Re: Installation to SGI Indigo 2, boot?
I recently just installed on an Indy, so I might be able to help here.
However, the Indigo 2 has the additional complexity of having video
hardware that is not supported by Debian 3.0. This means that at the
very least you will need another computer with a serial port so you can
use the Indigo 2 serial console.
>From what I can tell, there are 3 installation approaches you can take.
1. Install completely over the internet. Directions for doing this on an
Indy can be found at
http://www.linux-debian.de/howto/debian-mips-woody-install.html. I'm
assuming the instruction are the same for an Indigo, but having never
done this on an Indigo I can't tell for sure. Note that besides having
an internet connection (which you say you don't have) you will also need
to setup a DHCP server from which you can netboot off of using bootp.
2. Install from a local ftp server. This is much like (1) above, except
rather than being on the internet, you copy all your Debian CD's to a
local ftp server. This basically means you need just 2 machines: your
Indigo 2 and the DHCP server which also supports ftp of the Debian CD
contents. This is the approach I took. You can get the DHCP
configuration setup info from (1) above, and I can give you a bit of
info on how to copy your CD's to the server and reference them during
the installation.
3. You can also do a CD install, but you can't boot the Debian 3.0
Install CD on an Indigo 2 (or any other SGI machine I believe).
Something to do with the CD not having an SGI volume header and the
kernel on the install CD not having ISO9660 CD support. There is a
solution to this which involves making a bootable CD. You can find info
in the recent mailing list thread "install from CD on an Indy" located
at
"http://lists.debian.org/debian-mips/2003/debian-mips-200303/threads.html";.
This is the approach I was going to take, but I had a bit of trouble
early on and opted for (2) instead.
In all 3 cases above, you'll need to use the serial console during the
installation. This is something I've never done. I think you set the
baud rate from the Indigo Command Monitor and you will also need to set
the PROM to use the serial console instead of by setting the "console"
environment variable, although it may default to the serial console if
no keyboard is plugged in (I recall reading this somewhere).
Hope this helps,
Chris
> <?xml:namespace prefix="v" /><?xml:namespace prefix="o" />
>
> We are a group of student in University of Baltimore, Maryland trying to install Linux for MIPS on SGI Indigo2 machines, currently
> running IRIX version 5.2 OS. The hardware specifications for these machines are as follows:
>
>
>
> Hard drive: 1.0 GB
>
> MIPS R4400
>
> 64 MB RAM
>
> CPU at 200 MHz
>
>
>
> These machines are not connected to a network, so we chose to install from CD, and downloaded the CD images from
> http://us.cdimage.debian.org/jigdo-area/3.0_r1/jigdo/mips/. We then followed the installation instructions that are available at
> http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/mips/install for this specific MIPS version. However, despite our heartiest effort, we could not
> boot the system from CD to start the installation process. We also prepared a boot disk as instructed in debian linux installation manuals
> but again we failed. We believe part of the problem is that we are not familiar enough with the IRIX operating system to deal with the
> problem neither we are very experienced UNIX system administrators but we need to get this project done and we are eager to learn
> more. So please help us to move a step further, to be more specific if you can tell us how to boot the system from either floppy or the
> CD that would help us a lot.
>
>
>
> We greatly appreciate your time and effort. Thanks in advance.
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