I am new to Linux for Sparc. I have 5 Sparc's sitting idle, two SparcStation LX's and 3 SparcStation 1"s. Using Potato Boot Disks 2.2.14 of 6 Jan 2000 build I was finally able to get Linux working on both types, but only by using the rescue floppies, root and then burning a CD with BASE2_2.tgz with the required file structure.
Today I tried the 15 Jan build on the LX. I have it running, but with many problems! The LX I tried has a floppy, SUN+ external CDROM (Sony CDU-561), ROM Rev 2.9 +32Mb RAM. 850Mb Quantum HD Things I observed or had to play with to get running with the sun4c Rescue disk, and an all floppy install. --The Unhidden "S" option was sure nice to see plus the way it partitioned the hard drive was great. --The autoconfigure hard drive settings were way off, not one setting correct. --With the first rescue disk Floppy 0: Warning-disk change called early. Seems to happen all the time if I remember back. --Large Font Looks Great ,but pages loaded like an old 150-300 baud modem. Plus when moving down menus the text overlaps, the margins tear and jump from Left, Right and Back to center all at the same time. --In Install Kernel & Modules menu, BLOCK cursor is one line high so you end up with the wrong selection. This was not a problem once I caught on, but this one line out problem changes from menu to menu throughout the install. --At Install Kernel and Modules it asks for the Rescue Disk, I assumed sun4c since that was the disk I started with but received "Message sun4c Rescue not correct". Wanted sun4cdm rescue disk. Instructions not specific enough. --message /target/sun4cdm/drivers.tgz no such file or directory. Used vt2 and created required directory and install continued. --Installing modules, BLOCK cursor now on correct line. When at loading modules menu should have an arrow or more or something to indicated the menu has more items out of site below. --Install Network menu, cursor one line high --At Make Boot Floppy shows Formatting Floppy -- then Problem-- Creation of Boot floppy failed--tried many times end up always going back to create boot floppy. Even selecting Reboot option on menu sends me to Create Boot Floppy! Use vt2; mount showed only /dev/sda1 and /proc on/ proc type (rw). All attempts to mount the floppy failed. --could not escape, used STOP-A to get out of setup. --Using sun4cdm Rescue and linux root=/dev/sda1 system rebooted. --Task Installer V0.1 was just a blank screen- no options listed; with enter was put in dselect program. --Still could not mount floppy; mount fd0 gives "can't find etc/fstab or /etc/mtap" Same two devices as mentioned above mounted. Did not try to install programs yet. Will try sun4cdm rescue first on the LX and try both on SS1's. Will also burn CD with base2_2.tgz to try. Hope this helps. Peter Myers
