john@wa3wbu.UUCP (John Gayman) (10/03/88)
I just received in the mail the announcement of availability for Sys V/AT 2.4. It looks very nice. Has anyone perhaps received this update and can comment on it ? Im running 2.3U with the HoneyDanber uucp and Everex tape drive and it works *VERY* solid. I would hope that 2.4 works equally as well but would like to hear from someone running it. John -- John Gayman, WA3WBU | UUCP: uunet!wa3wbu!john 1869 Valley Rd. | ARPA: john@wa3wbu.uu.net Marysville, PA 17053 | Packet: WA3WBU @ AK3P
fyl@ssc.UUCP (Phil Hughes) (10/06/88)
In article <645@wa3wbu.UUCP>, john@wa3wbu.UUCP (John Gayman) writes: > I just received in the mail the announcement of availability for > Sys V/AT 2.4. It looks very nice. Has anyone perhaps received this > update and can comment on it ? Im running 2.3U with the HoneyDanber > uucp and Everex tape drive and it works *VERY* solid. I would hope > that 2.4 works equally as well but would like to hear from someone > running it. I have installed 2.4 and it works. That's the good news. I was running HoneyDanber uucp and still am -- all ok. I installed it to get the Everex support. First complaint, no documentation on configuring the Everex controller, no documentation on what all the nodes are for the Everex tape, no documentation on the strm program. The final, and most important, problem is whenever I do tape I/O anything with a lower priority interrupt (printer, floppy), at best, stops for a while. Most of the time either the tape or the printer/floppy hangs forever and a reboot is necessary. I cannot say for sure that I have everything installed correctly as I have no documentation on how to do it but I am pretty good at guessing. I have sent Microport a copy of my 'master' file and comments about the problems. I am waiting for an answer. -- Phil Hughes, SSC, Inc. P.O. Box 55549, Seattle, WA 98155 (206)FOR-UNIX uw-beaver!tikal!ssc!fyl or uunet!pilchuck!ssc!fyl or attmail!ssc!fyl
sjrudek@sactoh0.UUCP (Steve J. Rudek) (10/08/88)
In article <645@wa3wbu.UUCP>, john@wa3wbu.UUCP (John Gayman) writes: > > update and can comment on it ? Im running 2.3U with the HoneyDanber > uucp and Everex tape drive and it works *VERY* solid. I would hope To: pacbell!ames!ucsd!ucsdhub!esosun!seismo!uunet!wa3wbu!john Subject: Re: Sys V/AT 2.4 References: <645@wa3wbu.UUCP> I find your statement that you have found 2.3U "*VERY* solid" very intriguing; I've found it to be abysmally buggy! Didn't you have obvious problems with vi and terminfo? Doesn't your system do a "double panic" and die if ANYONE on your system compiles and runs the following program? /*------------------------*/ #include <stdio.h> int x; main () { x = 42; printf("%f", x); } /*------------------------*/ I use V/AT to run a public access bbs with two call-in modems. During the year and a half I've owned V/AT I've had regular (daily) , "double panics" which kill the system and sometimes destroy large sections of the file system. Because the problem is so fatal and so obvious, I am nonplussed when I encounter a happy V/AT customer. I'm new to the net. Quite likely, this subject has been beaten to death; in that case, perhaps someone could email me a summary of conclusions. When call-in users disconnect from my system (possibly this only occurs when they simply hangup without an orderly logout) my modem will often get hung. Once the modem hangs the game is over; any attempt to reset the modem, respawn the getty or shutdown the system will "double panic" the system and produce file damage. For the first year and a half that I had V/AT microport (including, of course, my initial 90 day period when I had an option of returning the product as defective) Microport denied any knowledge of such a bug in their software; they repeatedly told me it was a problem in my hardware. As a result, I spent a LOT of money and --piece by piece-- replaced practically every component of the system. Two months ago, they acknowledged a problem and told me I could download a fix from their bbs (mind you, they didn't send me a fix -- even though I had an upgrade contract which supposedly called for them to issue periodic "bug fixes"). Well, I've downloaded the "fix" and it doesn't fix anything. This is a serious question and I seriously would like a response: Does ANYONE out there have a way to stop the serial port panics? If I could just stop the continual serial port problems I could live with the other problems. Would buying a "smart" serial port card solve the difficulty? Since Microport's "bug fix" doesn't appear to work I am not hopeful the the 2.4 release will signal an end to my difficulty. -- ############################################################# # PRIVATE # Serving The State Capitol # # PARKING # Of California: sactoh0 # #############################################################
ruiu@dragos.UUCP (dragos) (10/10/88)
[the discussion is about SV/AT 2.3 reliability]
I would like to point out that my versions of 2.3 are *VERY* solid.
I've got one system here with a bbs that I'm typing on right now.
It has two drives and still has managed to stay up for 60 days.
I've got another system with 2.3U with three people using it as a front
end for a Varityper Photo-Typesetter with no complaints other than I wish I
had man pages.
I have found uPort to be sometimes swamped with complaints, and their
sales people are a little mis-informed, but they seem to try harder and
listen more than most software companies.
--
Dragos Ruiu ruiu@dragos.UUCP "We will probably never announce a processor
...alberta!dragos!ruiu as a RISC processor."-Ken Olsen ...wanna bet?john@wa3wbu.UUCP (John Gayman) (10/14/88)
In article <450@sactoh0.UUCP>, sjrudek@sactoh0.UUCP (Steve J. Rudek) writes: > In article <645@wa3wbu.UUCP>, john@wa3wbu.UUCP (John Gayman) writes: > > > > update and can comment on it ? Im running 2.3U with the HoneyDanber > > uucp and Everex tape drive and it works *VERY* solid. I would hope > I find your statement that you have found 2.3U "*VERY* solid" very > intriguing; I've found it to be abysmally buggy! Didn't you I must maintain that my 2.3U has been very solid. My configuration consists on a CompuAdd Standard-286 (8 Mhz) with a 8-port Digiboard (dumb), 3MB of memory, 71MB Miniscribe, 40MB CDC and Everex tape backup. I also have two modems, a Telebit trailblaser on one port and a Hayes SM240 on another port. Along with this a have two "radio" modems running at 1200 baud and a 4800 baud "slip" link to another machine. (I shouldn't say this) but I havn't had any panics in over 9 months. (I'll regret saying that) :-) The system runs 24 hours/day and feeds News to three other sites. I run two tape backups per week and have never had any problems. Also, I can call out on my Hayes at 2400 and dial into the TB+ and actually run 2400 baud from my own system with no troubles. I have even transferred files to myself as a test. Like I said, it's been very solid for me. I must admit that I can't do much else "serially" when the TB+ is taking a News feed at 9600 baud. I can run the console but another modem causes delays. > have obvious problems with vi and terminfo? Doesn't your system > do a "double panic" and die if ANYONE on your system compiles and runs > the following program? > > /*------------------------*/ > #include <stdio.h> > int x; > main () > { > x = 42; > printf("%f", x); > } > /*------------------------*/ > I tried this program and it didnt do anything bad. It compiled okay and when run, it just gives me the cursor back. Did I do something wrong ? I'm not much of a C-guru so I may not be much help here. > I use V/AT to run a public access bbs with two call-in modems. > During the year and a half I've owned V/AT I've had regular (daily) > , "double panics" which kill the system and sometimes destroy large > sections of the file system. Because the problem is so fatal and [some text deleted] > conclusions. When call-in users disconnect from my system (possibly > this only occurs when they simply hangup without an orderly logout) > my modem will often get hung. Once the modem hangs the game is over; > I did have a similar problem way back when in that if a dialin user at 300 baud just hung-up without logging off the modem would hang. If I tried to clear the modem, the system would panic with the dreaded rmsd [sic] panic. I recieved a new asy.o from Microport that corrected this problem. > This is a serious question and I seriously would like a response: > Does ANYONE out there have a way to stop the serial port panics? > If I could just stop the continual serial port problems I could > live with the other problems. Would buying a "smart" serial port > card solve the difficulty? I wish I could offer some suggestions here. I have been very confused by numerous postings where guys can't even get 1200 baud to work properly and I can run concurrent 2400 baud and as many 1200 baud as I can bring up. I can also be running my TCP/IP slip link at 4800 baud and still be feeding News at 2400. I guess it's just dumb luck. :-) I sure havn't done any tweaking to the system. I am also exploring the possibility of an intelligent card. This should eliminate the problem of running the TB+ at 9600 baud while other ports are active. I'm hoping that 2.4 is at least as good as 2.3 is for me. The only thing I'm still unsure of is the Tape drive support. Mine worked right off but I understand others had trouble with controllers from Everex that possibly has revised ROMS. John -- John Gayman, WA3WBU | UUCP: uunet!wa3wbu!john 1869 Valley Rd. | ARPA: john@wa3wbu.uu.net Marysville, PA 17053 | Packet: WA3WBU @ AK3P