gerson@parc.xerox.com (Dan Gerson) (07/19/90)
I just got my A/UX 2.0 upgrade, but I can't seem to get it installed. First off, I was foolish enough to order the floppy disks, and indeed, that is what I got. About 32 floppy disks, without a scrap of documentation; not even a README file! No manuals, nothing. The only paper in the box was the product contents list, which essentially was just the floppies. Now, the first floppy in the bundle was a MacOS floppy with a version of SASH setup to boot from another floppy containing a root directory. Booting this floppy rc's an initialization dialog, which goes ahead and checks my partitions, creates a file system, and copies over some "critical" files into the HD root fs. However, it then says to run read_disk in the MacPartition (by which I assume it means a SASH command), which in essence runs either a SASH tar or cpio program. However, although the SASH program describes these commands in its help command, guess what, there are no such programs around. The floppy distribution did not include any SASH commands other than launch. And the A/UX 1.1.1 version I am upgrading from does not have cpio or tar commands. So, instead, I was able to boot the old 1.1.1 version, and run cpio there to read in the third floppy containing the kernel. Unfortunately, v1.1.1 can't read v2.0 file systems (at least I couldn't mount it although I could mount the floppies), but I was able to copy the xunix kernel from the 1.1.1 disk to the 2.0 disk using the old SASH cp command from 1.1.1. Great. However, the next step is supposed to be booting from the HD disk, which has a rc file to run the second initialization step. Unfortunately, trying to boot the system now reads the kernel correctly in launch, but then just clears the screen and hangs forever. I tried various things, such as running kconfig to setup various parameters, and checking the disk partitions using dp, but everything looks fine, and yields the same result when I try to boot. If I get creative, and try launch -n -r -m -f floppykernel to try to get it to use the kernel on the Mac partition, but still using the HD root, it complains that there is no valid root partition. However, looking at the BZB entry in the partition map does indeed show that the root/usr partition is truely a root/usr partition. At least this does clear the screen and bring up a console window. This is all on a MacII with a PMMU installed which runs A/UX 1.1.1 just fine. I've tried using an unmodified apple HD SC Setup on an Apple 40MB quantum drive (yes, that is supported in the installation script), and on a 100MB CMS drive (CONNER) using a patched HD SC Setup. Anyone else succeed using a floppy upgrade kit? I have a call into Businessland corporate sales, who is in turn calling Apple, but there was not even any Apple tech support info listed, and Businessland has not come up with any answers yet. By the way, the problem is not due to the startsysrc or whatever it is called; I created one which simply creates a file letting me know whether it got that far, but it doesn't. This indicates that it is hanging prior to running the rc script, and that the problem isn't that it is simply using a serial line or something as the console. Also, I don't think the problem is with autoconfig, since I've tried launching with both the -n and the -a flags. Any clues?
gentner@Apple.COM (Don Gentner) (07/19/90)
In article <GERSON.90Jul18230015@dupin.parc.xerox.com> gerson@parc.xerox.com (Dan Gerson) writes: >I just got my A/UX 2.0 upgrade, but I can't seem to get it installed. >First off, I was foolish enough to order the floppy disks, and indeed, >that is what I got. About 32 floppy disks, without a scrap of documentation; >not even a README file! No manuals, nothing. Wow! I admire your courage in trying to install 2.0 without any documentation at all. You are missing an entire box: The A/UX Accessory Kit. It should be included with all versions of A/UX 2.0. The A/UX Accessory Kit includes "A/UX Installation Guide" (that should be a big help :-)), "A/UX Essentials", "Setting Up Accounts and Peripherals for A/UX" and "Road Map to A/UX". It's time to talk to your dealer if you haven't received these yet. Don - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Don Gentner email: gentner@apple.com Apple Computer telephone: 408 974-5198 10440 Bubb Rd, MS: 58A fax: 408 974-0892 Cupertino, CA 95014 AppleLink: GENTNER