questions about alpha

[Alex Deucher]

On Fri, 3 Dec 2004 17:51:10 -0500, Jay Estabrook <jay.estabrook at hp.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 03, 2004 at 04:42:45PM -0500, Alex Deucher wrote:
> > I just picked up an old alphastation 500 on ebay and I'd like to
> > install gentoo on it.  I've read over the handbook, but I have a few
> > questions.
> >
> > - ecu seems to be required to enable the sound card on AS500.  Is that
> > an srm utility, an external utility, or something I run from linux?
> 
> ECU should not be needed for use of the card under Linux; it is really
> needed only for Tru64.
> 
> > - has anyone tried alphacore on AS500?
> 
> Yes, and was successful, using a Permedia-2 based card (ELSA Gloria
> Synergy 8).
> 
> > - I'd like mess around with xorg on alpha.  I'm running srm 6.7-2 and
> > it won't post my pci radeon 9000, so for the time being I have an old
> > s3virge in there.  does anyone have any experience with the newer srm
> > (7.2) and radeon cards?  I've heard arc/alphabios is better at posting
> > video cards.  Is there any truth to that?  Also I seem to recall
> > having read somewhere that milo or aboot will also post video cards is
> > srm can't.  Is this true?
> 
> MILO will indeed POST more cards than the BIOS emulation in that old SRM.
> I do NOT believe you'll have better luck with the later SRM version.
> 
> If you really want to run 3D on a Radeon in there, I suggest you use
> ARC/AlphaBIOS and MILO to do so; I've had luck doing just that on an
> AS500. Use the MILO for XLT.

ARC posts the radeon fine, however I couldn't get MILO to load off the
floppy so I switched srm and installed linux, however, I taylored my
install to ARC so that I could switch after I got installed.  I then
copied linload.exe and an XLT milo image to the first FAT partition.
Now, when I try to boot via MILO, MILO loads then system hangs at:
Swapping to Palcode at 0x0

I've seem several posts from other people with similar problems, but
no resolution.  seems like it may be related to MILO's failure to post
the video card. perhaps a MILO image with DEC's bios emu code would
work better. any one know of any MILO images with that code or images
in general that might work better with newer video cards?  If that's
not the issue, then any other ideas?

Thanks so much for your help.

Alex

> 
> > - How does one upgrade the srm?  I've not be able to find any
> > particularly clear instructions anywhere.  DEC/Compaq/HP's
> > instructions seem to be about all there are and they are pretty vague.
> >  They all talk about some firmware/sdk cdrom that you can boot to
> > upgrade.  I haven't been able to find such a disc anywhere.  Can I
> > just burn the fireware update .exe files to cdrom, or is some special
> > preparation required?
> 
> The latest FW files are on ftp.digital.com. I'd try either the BOOTP
> method or the floppy method. Note that with the latter, the directions
> have to be "translated" from Tru64 to Linux... :-)
> 
> Apparently the latest (V6.9) CD ISO is not yet available. Regardless,
> you wouldn't have found the AS500 FW on there, it has long been left
> off.
> 
> Good luck.
> 
>  --Jay++
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------------
> Jay A Estabrook                            HPTC - LINUX support
> Hewlett-Packard Company - ZKO2-3/N30       (603) 884-0301
> 110 Spit Brook Road, Nashua NH 03062       Jay.Estabrook at hp.com
> ---------------------------------------------------------------
>