The collected works of bunnspecial

I've been handed a project at work that someone got the crazy idea I was qualified to take on, and am getting a bit stuck.

Basically, we have a couple of SGI systems floating around the department. All of them have Felix installed, which is an NMR(nuclear magnetic resonance) interpretation package. There's also some expensive(and still useful) protein modeling software.

Here's basically what I'm dealing with:

I'm trying to get an Octane working, which I've been told is the "main" one and is needed for all the other systems to work(this was explained to me by a non-computer person, so I don't know the full details).

In any case, this particular Octane will boot just fine to a login screen. There are three user accounts on it, and we don't know passwords for any of them(two of the people are still around )

I understand that there is a "back door" by booting off the install disk and either deleting the password files for the current user account(s) or creating a new user account.

I have an external SCSI DVD drive, along with a copy of IRIX 6.4. This is the same version of IRIX installed on the computer. When I boot off the install disk, I get the message "Unable to mount partition: /dev/dsk/dks0d1s0 on /root. This is your system disk: without it we have nothing on which to install software."

I'm then prompted to press enter to invoke C shell csh:

As I said, the HDDs are fully functional as best as I can tell. The computer will boot to them. There are two drives(80 pin SCSI), and I'm not sure if they're in RAID or simply two separate volumes. I don't think there's a SCSI ID conflict, as the computer will still boot to the OS even with the external drive attached/turned on.

I'm far from a Unix expert, but am(primarily) a Mac user and have some familiarity with a BSD Unix based OS (OS X). I can at least navigate my way around a command prompt/terminal most of the time, but am sort of stuck at the above-especially when I can't seem to find any way to get the installed HDDs to mount.

I'd appreciate any advice on where to go next.

Thanks

Yes, I am

Thanks guys for the quick and detailed responses.

1. The drive that I assume is the boot drive(it has a sticker on the front labeled Iris 6.4) is in the bottom bay. The second drive is in the topmost bay.

2. I have an O2 sitting right next to the Octane, but I can't get it to boot. I may dig into this further. There's another Octane as well as an Octane2 elsewhere, but I don't know their current status and the PI who is in charge of them is a bit "touchy"(understandably) about people messing with her equipment. I also have an Altix 3000 minicluster in the room with me, but I'm guessing that won't be any help.

3. Here's the screen that I get from typing hinv in the PROM

One other quick question-

I have no shortage of Macs with SCSI cards, along with the appropriate 80 pin to 68 pin and 50 pin adapters. Is there any hope of being able to read/access the file system in OS X?

Thanks-looks like it's trying to boot from bay 0, which I'm guessing is the bottom.



In the last little bit, I've also experimented with pulling both hard drives in turn. When I pull the "top" hard drive, I get a warning on booting that no user accounts will be available, but am still prompted with a login screen. When I pull the bottom(and put the top in bay 0) the computer won't boot.

It attempted to boot into SUM, but I'm prompted for a root password

I should also add that apparently the computer is running IRIX 6.5. Could my issues be related to the fact that I'm using a 6.4 install CD? If so, it's time to go digging again...

Thanks-if I can located the 6.5 media, would I have a better chance of it working?

Thanks-if I can locate the 6.5 media, would I have a better chance of it working?

Probably so-I thought I'd found them online, but I can't seem to get anything I type to work.

I'm sorry to pester you all with what are probably simple questions.

Okay, found a 6.5 disk and booted off of it-it seemed to mount the HDDs fine.

uunix wrote: So what was the outcome? Are you in?

Not yet-haven't had another chance to "play" with it.

Okay, I apologize again for asking what are probably stupid and obvious questions, but I feel like I'm quite a bit out of my element on this one even though I'm not a complete Unix noobie.

I was able to boot from an Irix 6.5 disk and it was reported to me that the drives mounted okay. Here's where I'm stuck-I spent a bunch of time yesterday typing in commands and trying to find the password file, but couldn't get to it. I decided to start fresh, and would appreciate it if someone might be able to give me some guidance.

The OS is on drive 0(bottom bay), and as best as I can tell all the user accounts on drive 2(topmost bay). I know that when I pulled the top drive, I was prompted with a login scree with no accounts visible and also got an error about accounts not being found. The computer would not boot at all when the drive currently in bay 2 was put in bay 0 and the other drive removed completely.



I'm just hoping that my "prize" from all of this work might be a(currently not working) O2.

uunix wrote: The fact that you can see no user accounts with the top drive removed, may because the user login accounts profile/area is stored in the top drive?

I think that's the case. In any case, I'm off to try again. Thank you!

Okay, I found both passwd and shadow in the /root/etc/ directory. When I type in either of these, I get "permission denied"

jan-jaap wrote: From the Admin> menu in the photo, choose '6' (sh)

You now have a shell in the installer environment

You can chroot into the harddisk using:

Code: Select all

chroot /root /bin/sh

(this assumes the hard disk is mounted under /root)

Once you're chrooted into the system disk, issue

Code: Select all

passwd root

and change the password to your choice.

Type cntrl-D (or 'exit') twice and you're back in the 'Admin>' menu

Reboot the system and boot from hard disk.

Log in & enjoy

PS: Don't forget to create (and use!) a normal account for daily use.

Perfect!

Thank you!

And, I'm in! I ended up just resetting the passwords on existing accounts rather than creating new ones.



Thank you all again for your help. I'll probably be coming back for help with the O2