The collected works of nongrato - Page 1

Hi, everyone!

Sorry if i'm posting to a wrong board - i'm new to this forum, and new to SGI machines. I'm trying to install IRIX.6.5.x on Octane(R12000 400Mz, 1Gb ram, MXI). Funny, but the huge chassis of Octane has no room for internal CDROM, so network install is the only option at the moment.

what i have:

2 "IRIX Foundations" Cds, 3 "Install tools and overlays" CDs.

What i do:

since a standard PC cdroms are unable to read IRIX media, i had to create images using "dd", then mount then and copy the content of all CDs into one directory. The boopt server on my debian box seems to work fine- i'm able to load fx and start installer with no problem. The installation process also gives me no errors, except for several conflicts, but they do not seem fatal to me. It complains about missing some prerequisites for netscape plugins or something. Troubles begin when i restart the system- the startup process always ends up with a kernel panic.



I tried different distributions from 6.5.11 to 6.5.30 with a same luck. I mean no luck at all. All I can do is to boot in a single user mode.

I'm totally at a loss now, probaly someone could point me a direction? What am I missing or doing wrong?

duck wrote: You may have faulty hardware, perhaps you could try the extended test in the PROM.

well, this could be a HW failure, but i got this machine with a working system installed. "kind of working" - looks like a sys admin who maintained this machine did everything to make the system impossible for normal use: the toolchest was a mess, a lot of features were locked or removed, the system did not save workspace settings etc. I still have a backup image for any case, but i want a fresh system.

How do i run those extended tests? is it "Run diagnostics" in the PROM main menu? I did it several times, it says "tests completed". How can i see a detailed output?

Trippynet wrote: Might be worth trying DINA. This is useful for isntalling IRIX over a network.

Edit: Link is here: http://dina.harrydebug.com/

thanks! that definately looks worth trying!

wow..

i dunno what happenned.. i removed the graphics board, disassembled it, replaced the thermal grease on every chip, reseated TRAM modules, and reinstalled the system again.. and.. that worked! now i have a new shiny IRIX!

thank you, Staffan! your help is highly appreciated!

don't worry, i like disassembling stuff, fortunately in most cases i can put everything back

alright, this problem is solved, but my exploration of IRIX OS has just begun, i'll be back soon with more noob questions

Btw, what is the normal working temperature of sgi graphics boards? Assuming they have no active cooling it should not be that high?

yeah, all fans function ok, otherwise i 'd already had a pile of ash instead of my Octane btw, do i need to keep the door on the faceplate open when machine is running?

this thread eventually turned into "newcomer's noob questions".

alright, another one:

i've seen on YouTube a lot of videos of IRIX demos, but they seem to be absent in my IRIX distribution, at least i'm unable to find them anywhere- the toolchest item "find-> demos" is greyed out and there is no "demos" tab in the icon catalog. Where do people get them? Should they be purchased separately?

yes, but what about those 3D demos and "buttonfly" menu? Where are they found?

Probably my "Apps" CD is "too new". Demos package is absent there

oh, well.. i'll keep looking for a proper CD.

Debian still supports EFS.

Yes. I got an original installation media of WS5 but haven't chance to try since the license is not included, but i would love to.

Hi, everyone!

I decided to test my brand new Octane Personal Video option and record some videos. Since I have no external devices yet(except for the O2 camera) only screen capture feature was tested. I recorded several Octane Demos and uploaded them to the dedicated Youtube channel:

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkq5rVMip-ejhHJgx5XcfhA

The maximum video resolution EVO can deal with is PAL 768x576 so the videos are not in HD. Also for some reason the screen is cropped from the bottom, but this is not a big deal. Hope you enjoy!

No, all I have to do is to install the Demo package from the CD.

Still Cyber Detroit is my favorite. VR-based forging training. Wow.

another video uploaded: CosmoPlayer demo "Chomp" - an early browser game.

thanks! \m/ \m/

A few more videos uploaded: Inventor demos and simultaneous video input and screen capturing test:

http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkq5rVM ... fhA/videos

Another video: Quake3 - Glitch Arena

fantastic! thank you!

I would bid too, but the shipment to my place is more than 40$

This is my first SGI box and to put my hands on it I had to travel nearly 700kms by train from St.Petersburg to Moscow. The specs are not top, but SGI machines are rarely found in Russia -not many companies of post-soviet Russia could afford them. Also the price was very good: 3000RUR( about 80USD) so I decided to take a chance on it. The Octane appeared to be in a nearly mint condition equipped with original "granite" speakers and external CDROM which supports sound via SCSI so no additional cables are required to listen to CD audio.

Later the system was upgraded with Octane Personal Video option and O2 camera. Few scratches on the skin were removed with a car polish for plastic. Burnt out lightbulbs were replaced with a LED:

(clickable)



Here are the hinv and gfxinfo outputs:

uunix wrote: 700Kms.. oooh that's some love.

That was a deal you don't want to miss. As I told SGI boxes are super rare in Russia and the price was just a joke. Now I have tons of fun with my Octane :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70VAIj6K ... HJgx5XcfhA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLwzMMtk ... HJgx5XcfhA

Geoman wrote: Forma y zvet

"Shape and colour" - it is a poster from an arts exhibition.

Geoman wrote: _AND_ EVO+Cam! So you can do everything that IRIX has to offer!

Yep, I'm very happy with that EVO thing. It was a good investment - huge fun factor for a relatively low price. At the right bottom of the photo in the first post you can see a VHS player connected to the EVO. I use it to digitize my old tapes. For example,a tape from my promotion party 15 years ago

(clickable)


You can also plug in a DVD player or your favorite game console:



or send a video to an external device:



Also it is possible to make your O2 camera accessible via OutBox service, but I'm not gonna post a link here, sorry

foetz wrote: except for the ram maybe but that depends on what you do.

Yes, you're right. I nearly run out of memory while rendering like 120 frames (640x480) into flipbook in "Shake". So I will consider an upgrade.

jan-jaap wrote: That cat

Bad addr: 0x3e8, cause: 0x8<CE=0

Exactly like mine:

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=16728612

In my case that seemed to be a graphics board fault.

surrealdeal wrote: Was it an SI board that was defective for you? What did you replace it with?

I never replaced my EMXI. Can't afford a new one at the moment

Disassembling, cleaning and replacing old thermal pads with a fresh grease helped.

Maybe yes, maybe no. Maybe just reseating TRAMs(or the board itself) was a solution, but you have a certain problem: overheating so your thermal pads definitely need some treatment. I replaced mine with a generic thermal paste.

6.5 runs just fine on dual 360 Octane with EMXI. Fine until you need to do physical simulations.

Maya, Shake, Moviemaker

Thumbs up for the Performer demo "Town":

FlasBurn wrote: I would need a computer w/o integrated video.

You would need a computer with Sbus support. That's it.

eudatux23 wrote: Can someone tell me, what this service esp does? Thanks

http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi ... /ch01.html

Very cool, thanks for sharing!

Btw, does anyone have Octane ads and posters?

sgtprobe wrote: Hey, thats a great machine and loving this thread

Thanks!

vishnu wrote: What versions and how do they run on your dual-360? Do you use it for rendering as well or do you farm that out?

Maya 6.5 and Shake 3.

Shake is slow. The only way to preview the composiotion is to render it to the flipbook and you need tons of memory for that. Maya is okay unless you want to make a complex scene or run physical simulations, but still, rendering one frame of a simple scene like this takes more than 30 mins:

vishnu wrote: If you set shaded view in the perspective window is it still responsive to pan, dolly and zoom? Beautiful render though, very nice. Is that the Maya built in renderer or Mental Ray?

The performance is still okay. The scene is simple - most of models are lo-poly except for the cables and it takes that long to render only because of multiple light sources and a deep shadow ray tracing. Yes, I use Mental Ray for that.

Thanks to TeamBlackFox the memory is now maxed out. Hinv updated.

Geoman wrote: Wow - this scene looks good. Did you model that by yourself?

Thanks yup, and here is the full movie - a dedication to the Netscape's 20th anniversary :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBV-0yd8ha0

the DOS thing

Is this how you call the command line interface?

What you need is:

"Toolchest" -> "System" ->"System Manager" -> "Networking and Connectivity" -> "Set Up and Start Networking"

Lol, I had to remove two memory modules because that EVO crap didn't seem to want to work with 2 Gigs of RAM. Setting "SRV_LOMEM_POOL" to "1" helped just a little bit - it fixed analog inputs, but digital inputs remained non-functional. So frustrating. Although i can imagine how frustrated could be a hypotetical Octane+EVO owner who purchsed an overpriced memory upgrade back in late 90s only to find out it was a total waste of money. So lame. hinv updated.