<<< SSAG::DISK$ARCH2:[NOTES$LIBRARY.SSAG]ASK_SSAG.NOTE;7 >>> -< Ask the Storage Architecture Group >- ================================================================================ Note 5599.1 DEC 2000-500 PROBLEM 1 of 1 BLOFLY::SMITHP "Beware the knights who say "NT"..." 244 lines 30-MAY-1996 03:00 -< information... >- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I have attached a v.old Jensen/Culzean support note. Looks like you MUST disable floppy controller and MUST NOT remove the on-board termination resistors from the 2nd 1742A. Hope this helps. Cheers, P.  Here are some useful snippets of poorly documented or hard-to-find Jensen / DECpc AXP 150 / DEC 2000-300 and Culzean / DEC 2000-500 info: - There are some good notes file containing general Jensen/Culzean and OS specific info - AYJEN1::JENSEN, EVMS::JENSEN_VMS and DECWET::NTAXP - The VMS/OSF and NT ECU (EISA Configuration Utility) are almost, but NOT, the same. The main difference is in how multiple SCSI adaptors are configured. While VMS can auto-configure the standard devices (i.e. motherboard resident plus one SCSI and one Ethernet adaptor) even if the ECU hasn't been run, the VMS specific ECU must be used if duplicate adaptors or a graphics card is present. NOTE: It is usually possible to run Windows NT perfectly well using the VMS/OSF ECU, although not vice versa. - Upgrading or reloading the console firmware causes all boot setup entries and environment variables to be lost. The customers must write down all the settings before up/downgrading so they can be re-entered by hand - if they don't, they won't be able to reboot afterwards. Alternatively, there are a pair of DEC supplied (sometimes!) utilities named SAVEENV.EXE and RESTENV.EXE that can be run from a floppy using the console NT menu, and which will save and restore the NT environment part of the NVRAM to and from the file FWENV.SAV on a floppy. These utilities can be found on node RIPPER:: in the SYS$KITS:[AXP_FIRMWARE.JENSEN] directory. NOTE: Unless you do the "Set default environment variables" and "Set default configuration" items in the "Set up the system..." menu before you run RESTENV, the environment variable for drive A: won't be defined and you will have to run RESTENV as eisa(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)RESTENV.EXE instead of A:RESTENV.EXE. - The algorithms that VMS & the Jensen/Culzean console firmware use to assign "controller letters" to adaptor cards when more than one of a particular type is present are NOT the same. Unless care is taken when installing cards, VMS and the >>> console will have different names for the same device. See EVMS::JENSEN_VMS note 55.8 for details on how to avoid this. - Part number PCTAZ-AB (Adaptec 1740A SCSI adapter) is no longer valid for ordering as an additional SCSI adapter on the Jensen / Culzean. It never had the correct firmware version for these systems and is now no longer even available - all orders for the PCTAZ-AB are currently being fulfilled with a PCTAZ-CB (Adaptec 2740). The PCTAZ-CB is *not* supported by VMS, OSF/1 or the firmware (although it can be made to work under Windows NT with a lot of fiddling). To obtain an additional SCSI adapter you should now order a PB2HA-SA (Adaptec 1742A) and disable its floppy controller. NOTE: The installation instructions currently tell you to remove the on-board SCSI terminator packs on all additional SCSI adapters. This is WRONG and should never be done! - To connect an external SCSI device to the first Adaptec 1742A SCSI adapter (i.e. the one controlling the internal SCSI devices) in a Jensen/Culzean the three on-board terminator resistor packs on the SCSI adaptor MUST be removed. However, this should *not* be done on any additional 1740A or 1742A SCSI adapters. Once the terminators are removed an external device or a terminator plug must always be plugged into the external connector on the 1742A. - The correct external SCSI terminator for the 174xA's is the 12-35759-01 (as originally used on the DECpc 433W) or the 12-37791-01 (used on the the DECpc 425ST). The electrically identical 12-33626-01 / H8578-AA used on the DECstation 5000-25 will NOT physically fit. - There have been multiple revisions of the MCODE firmware on the Adaptec 174xA SCSI controllers that are used in the Jensen and Culzean platforms. The following should help you know what revision you need and how to identify what you have: OSF/1 V1.3B will refuse to use any 174xA that doesn't contain rev G.2 or higher MCODE, and VMS V1.5-1H1 will do the same unless it sees rev G.1 or higher. Windows NT (both Beta and SSB) will work with any rev, but will work more reliably with the latest MCODE. To identify the MCODE rev on a 174xA either do a ">>> SHOW DEVICE" in VMS/OSF console mode, or look at the checksum on the 174xA MCODE EPROM. (The EPROM will be marked "MCODE xxxx", where xxxx is the checksum.) MCODE rev Checksum Comment --------- -------- ------- G.2 BCE3 Minimum rev for OSF/1 V1.3B and above G.1 C3DD Minimum rev for OpenVMS AXP V1.5-1H1 and above G B646 Shipped in DECpc AXP 150 "developer specials" F B6CF Rare, mostly seen in prototype machines E B7D6 "Generic" 174xA's have rev E MCODE A pre-programmed rev G.2 EPROM can be ordered as part number 23-681E6-00. N.B.: Revisions F, G, G.1 and G.2 were special releases of firmware provided to Digital by Adaptec to fix bugs found by VMS and OSF/1 engineering, and are only found in 174xA's sold by DEC specifically for the Jensen/Culzean. They aren't shipping with "generic" Adaptec 174xA's and possibly never will. The highest MCODE revision Adaptec has released on generic 174xA's is rev E. There is currently no such thing as rev H MCODE - the message demanding rev H that the OSF/1 install process displays when it encounters old MCODE is in error. The correct rev for OSF/1 is G.2 (or higher). Also, the revision (usually H) reported when booting an Intel-based PC with the 174xA's BIOS enabled is the BIOS revision, not the MCODE revision. The 174xA BIOS is not used at all on AXP PCs. - The 174xA's are FAST-SCSI (10MB/sec) capable and if there are any FAST-SCSI devices (e.g. an RZ26) the maximum total effective cable length is 3 metres. The first 1742A already has 1 metre of internal cable, so its external max would be 2M. As an example, the BA350 Storageworks box is equivalent to 0.9 metres of cable so the maximum supported connecting cable length would be 1M unless you used DWZZA repeaters. I've seen lightly loaded BA350's with one or two RZ26's work fine with a 2M cable off the 1742A, but I wouldn't want to try it with a fully populated BA350. - The correct SCSI cable (50-pin micro Honda -> 50 pin CHAMP-Centronics) for connecting the 174xA to a TK50 (or similar device with the old-style large SCSI connectors) is a BC09D-xx (e.g. 3 foot is BC09D-03 and 6 foot is -06). - To temporarily enable the alternate console port (serial port 1) just disconnect the keyboard cable before powering up the system, or you can SET CONSOLE SERIAL at the >>> prompt for a more lasting effect. (>>> SET CONSOLE VGA goes back to the graphic console.) The default setup is 9600 baud, 8 bits, no parity, one stop bit. The console terminal must be set to send 8 bit control sequences for the arrow keys to work properly in console mode. The correct serial port to DECconnect adapter plug is the H8571-J. NOTE: When using the serial port console there is NO WAY to prevent CTRL-P and BREAK from halting the system - they are always enabled! - The only graphics card currently supported by VMS V1.5-1H1 and OSF/1 V1.3B is the Compaq Qvision 1024E. Windows NT also supports the #9 GXE card, but there are NO plans to support this card under VMS or OSF! The next (Jensen and Culzean) graphics support planned for VMS/OSF is for the ATI Mach-32 Ultra Pro and for low-end standard VGA. - When using the Qvision graphics card under VMS the SYSGEN parameter VIRTUALPAGECNT must be set to at least 400,000 to allow the X server to map the frame buffer, otherwise it fails with a %SYSTEM-F-VASFULL error. - VMS accesses the console, keyboard, mouse and serial ports via console firmware routines and they are thus all OPAx devices - the numbering is as follows: OPA0: Serial port 1 when using the alternate console OR Graphics head operator window when using the graphics console. OPA1: *Serial port 2 OPA2: The PC keyboard port OPA3: The mouse OPA4: *Serial port 1 when using the graphics console *Note: As of console firmware V1.2, the built-in serial ports (OPA1: and OPA4:) still don't work when using the graphics console. As a work-around you can install a PC4XD-AA serial/parallel card; see JENSEN_VMS note 61.10 - Other Jensen & Culzean specific VMS device names are as follows: DVA0: The RX26 2.88MB floppy drive (HINT: Use "$ INIT/DENS=xx DVA0: " to format floppies, where xx = ED for 2.88MB, HD for 1.44MB, or DD for 720K) LRA0: The parallel printer port GQA0: The Compaq Qvision 1024E card ERA0: The DE422 Ethernet card - The V1.2 firmware for the Jensen still has the following shortcomings when running VMS: > Support for the 2 serial ports (as OPA4 & OPA1) doesn't work yet when the graphics card is used as the console (fixed in V1.3). > Poor mouse performance under VMS (firmware not buffering mouse data - fixed in V1.3). OSF and Windows NT don't use the firmware routines for mouse access and don't have this problem. > No boot support for the floppy from the VMS/OSF >>> prompt, and none is planned as far as I know. However, V1.2 does add a >>> RUNECU command to allow the ECU utility to be run from floppy under the VMS/OSF console. - The V1.5-1H1 parallel port driver for the Jensen doesn't work with some DEC and foreign printers, e.g. the DECwriter 95 - see JENSEN_VMS note 61.10 for details. To be fixed in a later release of the LRDRIVER. - The Jensen / Culzean systems are currently supplied with PC7XL-AA or PCXAL-AA keyboards, which have the enhanced PC-AT style 101 key layout and keys. The key combinations required to simulate the extra keys present on a DEC standard keyboard are documented on pages 1-3 & 1-4 of the OpenVMS AXP Version 1.5-1H1 Release Notes and Update Procedures (AV-Q1CRA-TE). NOTE: As of V1.2 of the firmware, the console commands to set up for keyboards with anything other than US or UK key layouts (e.g., >>> SET KEYBOARD SUISSE) don't do anything. This will be fixed in V1.3 of the firmware. - The LK450 keyboard (a PC-interface keyboard with the DEC standard LK401 key layout and function keys which is ideal for use with VMS or OSF/1 by people used to DEC keyboards) is not supported by the SSB version of VMS V1.5-1H1, but updated drivers (SYS$IKBDRIVER.EXE and SYS$INBDRIVER.EXE) can be copied from BULOVA::ALPHA$KITS:[V15_SSB.UPDATE.V15_1H1] and then placed in the SYS$LOADABLE_IMAGES: directory. - The Jensen/Culzean console has no provision for either low- or high-level formatting of system disks. The Windows NT installation utility requires that the hard disk already have a valid PC-style partition table, but it doesn't tell you how to create one and the method isn't documented anywhere! ARCINST.EXE is the Microsoft utility which allows you to create the partition table and Windows NT system partition on a Jensen disk drive, and it can be found in the \alpha directory on the AXP Windows NT distribution CDROM. To partition a disk and/or configure an NT system partition: 1. Select 'Run a Program from the Boot Menu 2. Run the ARCINST.EXE program which is contained on the normal Windows NT distribution CD Program to Run : cd:\alpha\arcinst.exe 3. Select 'Configure Partitions' NOTE: If at any stage you make a mistake you can press the ESC key to abort and return to the previous menu level. 4. If you know that there are no existing partitions on the disk you wish to configure, go to step 5. Otherwise do the following to display the existing partitions and, if necessary, delete some or all of them. Select 'Delete Partition'. If you have more than one disk drive highlight the drive that you wish to configure and press Enter. Take great care to select the correct drive as the naming convention that ARCINST uses differs from that used by the firmware console. The list of partitions on the disk will be displayed. If you wish to delete a partition select it and press Enter; otherwise press ESC. Repeat step 4 until all unwanted partitions are removed. NOTE: Only FAT-format partitions of 4MBytes or more may be used as system partitions. 5. Select 'Create Partition'. If you have more than one drive, highlight the one that will contain the partition and press Enter. Take care to select the correct drive as the naming convention that ARCINST uses differs from that used by the firmware console. Type in the size of the partition (the system partition must be at least 4 MBytes) and press Enter to create it, followed by any key to format it. During the Windows NT installation the loader file OSLOADER.EXE will be installed within the system partition. If you wish, you can use ARCINST.EXE to create a further partition (by carrying out steps 4 and 5 again) which will hold all of the operating system files (this partition should be at least 130 MBytes in size). If you don't create this partition now you will be able to create one during the Windows NT installation process, but you will have to accept the default size (which is all of the remaining disk space). 6. Exit the ARCINST.EXE program back to the Boot Menu.