RedHat 7.2 on ES40 AlphaServer - Boot Problem - Help Solving

[William E Bohrer]

Hello!

 

Problem Description:  a previously stable installation of RedHat 7.2 on an
ES40 AlphaServer supporting the application Mathematica 5.0 (which runs
under Linux).  This computer has been in routine weekly use by me for the
purpose of solving various math problems of interest to me as a hobby and
also sometimes to support consulting work performed by me (business has been
poor of late).  This system has been operating successfully for at least
three years.

 

About 6 weeks ago I attempted the generation of some fancy graphics displays
to the screen, something I had not attempted previously.  Strange things,
with minor impact seemed to happen after that, slower booting is one symptom
and some commands that worked before did not seem to work as they had in the
past, but nothing of a work stopping nature.

 

Then, one day the system simply would not boot.

 

As a starting point I removed all the disks; installed spare disks and
reinstalled RedHat 7.2.  The system runs well with the reinstalled operating
system.  By "runs well" I mean that you can play games on it with flawless
and quick performance.  I have not attempted to reinstall the Mathematica
application yet.  Clearly not a hardware problem.  Somehow, I have damaged
the software while attempting the fancy plotting (color plots, lots of
curves, etc.) or at least so it appears.

 

The problem:  reinstalling Mathematica requires a payment to Wolfram
Research (not excessive, but I would just as soon avoid it if possible) and
I will lose electronic copies of the Notebooks developed on this system.  

There are paper copies of the work performed to date, however, it would be
nice to skip retyping those .nb files if possible.

 

The question is how to troubleshoot the damaged installation?  Philosophical
guidance at this point, please.  Please keep in mind that while I had
sufficient competence to follow directions and successfully install RedHat
7.2 on the ES40; that is not particularly a strong point with my computer
expertise.

 

Any and all suggestion gratefully accepted!

 

Thanks,

 

Bill

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