Date: Fri, 26 Sep 97 20:32:18 EST From: Dwight McKay (The Moderator) Reply-To: Suns-at-Home@net-kitchen.com Subject: Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #33 To: Suns-at-Home-List Suns-at-Home Digest Fri, 26 Sep 97 Volume 10 : Issue 33 Today's Topics: Are they worth it? Buying a Sparc for Home ELC Console on TTY NetBSD/BSDI Newbie questions OS Tape Copy Program Sun @ Home wannabe needs advice Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #31 (2 msgs) Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #32 (3 msgs) +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Submissions: suns-at-home \ | | Requests: suns-at-home-request > @net-kitchen.com | | Archives: suns-at-home-archives / | | WWW Archive access: http://www.net-kitchen.com/~sah | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 20 Sep 1997 12:21:14 -0400 (EDT) From: woods@most.weird.com (Greg A. Woods) Subject: Are they worth it? To: "John A. Plotecher" > Date: Fri, 12 Sep 1997 21:23:33 -0400 (EDT) > From: "John A. Plotecher" > Subject: Are they worth it? > To: Suns-at-Home Mailing List > > Is it a good idea to buy a used SPARCstation or would I be better off with > a PC clone? I don't play a lot of games, but I do like 3-d graphics and > such, programming, and Unix in general. What should I do (besides buying a > $60,000 Silicon Graphics workstation?) :-) I just saw someone advertise a 24-bit VME frame-buffer for a Sun-3 at $100 (USA). You can pick up a 3/260 or similar that would drive it for probably less than $200 and I populated mine with 128MB RAM for $500. Add some SCSI disks and away you go. Of course it draws nearly $50/month in electricity so has a limited lifetime in terms of cost/performance ratios. I'm driving a 3/60, a Decstation, and most recently an NCDhmx Xterm (and probably another NCD19c as soon as I can find the missing rodent) with it. With that much RAM it works exceptionally well for day-to-day use. It's a little short on CPU when it comes to running CPU intensive applications, at least in comparison to your average home PC of similar cost -- eg. compiles and XV and such run a lot slower than I'd like. What you might find both more efficient and useful, as well as a better learning experience, is to use a server and workstation combination. I.e. purchase a decent small server, be it a PC or something like a sparc but with as much CPU speed as you can afford, and then spend as much as you can afford on a used 24-bit high-end graphics workstation. Ideally you'll want identical architectures on both sides as this makes life oh-so-much simpler (but perhaps also less interesting). Run your workstation entirely diskless and make sure all your graphics processes (and even xterms) run on the server and use the workstation only as a display. Even a 10Mbps Ethernet can do wonders over what happens when you've got a compute intensive job losing cycles just to move those 24-bit pixels around on the screen. I hate to say this on a Sun oriented newsgroup, and I welcome any evidence to the contrary, but if your interest is in graphics the more modern SGI platforms probably come with better and more interesting graphics software, though they may be less useful in the sense that they don't work on just any Xterm. Of course you could go all the way to using a server and Xterm. In this case it probably doesn't matter what kind of architecture combinations you use. I don't know what a used NCD HMX-Pro24 is going for these days but it's got to be cheaper than even a used SGI workstation. I've seen a growing number of high-tech companies doing incredibly stupid things that end up making lots of high-end unix and X11 systems available on the used market for incredibly low $$$. (Many companies are for some unfathomable reason replacing easily managed Xterm desktops with full-blown disk-full Windows NT workstations!) -- Greg A. Woods +1 416 443-1734 VE3TCP Planix, Inc. ; Secrets of the Weird - ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 20 Sep 1997 12:03:20 -0700 (PDT) From: Curt Sampson Subject: Buying a Sparc for Home To: "John A. Plotecher" , I'm batching two replies here, since they're more or less on the same subject. > From: "John A. Plotecher" > Subject: Are they worth it? If you don't mind the lack of CPU power, Sparcs are fine. I generally buy them because it's the cheapest way to get a machine with a nice 17" colour monitor (I can buy an entire IPX system for considerably less than a new 17" multisync monitor) and because I really like the Sun 3 keyboards (which I use on my Sparc systems, too). If you're doing things like 3-d rendering, however, you may be much happer with a Pentium Pro system, which blows away any Sparc out there in terms of price/performance. > From: David Christensen > Subject: Sun @ Home wannabe needs advice > > Since I cant afford an Ultra or even thing of getting a 5, someone > offered me a Sparc LX w/32mb, 1gb, a 16", type 5, and a 2x cd for > $1300. That seems a bit on the expensive side to me. I'm sure you can do better than that if you look around. You definitely want to get more than 32 MB of RAM if you're going to do any serious work on the machine. I'd recommend 48, or even 64 MB. My experience with the LX is that in day-to-day use it's really about the speed of an IPX. This is probably due to the very small (4K/2K) cache in the LX as compared to the IPX (64K). So you may find it worthwhile to buy an IPX instead, if you can get one cheaper. cjs Curt Sampson cjs@portal.ca Info at http://www.portal.ca/ Internet Portal Services, Inc. `And malt does more than Milton can Vancouver, BC (604) 257-9400 To justify God's ways to man.' - ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Sep 1997 08:23:09 +0200 (MET DST) From: Lyndon Fletcher Subject: ELC Console on TTY To: Suns-at-Home@tigger.net-kitchen.com Hi all, I'm looking into using an ELC "screenless" ie working out a way to use the Motherboard without the screen. I was wondering if anyone had any experience using an ELC with a serial console, specifically does anyone know if the ELC's ROM monitor interpretes disconnection of the terminal as break? Foe sun machines that do interprete it in this way is it still possible to boot blind (ie without framebuffer or serial console?) Fletch - ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Sep 1997 18:12:07 -0400 (EDT) From: Mike Dugas Subject: NetBSD/BSDI To: suns-at-home@tigger.net-kitchen.com Anyone have any suggestions as to net-booting a Sun 3/60 to install NetBSD from a BSDI (i386) box? I can't seem to find anything that'll let me do it. And I'd love to get one of these 3/60s running to play with. Thanks! -- Mike Dugas mad@LunarWave.Net - ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 22 Sep 1997 13:36:02 -0500 From: "Frank Mango" Subject: Newbie questions To: "Suns-At-Home" Although I've used Suns at work for a few years, I've never gotten involved in the hardware side of things. I'm now setting up my first Sun at home, an ELC. I've been poring over all the reference materials I can find, but I have a couple of basic questions I'm having trouble with. [1] I don't see many external hard drives advertised _with case_. Would I be better off buying a shoebox and mounting the drive(s) in it? For that matter, is there any problem using newer SCSI-2 drives with this workstation? Or of using a mix of SCSI-1 and SCSI-2 devices? [2] I see SunOS 4.1.x on CD-ROM offered at wildly varying prices. Obviously some are lacking documentation, but what about the license? Is it separate? Does a shrinkwrapped CD-ROM include a single-user license? Is it transferable? I'm assuming Sun no longer markets SunOS 4.1.x...they've stopped supporting it, right? Yes, I know about Linux and NetBSD for SPARC - I may try one or both of them later, but for now I'd like to run SunOS. Frank Mango fmango@ix.netcom.com - ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 23 Sep 1997 09:54:00 -0400 From: Michael Thompson Subject: OS Tape Copy Program To: Suns-at-Home@tigger.net-kitchen.com A long time ago I picked up a program to copy OS tapes. The program made disk images of the files on a tape. I just had a disk crash. I recovered images of the OS for my Sun-2, but lost the tape copy program. I believe the program was tputil or tpcopy. Any idea where I might get a copy of the program again? Michael Thompson E-Mail: M_Thompson@IDS.net - ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 22 Sep 1997 10:59:26 -0700 (PDT) From: James Lockwood Subject: Sun @ Home wannabe needs advice To: suns-at-home@tigger.net-kitchen.com > I'm looking for some recommendations for a sparc at home. I do some devlopment in > Remedy, some database work, perl & tckl, and would also like to get rid of my > Intel box. IMHO this is quite high for an LX in this day and age. I see low-end Sparc 5's (70mhz) going for $700 for the bare base, add on 32mb of memory ($120), a 1gb drive ($100), a 16" monitor ($100), type 5 kbd & mouse ($50), a 2x Sun-bootable CD ($50), and a GX ($150) and you've got a complete system for under $1300. The SS5/70 is also fully twice as fast as the LX. Believe me, though, when I say you'll want more memory. 64mb is IMHO a minimum for any serious work (especially now that it's so cheap). For a LX/32mb/1gb/16" etc, I would expect to pay under $1k. Solaris 2.6 media is now available for only $100 (Sun TeleSales is one source) so this will be less expensive than you think (just try to get AIX 4 from IBM!). I bought a SS10 a couple of weeks ago as my "new" machine, and got the base for under $900 through a reseller (with a 120 day warranty). Now that 90MHz HyperSparc modules are under $200/ea, it's possible to build a fast SS10 for a low price (and you get a lot of expandability). At least now my wife can use the SS2 (64mb, running 2.6) instead of the aging 4/330 (40mb, running 2.4). As far as Applix goes, it's a nice package but too pricey. Other word processors like WordPerfect for Unix are considerably more affordable (especially if you can wrangle a college student into buying them with a discount). -James ============================================================================= James D. Lockwood The Getty Information Institute System Administrator 1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 300 james@gii.getty.edu Los Angeles, CA 90049-1680 - ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 20 Sep 1997 16:35:33 -0400 (EDT) From: Mike Frisch Subject: Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #31 To: Rick Leir EPS On Fri, 5 Sep 1997, Rick Leir EPS wrote: > Linux for Sparc is also a good option. Both of the free options will Don't forget about the sun4c related bugs in Sparc-Linux which cause it to be much slower than SunOS or NetBSD on _some_ (apparently not all 4c machines are affected. My IPC was...) machines. Mike. ====================================================================== Mike Frisch Email: mfrisch@saturn.tlug.org Northstar Technologies WWW: http://saturn.tlug.org/~mfrisch Newmarket, Ontario, CANADA ====================================================================== - ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 22 Sep 1997 10:46:36 -0700 (PDT) From: James Lockwood Subject: Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #31 To: suns-at-home@tigger.net-kitchen.com > > I have a SparcStation, running Sunos 4.1.3_U1. > > problems with the system sticking when X-Sessions finish. > > > Any ideas? Is it just a missing patch. This system is currently > > unpatched. I also have a problem with certain applications crashing > > OpenWindows, e.g. Cooltalk, when ran on a remote display e.g. Linux > > XFree86, the programs work fine. > > OpenWindows pre 2.5.3 is a NEWS server, and though it had its technical > merits, I would try to get away from it. 2.5.3, .4, .5 have X11R5. > > Instead of patching this, you might want to use NetBSD assuming you want > to stay with a BSD'ish flavour. > > Linux for Sparc is also a good option. Both of the free options will > bring you up to date with X11R6. Both might require a few days to install > if you have problems unless you have done it before (might be just an > hour!). Both have good support FAQ's on the net. > cheers -- Rick Another solution, probably the easiest, is to go grab source for MIT X11R6 and compile it. This is, after all, the X server that *BSD and Linux use by default. It's a good deal faster than the older servers bundled with SunOS, and includes support for the more common Sun framebuffers. Easy to compile & set up, and you don't modify your existing OS. -James ============================================================================= James D. Lockwood The Getty Information Institute System Administrator 1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 300 james@gii.getty.edu Los Angeles, CA 90049-1680 - ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 20 Sep 1997 11:16:27 +0200 (MET DST) From: lukas@design.de (Lukas Wunner) Subject: Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #32 To: Suns-at-Home@tigger.net-kitchen.com Hi, > I have the sunOS v4.1.1 installed and I plan to upgrade to SunOS v4.1.3U > which I got a good deal on the purchase price. I want to know what the > difference is between the version listed above and the SunOS v4.1.4. As far as I understand it, 4.1.3_U1 and 4.1.4 is basically the same except 4.1.4 has a lot of the patches already applied. So if you are able to get 4.1.3_U1 and have access to all the SunSolve patches (the ftp site only has the security-related and recommended patches AFAIK), you can manually achieve the same result as if you had bought 4.1.4. You may not even need most of the patches. It's basically just more convenient if you buy 4.1.4; e.g., the driver for the Zilog serial port chip on the desktop sparc machines had a bug which caused RTS/CTS to never work correctly. A patch has been released by Sun and an individual whose name I can't remember which more or less fixes that bug; with SunOS releases <= 4.1.3_U1, you have to apply that patch manually; with 4.1.4, it has already been applied to the base distribution. As for the differences between 4.1.1 and 4.1.4, I don't really know. > Is it > worth the time to get the more recent v4.1.4 or go all the way to Solaris > 2.5.1 or 2.6 to run on a Sparc 1 or maybe later on a Sparc 2? The question whether to go for SunOS 4.1.4 or Solaris 2.6 has been asked a lot here and in other mailing lists/newsgroups; my recommendation would be to go for SunOS 4.1.4 because a) IMO it's a lot more fun to work with a good ol' BSD-derived system, and b) the performance and the memory requirements are a lot better on the old machines with SunOS 4.x. YMMV, it's just my personal opinion. Cheers, Lukas. -- lukas wunner unix, internetworking and security engineer lukas@wunner.de LW26-RIPE http://www.wunner.de/~lukas/ "Shee, you guys are so unhip it's a wonder your bums don't fall off." - ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 20 Sep 1997 20:19:44 +1000 (EST) From: Rachel Polanskis Subject: Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #32 To: Suns-at-Home@tigger.net-kitchen.com > From: "John A. Plotecher" > Subject: Are they worth it? > > From: David Christensen > Subject: Sun @ Home wannabe needs advice Both these guys are asking the same thing! For the record, owning your own Sun is a prospect that is becoming more affordable for the average person. Even getting access to 24bit framebuffers is less of a problem now. I would not recommend a PC/pentium (mainly because I am a Sun bigot ;) ) over a Sun, unless you want to run the Gates Virus or Linux. If you really want to use a quality UNIX workstation, then a Sun is the best thing you can look for. I reckon a Sun would probably outlive any PC in general. The quality of the hardware is excellent. The fact that I have 2 IPCs here at home running Solaris 2.5.1 easily is testament to the long life of a Sun computer. Also, you can afford a SPARC 5 right now! I have seen full SS5 systems with everything except monitor for under $1000 US. This is even affordable to us over here in Australia, regardless of import costs and exchange rates. For example, I have just bought a SPARC20 with 128MB RAM 2GB drive and SX 24bit framebuffer (vsimm) for less than USD 3800 - around AUD 5000 for my own use as my new home computer ;) This is unbelievably good value, considering over here in Australia, you are *lucky* if anyone even knows what a SPARC20 is, and the only place you can get one is through a reseller, or Sun themselves. In fact Sun Australia were unable to provide me with a price, and only wanted to deal on a corporate level. The home buyer is out! I'd say to those of you with money to spare (and you don't need much) check out the comp.sys.sun.wanted newsgroup and find yourselves a bargain. FTR, I bought my SS20 through a reseller in the US, who was quite prepared to deal with me directly in Australia. He also has a very good reputation on the net, and I know a few aussies who have done a fair bit of business with him. I'm sure his prices are very good, although I have seen some a little cheaper, but a good reputation is valuable here. I have no attachment to him or his business other than I have bought goods from him, and reccomend "TK Technologies" very highly for the person wanting a good SPARC system on a small budget. Have a look at: http://www.execpc.com/~tkeidl/ for what I think are great bargains on SS5 and 10 boxes. He also has Solaris 2.6 for only USD95 (desktop version) Why buy a mass produced PC, that is poorly crafted when for the same money you can have a real workstation, upgradeable with parts you can still find nearly 10 years after being discontinued? Try that with a PC, where I had trouble upgrading cache RAM only 2 years after buying the computer new! just my 2kb ;) rachel -- Rachel Polanskis Kingswood, Greater Western Sydney, Australia grove@zeta.org.au http://www.zeta.org.au/~grove/grove.html r.polanskis@nepean.uws.edu.au http://www.nepean.uws.edu.au/ccd/ "Yow! Am I having fun yet?!" - John Howard^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Zippy the Pinhead - ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 21 Sep 1997 09:37:24 -0400 From: jfortes@saturn.net (Jonathan Fortes) Subject: Suns-at-Home Digest V10 #32 To: Suns-at-Home@tigger.net-kitchen.com >Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 14:57:22 -0400 >From: David Christensen >Subject: Sun @ Home wannabe needs advice $1300 for an LX seems high. Take a look on usenet(misc.forsale.computers.workstation, comp.sys.sun.wanted, etc.). You should be able to find a SS5 for around $1500 or so. - ------------------------------ End of Suns-at-Home Digest ******************************