SUMMARY: 4/[34]90 does not support SCSI/SMD disk under 4.1.1!?!?!?!

[Dan Ehrlich]

In article <F.=tl9h3 at cs.psu.edu> I wrote:

Dan> While purusing the 4.1.1 release notes I came across the following on page 4:
Dan> 
Dan> "Sun's SPARCserver 390 and SPARCserver 490 systems support only IPI disks.
Dan>  The SPARCserver 470 and SPARCstation 470 support both IPI and SCSI disks.
Dan>  No other Sun systems support IPI disks."
Dan> 
Dan> This leads me to wonder:
Dan> 
Dan> 1) Does this mean that Sun has totaly abandoned the SMD line?
Dan> 2) Is Sun offering trade ins for my old SMD disks?
Dan> 3) Have they totally lost their minds?
Dan> 4) Is it really true that I can not hook a SCSI disk to a 4/[34]90?
Dan> 5) Has anyone with 4.1.1 tried hooking a SCSI disk up?
Dan> 6) Can anyone tell me if this latest bogosity from Sun is for real?

I was amazed at the speed with which the responses came in.  It seems I
may have been a bit hasty jumping all over Sun.  What I was able to
glean from the responses I received was:

1) There is a problem with mixing SMD and IPI controllers in 4/[34]90s.
   Sun is aware of the problem and working to fix it.  Rumors are that it
   will require a hardware fix to the CPU and possibly the backplane
   (ouch!).  Another rumor is that it can be corrected with software.
   Anyone from Sun care to comment on this?

2) You can indeed connect SCSI disks to a 4/[34]90 under 4.1.1, but Sun
   does not support this.  Sun is using 'support' in the literal sense,
   meaning it may work but don't ask Sun to fix any problems you may
   encounter while using it.

   Also, it would appear that Sun will tell you that if you do install
   a SCSI disk, you can not use it as a boot device.  One person who
   responded told me that is exactly what he is doing.  SunOS is
   installed on the SCSI disk and his data all reside on the IPI
   drives.

3) My salesrep said he would "Check into the question of trading in the
   SMD disks for IPIs".  I am not holding my breath.

So, while it probably could have been worded better in the release
notes it seems that the world is not coming to an end as we know it.
:-)

One other thing.  We have only received the release notes, no tapes
yet.  I am assuming that the tapes will be arriving within a week or
so.  Our regional SE got his on Monday of this week.  There would also
appear to no longer be any PSR or 4c specific releases (hurray!).  Does
anyone know if this is true?

Lastly, I would like to thank all of the people who took time to reply:

    phil at pex.eecs.nwu.edu (William LeFebvre)
    Kerien Fitzpatrick <fitz at frc2.frc.ri.cmu.edu>
    kevin at Corp.Sun.COM (Kevin Sheehan {Consulting Poster Child})
    fwp1 at Ra.MsState.Edu
    fed!m1rcd00 at uunet.uu.net
    larryt at Phoenix.ERC.MsState.Edu
    mp at allegra.tempo.nj.att.com (Mark Plotnick)
    lokkur!scs (Steve Simmons)
    lentz at ody1.uchicago.edu (Gordon Lentz)
    gallacch at pluto.crd.ge.com (MaryBeth Gallacchi)
    Barbara Fraser <byf at SEI.CMU.EDU>
    Don Hooper <hoop at khonshu.Colorado.EDU>
    girish at heawk1.gsfc.nasa.gov (Girish )
    ekrell at ulysses.att.com
    "Ric Anderson" <ric at cs.arizona.edu>
    pbg at cs.brown.edu (Peter Galvin)
    liz at cgdisis.cgd.ucar.EDU (Liz Coolbaugh)
    cliffs at sunrock.East.Sun.COM (Cliff Skolnick {Prof Services} Sun Rochester)
    zjat02 at trc.amoco.com (Jon A. Tankersley)
    "Manavendra K. Thakur" <thakur at zerkalo.harvard.edu>
    tsacas at ilog.ilog.fr (Stephane Tsacas)
    fwp1 at Ra.MsState.Edu
    stpeters at dawn.crd.ge.com (Dick St.Peters)
    daryl at dash.mitre.org (Daryl Crandall)
    sbradley at iWarp.intel.com (Seth Bradley)
    dan at breeze.bellcore.com (Daniel Strick)
    era at niwot.scd.ucar.EDU (Ed Arnold)
    Don Hooper <hoop at khonshu.Colorado.EDU>
--
Dan Ehrlich - Sr. Systems Programmer - Penn State Computer Science
<ehrlich at cs.psu.edu>/Voice: +1 814 863 1142/FAX: +1 814 865 3176