jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu (Jay Maynard) (09/26/90)
With a lot of help from the net, especially Steve Bridges from NCR Wichita, I now have a shiny new :-) Tower XP which passes all the SUS diagnostics and will attempt to start the system install. It even - surprise, surprise - recognizes my Seagate ST4051, and formats it without complaint. (It says the drive type is SG51, which suggests it really knows what it's dealing with.) When I start the system installation process, it boots the tape fine, does the appropriate things to my hard disk, then begins creation of the install file system. It retensions and then verifies the tape; the verification ends with the message, "*** Error *** Corrupted or missing data on media. System installation terminated." Am I SOL? What do I do now? Hopefully, there's a solution out there that won't cost me lots of $...I only have $500 invested in the machine. This will become my personal system at home if I can ever get it running. Please email me at jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu....thanks in advance! -- Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL | Never ascribe to malice that which can jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu | adequately be explained by stupidity. "It's a hardware bug!" "It's a +--------------------------------------- software bug!" "It's two...two...two bugs in one!" - _Engineer's Rap_
nick@bilpin.UUCP (nick) (09/27/90)
In article <4124@lib.tmc.edu>, jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu (Jay Maynard) writes: > With a lot of help from the net, especially Steve Bridges from NCR Wichita, > I now have a shiny new :-) Tower XP which passes all the SUS diagnostics and > will attempt to start the system install. It even - surprise, surprise - > recognizes my Seagate ST4051, and formats it without complaint. (It says the > drive type is SG51, which suggests it really knows what it's dealing with.) > > When I start the system installation process, it boots the tape fine, does the > appropriate things to my hard disk, then begins creation of the install file > system. It retensions and then verifies the tape; the verification ends with > the message, "*** Error *** Corrupted or missing data on media. System > installation terminated." > > Am I SOL? What do I do now? Hopefully, there's a solution out there that won't > cost me lots of $...I only have $500 invested in the machine. This will become > my personal system at home if I can ever get it running. Please email me at > jmaynard@thesis1.hsch.utexas.edu....thanks in advance! > You could try unpacking the tape and maybe patching and/or creating a new one. NCR install format tapes have the format: <512b index> <cpio archive 1> .. <cpio archive n> <512b trailer> I have included a small script at the end of this posting for reading the tapes. You will be asked to supply the no rewind on open/close tape device which should be '/dev/nnrtp' or '/dev/rstp/0nn'. Oncle you have the files on disk you can check to see if you can unpack them. Additionally I would suggest finding out which install script is generating the message that you are seeing. I can't tell you I'm afraid because I am running SVR3, however all you have to do is grep for 'Corrupted or missing data on media' in '/menu/script/*' and step through the code. This should give you a good idea of what is going on. I seem to remember that NCR used to security stamp tapes in the XP and 32/600 days, so it would be a good idea to check if this is the case. Again looking at the actual install script should point the way. If memory serves the security could be got round in one of two ways. Either read in the tape and remove the last file (I think - it was a long time ago !), or simply comment out the call to the security check program from the install script, again I think it was '/menu/obj/secchk.o' or someting like that. Here is the script Good luck Nick -------------------------------CUT HERE--------------------------------------- echo "\n\n\nUNPACK Multi-file cpio archives" echo "Enter full path name for the no rewind tape device : \c" read tape num=1 echo "\nREADING File : \c" while dd if=$tape bs=800k of=file$num 1>/dev/null 2>&1 do num=`expr $num + 1` echo "\b$num\c" done while true do echo "\nThe following cpio archives are available:\n\n" file file* echo "\nWhich one to unpack/list (X cancels) ? [<num>|X] \c" read num case $num in X|x) echo Cancelled exit 0 ;; *) olddir=`pwd` echo "List/Unpack 'file$num' ? [l/u] \c " read answer case $answer in U|u) mkdir File$num cd File$num echo "Unpacking file: file$num ...\n" sleep 2 cpio -icvdlmuB < file$num cd $olddir L|l) echo "The following files are in: file$num ...\n" sleep 2 echo "\n\n**************************** File$num *************************\n\n" cpio -icvtB < file$num 2> /dev/null echo "\n\n**************************** File$num *************************\n\n" ;; *) echo Invalid response ! ;; esac ;; esac done -- _______________________________________________________________________________ Nick Price SRL Data || Apple link : UK0001 1 Perren Street London NW5 3ED || UUCP : nick@bilpin.uucp Phone: +44 1 485 6665 || Path : nick@bilpin.co.uk
greg@tcnz2.tcnz.co.nz (Greg Calkin) (09/29/90)
Before rebuilding your tape, clean your tape heads and try the tape on
another box, if possible. May also be a head alignment problem (I have had
this several times). If another machine can read it, copy the tape on it
or get an engineer to check you alignments
"that what a lady looks for in her lover
is quarks, strangeness and charm" Hawkwind
--
Greg Calkin, Systems Engineer {include "sexual_hard_sell"} (greg@tcnz.co.nz)
Thomas Cook N.Z. Limited, PO Box 24, Auckland CPO, New Zealand, Ph (09)-793920
Disclaimer : Would you buy a used car from someone with these opinions ?