19 Sep
2006
19 Sep
'06
11:32 a.m.
Hello Josh,
Monday, September 18, 2006, 9:33:11 AM, you wrote:
Thanks for the tips. This morning the machine
actually booted to the
IRIX login screen but crashed to a black screen as soon as I tried to do
anything graphics-intensive, so it looks like your assessments are
correct, it's definitely a sporadic hardware failure.
that sounds like a step forward from your last description.
I went through and cleaned out the machine before I
powered it on the
first time (it was quite dirty); and I reseated everything that was
socketed. I'll try running diagnostics on it sometime this week and see
if it tells me anything.
Probably the key is *not* reseating *everything*. Most of my 10-20
year old machines (esp. the SGIs) are plugged in the way they are
(after taking care of transportation "bugs"). Sometimes I come to
think that after 10 years the dirt is part of the "whole" and has
grown to some kind of function. ;-)
Seeing that it works in general you should probably try reseat-magic
with the bare minimum of hardware and see if the thing can stay stable
at PROM level and proceed from that point on. And remember... if it is
really a 4D/35 cooling is a BIG issiue... do NOT run the system
without a working "cardcage" fan for the CPU and without the whole
cage installed into the larger chassis. Did I mention cooling is
essential on these systems?
--
Best regards,
Gerhard mailto:mail at g-lenerz.de
Old SGI Stuff http://sgistuff.g-lenerz.de/