybe the last "5" indicates that it's from the 15K.5 series. It's possible the IBM sticker is wrong. It's also possible that IBM deliberately crippled the drive. I've heard of drives being "short stroked" for performance reasons (to use only the tracks with the fastest data access). It's also possible that IBM was still supporting 36GB disks after Seagate stopped making them. In that case, altering their firmware to limit capacity would make sense if IBM was sending them out as warranty replacements for real 36GB drives in RAID arrays (where the controller would complain about size mis-matches).

I've actually got a 73GB U320 Seagate drive that was pulled from an IBM storage array. The IBM firmware limits it to U160 speeds despite the Seagate label and part number very clearly being for a U320 drive. It wouldn't surprise me at all if IBM did something similar to make a 36GB drive out of 146GB one for you.

BTW, the same part number decoding suggests that the "36GB, 15K, ST373455LC (VERY Low noise) - my current Indigo2 system drive" in your list is actually a 73GB drive, and probably one generation newer than the ST373454LC you have listed right below it.

jpstewart wrote:

Trippynet wrote: Now the model number definitely matches the 146GB drive (it wasn't a mistake), but it also has an IBM sticker on it with 36GB listed as the capacity. Maybe the IBM sticker is wrong, I'll have to test it. If it's actually a super-quiet 146GB drive then I'm not complaining!

There used to be a guide on Seagate's website explaining how to decode their model numbers. I can't find it anymore, and only remember parts of it. The first digit was a code for physical size, and the rest of the digits represented capacity. Maybe the last digit was the generation.

First digit, size in inches
3 = 3.5 diameter, 1 high
1 = 3.5 diameter, 1.6 high (HH)
9 = 2.5 diameter
5 = 3.5 diameter, 0.8 high (shorter than standard too, I think intended for use in games console / other non-computer)
2 / 4 = 5.25, can't recall which was HH and which FH

Then capacity, which once accounted for the whole of the rest of the number and gave capacity in megabytes, but for SCSI drives at least has been truncated to 3-4 digits; once you get to the 36/73/146GB models (and probably some 18GB of the same series), the penultimate digit is/was speed (0=10K, 5=15K) and last digit is/was generation ('was' at the time the drives in which we tend to be interested were current products).

Then one or two letters for interface/connection, e.g.
N = narrow, 50pin
LW = LVD wide, 68pin
LC = LVD wide, 80pin
A = ATA/IDE

I presume other manufacturers' model numbers contain similar data, but Seagate's is on the only "code" for which I've seen the codebook.

tomvos wrote: Another option to use a SD Card with a SCSI device may be this:

http://shop.codesrc.com

They are currently out of stock, but perhaps you're lucky and can find one of these on ebay. However, as you stated, they are not in the 20 $ range. But I doubt that you'll find any something2SCSI converter in the 20 $ range.

Hope it's ok to respond to an older topic, but I wanted to say I got one of those a few months ago and have been happy with it. It's not in an sgi, fwiw, but I'm not sure how much a difference that really makes

Won't most CF/SD cards have problems with Random Reads/Writes? I think most of them are optimized for long reads/writes, like saving a several megapixel large RAW image. Most of these cards have extremely small cache.

Sure, you'll burn them out with write amplification.

Well this thread certainly blew up since I last checked it and certainly contains a wealth of useful information.

So, based on what I've gathered from the above comments, my plan is to use a 50<>80 pin SCSI adapter like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-2014-SCA-80 ... 1462107251

With an SCA drive like this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Seagate-Cheetah ... 1352458484

Seem like a good plan?

BTW - I'm on a little bit of a budget, but when money isn't a constraint I will totally look into the SCSI2SD for a long term solution.