26 Mar
2000
26 Mar
'00
1:02 p.m.
Altos machines came in several generations.
1st Generation
Altos 5-ZZ where ZZ was the size of the HD. These were Z80 machines with 5
1/4 inch drives. These are small rectangular desktop boxes.
Altos 8XXX-ZZ was a large heavy rectangular desktop box with Z80s or 68000
CPUs. These were generally multiuser machines. ZZ again refers to the size of
the 8" HD(10=10 Meg, 12=20 Meg, 14=40 Meg HDs). They used a large custom
single board computer the size of the case. The drive controller was a
separate half card mounted on top of the SBC. The early 8000s had separate
cases for the 8" FD & HD. In later models the drives and cards were
integrated in the same case. I think the 68000 processor machines were
labeled 68XX-ZZ but it has been too long to be sure. I also think the 68000
machines ran an early version of Xenix. You could get them in versions up to
9 users and a supervisor.
2nd Generation
Altos 5XX & 6XX class machines. These looked like squashed hexagons, flat on
the bottom and top with two angles on each side. These were medium sized
desktop cases, usually beige but often came in custom colors. They carried on
the two circuit card configuration. Large SBC with secondary drive controller
card.
Altos 580 was my favorite. Half height floppy and St 225 20 Meg HD with a Z80
and ran 4 terminals under MPM. They would also run CPM. These also came with
FH 10 & 15 Meg HDs
Altos 586 came with a 40 meg FHHD and the new 8086 processor and was a 6 user
machine. These often ran Xenix and were password protected.
While I never had one I think the 686 series machines had the 68000 processor
and ran Xenix.
These were all squashed Hexagonal shaped machines. I think this line went up
to 9XX series numbers with greater amounts of users.
3rd Generation
Then there were the Brown floor towers, Altos II & III. These were multiple
card towers for large amounts of users. These had 80286 and 80386 processors.
I believe there were machines that continued the 680xx processor line too. I
only had a couple of these.
The Altos II terminal is a rebadged Wyse 100 and the Altos III was a Wyse 50.
I think the Altos IV was a Wyse 60 but I am not sure at the moment.
Paxton
27 Mar
27 Mar
7:35 a.m.
Hi,
Altos machines came in several generations....
Thanks for the comprehensive description, that's exactly what I needed to
know.
TTFN - Pete.
--
Hardware & Software Engineer. Sound Engineer.
Collector of Arcade Machines, Games Consoles & Obsolete Computers (esp DEC)
peter.pachla(a)wintermute.org.uk | www.wintermute.org.uk
--
11:23 a.m.
On Sun, 26 Mar 2000 Innfogra(a)aol.com wrote:
There was also a 486 that came packaged in a neat tan desktop case that
was smaller than a PC. It had a single half high floppy and a single
half high hard drive and ran Concurrent CP/M-86. Supporting three
users, IIRC. I also have a recall of it being 80186 based, but could be
wrong on that one.
- don
Altos machines came in several generations.
1st Generation
Altos 5-ZZ where ZZ was the size of the HD. These were Z80 machines with 5
1/4 inch drives. These are small rectangular desktop boxes.
Altos 8XXX-ZZ was a large heavy rectangular desktop box with Z80s or 68000
CPUs. These were generally multiuser machines. ZZ again refers to the size of
the 8" HD(10=10 Meg, 12=20 Meg, 14=40 Meg HDs). They used a large custom
single board computer the size of the case. The drive controller was a
separate half card mounted on top of the SBC. The early 8000s had separate
cases for the 8" FD & HD. In later models the drives and cards were
integrated in the same case. I think the 68000 processor machines were
labeled 68XX-ZZ but it has been too long to be sure. I also think the 68000
machines ran an early version of Xenix. You could get them in versions up to
9 users and a supervisor.
2nd Generation
Altos 5XX & 6XX class machines. These looked like squashed hexagons, flat on
the bottom and top with two angles on each side. These were medium sized
desktop cases, usually beige but often came in custom colors. They carried on
the two circuit card configuration. Large SBC with secondary drive controller
card.
Altos 580 was my favorite. Half height floppy and St 225 20 Meg HD with a Z80
and ran 4 terminals under MPM. They would also run CPM. These also came with
FH 10 & 15 Meg HDs
Altos 586 came with a 40 meg FHHD and the new 8086 processor and was a 6 user
machine. These often ran Xenix and were password protected.
While I never had one I think the 686 series machines had the 68000 processor
and ran Xenix.
These were all squashed Hexagonal shaped machines. I think this line went up
to 9XX series numbers with greater amounts of users.
3rd Generation
Then there were the Brown floor towers, Altos II & III. These were multiple
card towers for large amounts of users. These had 80286 and 80386 processors.
I believe there were machines that continued the 680xx processor line too. I
only had a couple of these.
The Altos II terminal is a rebadged Wyse 100 and the Altos III was a Wyse 50.
I think the Altos IV was a Wyse 60 but I am not sure at the moment.
Paxton
11:49 a.m.
The ALTOS server box I have has no 808x that I've seen so far, not that it's
been examined with any rigor. The second board is that 2900-based HDC I
once described.
The box is sort of squashed-hexagon-shaped, and the cigarette-stain-brown
doesn't wash off, so I suspect it's there by design.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: Don Maslin <donm(a)cts.com>
To: <classiccmp(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Monday, March 27, 2000 6:23 PM
Subject: Re: Altos machines
On Sun, 26 Mar 2000 Innfogra(a)aol.com wrote:
There was also a 486 that came packaged in a neat tan desktop case that
was smaller than a PC. It had a single half high floppy and a single
half high hard drive and ran Concurrent CP/M-86. Supporting three
users, IIRC. I also have a recall of it being 80186 based, but could be
wrong on that one.
- don
> Altos machines came in several generations.
>
> 1st Generation
>
> Altos 5-ZZ where ZZ was the size of the HD. These were Z80 machines with
5
> 1/4 inch drives. These are small rectangular
desktop boxes.
>
> Altos 8XXX-ZZ was a large heavy rectangular desktop box with Z80s or
68000
> CPUs. These were generally multiuser machines. ZZ
again refers to the
size of
> the 8" HD(10=10 Meg, 12=20 Meg, 14=40 Meg
HDs). They used a large custom
> single board computer the size of the case. The drive controller was a
> separate half card mounted on top of the SBC. The early 8000s had
separate
> cases for the 8" FD & HD. In later
models the drives and cards were
> integrated in the same case. I think the 68000 processor machines were
> labeled 68XX-ZZ but it has been too long to be sure. I also think the
68000
> machines ran an early version of Xenix. You could
get them in versions
up to
> 9 users and a supervisor.
>
> 2nd Generation
>
> Altos 5XX & 6XX class machines. These looked like squashed hexagons,
flat
on
> the bottom and top with two angles on each side.
These were medium sized
> desktop cases, usually beige but often came in custom colors. They
carried on
> the two circuit card configuration. Large SBC
with secondary drive
controller
> card.
>
> Altos 580 was my favorite. Half height floppy and St 225 20 Meg HD with
a Z80
> and ran 4 terminals under MPM. They would also
run CPM. These also came
with
> FH 10 & 15 Meg HDs
>
> Altos 586 came with a 40 meg FHHD and the new 8086 processor and was a 6
user
> machine. These often ran Xenix and were password
protected.
>
> While I never had one I think the 686 series machines had the 68000
processor
> and ran Xenix.
>
> These were all squashed Hexagonal shaped machines. I think this line
went up
> to 9XX series numbers with greater amounts of
users.
>
> 3rd Generation
>
> Then there were the Brown floor towers, Altos II & III. These were
multiple
> card towers for large amounts of users. These had
80286 and 80386
processors.
> I believe there were machines that continued the
680xx processor line
too. I
> only had a couple of these.
>
> The Altos II terminal is a rebadged Wyse 100 and the Altos III was a
Wyse 50.
I think the
Altos IV was a Wyse 60 but I am not sure at the moment.
Paxton
2:59 p.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
The machine boots to a password prompt. If I boot single-user it still
comes up with a maintainence prompt and asks for the root password.
I can't seem to get a CDROM working on the machine. The entire scsi
subsystem does not want to function. The CDROM is unterminated on it's
own address with parity off. The hard disk which does boot, parity off,
terminated at end of chain.
Should I just mount this drive under linux and get root access that way?
Should I install solaris for x86 to gain root? What filesystem is SUNOS
5.4 using so I can tell Linux what to use?
Thanks
--
-----------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey S. Worley
Technical Services
Bits & Bytes Computer Services Inc.
1979B Hendersonville Road
Asheville, NC 28803
828-684-8953 - voice 0900-1700 five days
828-687-9284 - 24hr fax
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
Technoid(a)Cheta.net
-----------------------------------------------------------
3:41 p.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
On Mon, 27 Mar 2000 Technoid(a)cheta.net wrote:
I can't seem to get a CDROM working on the
machine. The entire scsi
subsystem does not want to function. The CDROM is unterminated on it's
own address with parity off. The hard disk which does boot, parity off,
terminated at end of chain.
What kind of cdrom? Does it support 512k blocksize? Have you looked at the
Sun HW faq? Sun machines have a strange system of assigning/referencing
scsi id no's...
Should I just mount this drive under linux and get
root access that way?
Should I install solaris for x86 to gain root? What filesystem is SUNOS
5.4 using so I can tell Linux what to use?
SunOS uses the UFS filesystem, you'll need linux kernel 2.1.112 or higher
to try the experimental read-write UFS (earlier is read-only). Backup
first...
Basically, you need to boot from the install CD/floppy/net in order to
hack it. Booting to single user mode here can help if you munge the root
user line (like set shell to /bin/oops or something) but won't let you
bypass the root password. You need to focus on getting the CD working.
Aaron
28 Mar
28 Mar
8:57 a.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
What kind of cdrom? Does it support 512k blocksize?
Have you looked at the
<nitpick>
You mean 512-byte block size. The "standard" size is 2048 bytes, but some
Unix boxes require 512 bytes. Some SCSI CD-ROM drives (e.g., Plextor) have
a jumper setting for this. Some (e.g., Toshiba) have an undocumented set
of solder pads that can be bridged for this.
</nitpick>
10:30 a.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
<nitpick>
You mean 512-byte block size. The "standard" size is 2048
bytes, but some
Unix boxes require 512 bytes. Some SCSI CD-ROM drives (e.g.,
Plextor) have
a jumper setting for this. Some (e.g., Toshiba) have an
undocumented set
of solder pads that can be bridged for this.
</nitpick>
Take a look at the SUN CDROM faq as it tells you how to overcome the
512-byte block size so that you can hook up one of the "Standard" SCSI
CDROMs. I believe the faq is at http://www.sunhelp.org
Ram
27 Mar
27 Mar
3:50 p.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
Technoid(a)cheta.net wrote:
The machine boots to a password prompt. If I boot
single-user it still
comes up with a maintainence prompt and asks for the root password.
That's correct. Unlike SunOS, a boot -s to Solaris will still demand
the root password. The only way around this mess is, as you surmised,
to boot from cdrom, run the installation script long enough to exit to
a shell, mount the root disk partition under the /tmp file system (it's
the only one writable when booting from CD) and then hammer the /etc/shadow
entry for root to specify no password.
I can't seem to get a CDROM working on the
machine. The entire scsi
subsystem does not want to function. The CDROM is unterminated on it's
own address with parity off. The hard disk which does boot, parity off,
terminated at end of chain.
Well, it must be working if it's booting from the hard disk. I take it
from your description that you believe you've
inserted the CDROM into
the chain between the controller and the hard drive. Is
that correct?
Beware the fact that some earlier deskside Sparcs had Bad Weirdness
with their SCSI cabling, in that the internal controller spoke to
internal drives using an external cable...
Is this a Sun cdrom drive? Random SCSI cdrom drives are prone to not working
unless they have a sun-specific hack to make the ID string they return
something identifiable to the boot prom. Differing Suns have differing
ways of refering to CDROM drives, and some insist that the CDROM drive
show up as ID 6. Have you tried using the prom diagnostics to probe
the bus to see who is home?
Should I just mount this drive under linux and get
root access that way?
Should I install solaris for x86 to gain root? What filesystem is SUNOS
5.4 using so I can tell Linux what to use?
I think I'd sort out the hardware issues. Solaris 5.4 (2.4) is incredibly
old, slow, buggy and unsupported. You can get a single machine license for
Solaris 8 (nee 5.8 or 2.8, depending on which numbering scheme you chose to
use -- it's all the same thing) for the cost of media and shipping; unlimited
license is $75 as is the source license. You're better off sorting out
the hardware so you can install a version of the OS that actually works, but
failing that you could pry the drive out and mount it on an x86 Solaris machine.
--
Chris Kennedy
chris(a)mainecoon.com
http://www.mainecoon.com
PGP fingerprint: 4E99 10B6 7253 B048 6685 6CBC 55E1 20A3 108D AB97
4:26 p.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
In <38E04821.4B8943AE(a)mainecoon.com>om>, on 03/28/00
at 01:26 AM, Chris Kennedy <chris(a)mainecoon.com> said:
Well, it must be working if it's booting from the
hard disk. I take it
from your description that you believe you've inserted the CDROM into the
chain between the controller and the hard drive. Is that correct? Beware
the fact that some earlier deskside Sparcs had Bad Weirdness with their
SCSI cabling, in that the internal controller spoke to internal drives
using an external cable...
Yes, the cdrom is in the 'middle'. This IS one of those wierd machines
that has an external cable running from the internal drive chain to the
internal controller....
Is this a Sun cdrom drive? Random SCSI cdrom drives
are prone to not
working unless they have a sun-specific hack to make the ID string they
return something identifiable to the boot prom. Differing Suns have
differing ways of refering to CDROM drives, and some insist that the
CDROM drive show up as ID 6. Have you tried using the prom diagnostics
to probe the bus to see who is home?
I figured the id6 thing out by inferring from other info I hit on the web
which was pretty slim on specifics. The drive is 6 and is a Toshiba
XM-3701b.
I think I'd sort out the hardware issues. Solaris
5.4 (2.4) is
incredibly old, slow, buggy and unsupported. You can get a single
machine license for Solaris 8 (nee 5.8 or 2.8, depending on which
numbering scheme you chose to use -- it's all the same thing) for the
cost of media and shipping; unlimited license is $75 as is the source
license. You're better off sorting out the hardware so you can install a
version of the OS that actually works, but failing that you could pry the
drive out and mount it on an x86 Solaris machine.
I may well just do that (mount the drive on my clone for cracking).
Another option I though of would be to install solaris X86 on my clone as
a boot server and install over the lan. I have the correct tranceiver (on
my Data General mv4000 right now).
Maybe I need a single-speed cdrom? BTW there are issues with this machine
I have not yet resolved such as a parity error on a simm and what I think
might be a power problem. I have cleaned and reassembled it but don't
have any 30pin 4mb simms handy this evening.
I have both the X86 free solaris 7 and the sparq version of same on cdrom.
--
-----------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey S. Worley
Technical Services
Bits & Bytes Computer Services Inc.
1979B Hendersonville Road
Asheville, NC 28803
828-684-8953 - voice 0900-1700 five days
828-687-9284 - 24hr fax
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
Technoid(a)Cheta.net
-----------------------------------------------------------
5:30 p.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
To boot a sun machine from the CDROM using the "old style" (gives you the >
prompt) it is :
b sd(0,6,2)
If it gives you the "ok" prompt (aka Open Boot Prom) you should be able to
type:
ok boot cdrom
The syntax in the first case is:
dev(logical unit, scsi target, partition)
I don't know why sd(0,18,0) works unless it just does it mod 8 and and
boots target 2. There was a bit of weirdness in that "scsi device 0" was
actually target 3.
To boot from tape by the way you type:
b st(0,0,0)foo
If you're booting SunOS (prior to Solaris 2.x) then the full command is
b sd(0,0,0)vmunix [options]
for Solaris
b sd(0,0,0)kernel/unix [options]
Usually it gets it right if you leave the file name blank.
--Chuck
4:34 p.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
You mentioned PROM diags.
The prom recognizes only:
b sd(0,18,0) -- which is to boot the machine from the only hard drive
which is on controller 0 at id 3!!! What the hell. I understand it needs
to be set to three but WHY?! Whats the rule? Why is the second argument
18? How would I represent then:
b sr(x,x,x) if the cdrom was on id6 on the same controller (0) to boot
cdrom?
Other docs I have seen mention an 'OK' prompt. I get a wedge and
sometimes a "watchdog" halt to this prompt or I can get the prompt by
Stop+A. My prompt is more primitive than the OK version I think.
PROBE-SCSI-ALL does not return anything near what is expected. It gives
me a memory dump to screen of a few locations. PRO does the same so I
know it is executing a different command and ignoring or misprocessing
other chars following the real command.
How do I get a floppy on this box? It has a 150mb scsi tape drive as it's
only removable io. I am not hurting at all for scsi drives so if I have
to...
I think you think this machine is running solaris 5.4. It is actually
SUNOS and still asks for the root password for a maintainence prompt. I
don't know enough to say they are not really the same product with
different names though...
THanks a lot for the discussion all. I really appreciate the input.
--
-----------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey S. Worley
Technical Services
Bits & Bytes Computer Services Inc.
1979B Hendersonville Road
Asheville, NC 28803
828-684-8953 - voice 0900-1700 five days
828-687-9284 - 24hr fax
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
Technoid(a)Cheta.net
-----------------------------------------------------------
28 Mar
28 Mar
5:59 a.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
First, check out http://saturn.tlug.org/suncdfaq/index.html
Regarding OS's, keep in mind that Sol 7 may not support this machine
(didn't they drop VME support?). Also, Solaris *is* SunOS; SunOS 5.4 is
Solaris 2.4.
The CD does need to be scsi id#6, this is hardcoded into the kernel with
Solaris v2.5 and older.
As far as booting, what you enter at the monitor prompt depends on
*where* on the CD the system for your architecture is. For the 4/330, you
might try >b sd(,18,1) or >b sd(,30,1). Again, check to see that the
version of Solaris that you're trying to boot supports your machine...
Good luck,
Aaron
BTW, of course I did mean 512 bytes instead of 512K in my last post...
On Tue, 28 Mar 2000 Technoid(a)cheta.net wrote:
You mentioned PROM diags.
The prom recognizes only:
b sd(0,18,0) -- which is to boot the machine from the only hard drive
which is on controller 0 at id 3!!! What the hell. I understand it needs
to be set to three but WHY?! Whats the rule? Why is the second argument
18? How would I represent then:
b sr(x,x,x) if the cdrom was on id6 on the same controller (0) to boot
cdrom?
Other docs I have seen mention an 'OK' prompt. I get a wedge and
sometimes a "watchdog" halt to this prompt or I can get the prompt by
Stop+A. My prompt is more primitive than the OK version I think.
PROBE-SCSI-ALL does not return anything near what is expected. It gives
me a memory dump to screen of a few locations. PRO does the same so I
know it is executing a different command and ignoring or misprocessing
other chars following the real command.
How do I get a floppy on this box? It has a 150mb scsi tape drive as it's
only removable io. I am not hurting at all for scsi drives so if I have
to...
I think you think this machine is running solaris 5.4. It is actually
SUNOS and still asks for the root password for a maintainence prompt. I
don't know enough to say they are not really the same product with
different names though...
THanks a lot for the discussion all. I really appreciate the input.
--
-----------------------------------------------------------
Jeffrey S. Worley
Technical Services
Bits & Bytes Computer Services Inc.
1979B Hendersonville Road
Asheville, NC 28803
828-684-8953 - voice 0900-1700 five days
828-687-9284 - 24hr fax
Who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard disk?
Technoid(a)Cheta.net
-----------------------------------------------------------
7:12 a.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
Aaron Christopher Finney wrote:
Regarding OS's, keep in mind that Sol 7 may not
support this machine
(didn't they drop VME support?).
Urg. Yeah, that's right, except I believe 7 still supported the 600MP.
That's been dropped by Sol 8, along with support for the 4c family
(1/1+/2/IPC/IPX and the like).
--
Chris Kennedy
chris(a)mainecoon.com
http://www.mainecoon.com
PGP fingerprint: 4E99 10B6 7253 B048 6685 6CBC 55E1 20A3 108D AB97
9:34 a.m.
New subject: SUNOS 5.4 Root Password
Aaron Christopher Finney wrote:
Solaris 8 dropped support for the 4c. Damn, wonder if I can
return the order.
Bill
--
bpechter(a)monmouth.com | Microsoft: Where do you want to go today?
| Linux: Where do you want to go tomorrow?
| BSD: Are you guys coming, or what?
Regarding OS's, keep in mind that Sol 7 may
not support this machine
(didn't they drop VME support?).
Urg. Yeah, that's right, except I believe 7 still supported the 600MP.
That's been dropped by Sol 8, along with support for the 4c family
(1/1+/2/IPC/IPX and the like).
--
Chris Kennedy
chris(a)mainecoon.com
http://www.mainecoon.com
PGP fingerprint: 4E99 10B6 7253 B048 6685 6CBC 55E1 20A3 108D AB97
9:48 a.m.
Hi,
3rd Generation
Then there were the Brown floor towers, Altos II & III....
The one we had at work (I'm pretty sure now it was a "III") was white, well
a creamy white anyway.
Any idea why this should be?
....I believe there were machines that continued the
680xx processor
line too....
Hmm, do you recall any model numbers (68K based systems are much more
interesting to me than x86 based ones on the whole)?
TTFN - Pete.
--
Hardware & Software Engineer. Sound Engineer.
Collector of Arcade Machines, Games Consoles & Obsolete Computers (esp DEC)
peter.pachla(a)wintermute.org.uk | www.wintermute.org.uk
--
5:05 p.m.
New subject: Aaack, I've been bitten again
Digging around in junk bins has its hazards. I was poking away, sticking my
hands where they didn't belong, and ZAP, I got bit. Nasty looking thing, in
fact it appears to be some sort of horrible nest. One of the big ones is a
C64, then a 1541 got me, even the bulky old printer managed to latch on. I
figured my only hope for a antidote is to take the whole box home and
analyze it. The swelling (my garage walls) hasn't gone down yet, but I have
heard eBay is good for reducing it a bit, plus tomorrow is trash day,,,, ;)
29 Mar
29 Mar
12:39 a.m.
New subject: Aaack, I've been bitten again
::Digging around in junk bins has its hazards. I was poking away, sticking my
::hands where they didn't belong, and ZAP, I got bit. Nasty looking thing, in
::fact it appears to be some sort of horrible nest. One of the big ones is a
::C64, then a 1541 got me, even the bulky old printer managed to latch on. I
::figured my only hope for a antidote is to take the whole box home and
::analyze it. The swelling (my garage walls) hasn't gone down yet, but I have
::heard eBay is good for reducing it a bit, plus tomorrow is trash day,,,, ;)
And as a Commodore owner, I must warn you that Commodore bites can carry
hobbyitis, demo inflammation and swelling of the game-playing and music
lobes of the head. The only treatment is another Commodore, so I'm still
recovering. ;-)
--
----------------------------- personal page: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ --
Cameron Kaiser * Point Loma Nazarene University * ckaiser(a)ptloma.edu
-- The fact that it works is immaterial. -- L. Ogborn -------------------------
8815
days inactive
8818
days old
17 comments
13 participants
participants (13)
-
af-list＠wfi-inc.com -
chris＠mainecoon.com -
ckaiser＠oa.ptloma.edu -
cmcmanis＠mcmanis.com -
donm＠cts.com -
edick＠idcomm.com -
eric＠brouhaha.com -
Innfogra＠aol.com -
mikeford＠socal.rr.com -
pechter＠pechter.dyndns.org -
peter.pachla＠wintermute.org.uk -
rmeenaks＠olf.com -
Technoid＠cheta.net