6 Aug
2015
6 Aug
'15
2:25 p.m.
-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of JP Hindin
Sent: 06 August 2015 19:07
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
<cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Subject: RE: Booting an IBM MP 3000 S/390 System
On Thu, 6 Aug 2015, Dave G4UGM wrote:
over
Christmas. Just pressing the Power button powered it up eventually,
but I am pretty sure it took nearly an hour to get to the IPL prompt. So
it did
> Booting an old CDC 6000-series machine meant
mounting a "deadstart"
> tape, pushing the button just below the screens on the DD60, entering
> or editing the equipment status table, then going out for a smoke
> (not me) or a cup of coffee, while the system copied the deadstart tape
to
disk.
The
next prompt was to enter the date and time.
People are too impatient today.
--Chuck
Actually I remember booting an IBM4381 from cold after we shut it down disk drives, then tape drives, then other bits and
bobs. But when it spun
up
the disks it brought them up one at a time so the
startup surges didn't
trip
the main breaker. The same with the tape drives. Then
it loaded the
microcode into all the controllers. Then it booted the OS. As we were
running
VM this last bit took a few seconds (I think). I do
know if VM crashed you
screen logo frequently re-appeared before you had time to think.
Spinning off on this tangent, when I was learning how to fire up my Sun
E10k
I didn't realise it took so ruddy long for the SSP
and the E10k to speak
to each
other.
So I was constantly asking the SSP for the E10k's power status (to see if
they
were communicating) and being told the SSP
"wasn't the master".
I'd powered things up repeatedly and made all sorts of changes to the SSP
config and just couldn't figure out what wasn't working. So one day I'm
messing with it again and I'd walked over to the other side of the shop
for a
manual and gotten distracted and maybe ten minuted
passed and all of a
sudden all of the blowers dropped RPM and evened out. The SSP and E10k
had finally finished their secret masonic handshake and the SSP did the
equivalent of "Hey, dude, it's not 7000 degrees in here, you can chillax
now".
"People are too impatient today" -- Chuck G
True enough. I just didn't know enough to know I should be patient.
Excuse me if this isn't Exactly right, but I seem to recall some on in IBM
saying that Thomas Watson Jr got a phone call one day. It went...
TWJ: Thomas Watson here
CLR: Is that Thomas Watson Jnr.
TWJ: Yes
CLR: and you are the head of IBM
TWJ: Yes
CLR and you first name is Thomas
TWJ: yes
CLR: and you are the head of IBM
TWJ: yes
CLE: and you are in your office
TWJ: yes, but what do you want
CLR: Just thought I would show what it is like trying set up and SNA
session. Bye...
- JP