Sun E250, NVRAM edit? (Serial Speeds, no console, etc)

[Ethan O'Toole]

> In theory console can be set to anything but its usually 9600/8/n/1 as 
> I’m sure you’ve tried.

Oh yea, I see the diags at that speed but everything else is noise. Memory 
is kind of hazy since it was 2008 era, but back then I had a Livingston 
Portmaster PM-25 hooked to all the colo hosts and I seem to recall this 
Sun box never working right. But the owner had it working over ethernet 
and didn't care.

I spent all weekend camping / diving so I didn't get back to it. But going 
to try to dump the contents of the NVRAM into a file to back it up. Then I 
will see if things are plain text or not. If not, maybe try all FF's so I 
have a working NVRAM to satisfy it. If it is text, there is definitely a 
checksum as I recall. But maybe I can just nuke out the serial console 
statement (graphics console disable), and then it will complain about a 
checksum mismatch but continue to go?

With the NVRAM out I get graphics console but can never type and it seems 
to halt.


> On some suns unplugging the serial cable is the equivalent of sending a break, so might be worth a try?
> Suns do require full hardware signalling on the console connection so might be worth checking.

Hmm I tried sending hard breaks via Putty / Hyperterminal. I was using an 
older Dell laptop with a physical RS232 port on it (not USB dongle.) But I 
will try that. Also I can't remember how the serial port A works with 
regards to the lights out management port? That serial data is somehow 
split between the two?

I will definitely mess with it this week. Motivation is high to get it 
working then find it and the ultra 5 a home.

Thanks for the reply! Will poke then report back.

 			- Ethan


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: Ethan O'Toole