I wrote to mention that I couldn't get a new DS-10 booted. The cause:
-Possibly a bad CD-ROM.
But there's more.
Dr. Tom Blinn got back to me and suggested, as a couple of others
did, that the sole IDE device on our box, the CD-ROM, was acting up.
In fact, uncabling the CD allowed the box to boot up to X, and
run the factory setup. I selected the halt option, to make sure
that this behavior was repeatable.
In fact, when I tried again, w/o doing anything, I then got the solid blue
screen during the init, but no "Testing System" ever came up. Cycled the
power again, and the system inits. Powered down, re-connected the IDE
cable to the CD, then up: "Testing System" followed by "Testing Disks
(Read Only)" followed immediately by something I was seeing before (and
should've mentioned), "dqa.0.0.13.0 no media present or disabled with
RUN/STOP switch", after which it proceded again to >>>. I imagine
that before I'd interpreted that message as "normal", given that
indeed there was no media in the drive. Tried again, blue
screen. Tried again, init to >>>. Booted: (just typed "b"), and lo and
behold, there's a slight pause when polling the CD but it cruises to the
X factory setup screen ... with the CD attached. There it sits as I type
this. Upon recollection, a previous attempt yesterday to boot (everything
as shipped - ie., CD connected), went all the way to "Starting X. please
wait..." and just hung *there*... and sometimes never got past the Blue
Screen.
So... possibly a bad CD, possibly more. I'd be more conclusive if I
hadn't seen init fails (solid blue screen, flashing cursor, nothing more)
with the drive uncabled...
Chris
======================================================================
Christopher C Stevenson C3004 office: (709) 737-2624
Dept. of Physics & Physical Oceanography fax: (709) 737-8739
Memorial University of Newfoundland
St. John's, Newfoundland, CANADA A1B 3X7
URL:
http://www.physics.mun.ca/~csteven
======================================================================
"A scientific truth does not triumph by convincing
its opponents and making them see the light, but
rather because its opponents eventually die and a
new generation grows up that is familiar with it."
-- Max Planck
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-- Oscar Wilde
Received on Wed Oct 25 2000 - 18:53:52 NZDT