RS6k 7012/320H woes

[Paul Berger]

Those code you highlighted are only a problem if it halts on that code 
if it continues on then its ok, in fact it is finding something to boot 
off of 299 means that it has loaded the bootable code from somewhere, in 
your case likely the disk and has transferred control to it.  Do you 
know if this machine ever had a graphics card of some kind installed?  
if so then it would likely have been defined as the console, if not then 
it may be a matter of finding out which serial ports where set up as 
TTYs.  If the disk does in fact have AIX installed on it you will only 
see activity on ports that have a getty running on them.  Do you have 
anything like diagnostic diskette or original install  media you could 
boot from?  Either one of those would check all the serial ports for a 
terminal.  The RS/6000 is very picky about the serial connections and 
does want to see certain signals present before it will talk to a serial 
port.   Search for the manual "Adapters Devices and Cabling Information 
for Microchannel Systems" near the back there is a section about 
cabling  pay attention to the device called printer/terminal interposer 
there is a wiring diagram, it is effectively a null modem.    Another 
potentially useful manual is "Diagnostic Information for Microchannel 
Systems"  There are equivalent manuals for the early PCI systems as well 
substitute "Multibus" for Microchannel"

Paul.


On 2018-11-06 6:29 PM, Carlos E Murillo-Sanchez via cctalk wrote:
> Since RS6K systems have been mentioned recently, I thought I should 
> ask for advice.  I have a Powerserver 320H with 32MB of RAM, an 8-port 
> async EIA-232 adapter, a SCSI adapter and a 400MB HD.   No framebuffer 
> or keyboard; no LAN card.  Because of the last issue, I haven't tried 
> to do much with it.  I tried getting it to talk on the serial console 
> (Serial 1 connector in the back), following all the advice I found on 
> the net:  The pinout of the MODU serial connector, the null modem 
> cable with full handshake (also driving the DCD line in the 320H).  I 
> turn it on in service mode, and it spits a lot of LED codes, finds the 
> HD, spins it up and it apparently loads something (I suppose AIX) from 
> it.  But nothing is  ever sent out on the serial 1 port, or any other 
> serial port. I believe that during the POST it fails to initialize the 
> serial 1 and 2 ports, because the 320H's DTR and RTS lines are never 
> asserted (the ports in the async RS232 card do assert these on power 
> up, but they are equally silent). I made sure that the CTS, DSR and 
> DCD inputs of the 320H are being driven by the external terminal.
>
> I made a video of the LED codes during POST and found some problems; 
> here are the codes and their meaning:
>
> 120 BIST starting a CRC check on the 8752 EPROM.
> 122 BIST started a CRC check on the first 32K bytes of the OCS EPROM.
> 124 BIST started a CRC check on the OCS area of NVRAM.
> 130 BIST presence test started.
> 101 BIST started following reset.
> 153 BIST started ACLST test code.
> 154 BIST started AST test code.
> 100 BIST completed successfully; control was passed to IPL ROS.
> 211 IPL ROM CRC comparison error (irrecoverable). !!!!!!!
> 214 Power status register failed (irrecoverable). !!!!!!!
> 218 RAM POST is looking for good memory.
> 219 RAM POST bit map is being generated.
> 290 IOCC POST error (irrecoverable). !!!!!!!
> 291 Standard I/O POST running.
> 252 Attempting a Service mode IPL from 7012 DBA disk-attached
>          devices specified in IPL ROM Default Device List.
> 253 Attempting a Service mode IPL from SCSI-attached devices
>          specified in the IPL ROM Default Device List.
> 299 IPL ROM passed control to the loaded program code.
>
> 814 NVRAM being identified or configured.
>
> 538 The configuration manager is going to invoke a configuration
>          method.
> 813 Battery for time-of-day, NVRAM, and so on being identified or
>          configured, or system I/O control logic being identified or
>          configured.
> 538 The configuration manager is going to invoke a configuration
>          method.
> 520 Bus configuration running.
> 538 The configuration manager is going to invoke a configuration
>          method.
> 869 SCSI adapter being identified or configured.
> 538 The configuration manager is going to invoke a configuration
>          method.
> 954 400MB SCSI disk drive being identified or configured.
> 538 The configuration manager is going to invoke a configuration
>          method.
> 539 The configuration method has terminated, and control has
>          returned to the configuration manager.
> 551 IPL varyon is running.
> 553 IPL phase 1 is complete.
>
> The code 290 above is particularly worrysome, I think.  The NVRAM 
> battery reads 2.85 volts even after all these years. I reseated all of 
> the chips that are on bases, all of the cards, and connectors; there 
> was no change.  Any ideas on how to proceed?
>
> carlos.
>