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alphaserver 400 console grief

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danm

Junior Member
Can anyone assist me. I was trying to install freebsd alpha on the above alphaserver. Chose the wrong option and ended up at the srm console. I don't know how to get back to the main bios on bootup. all I get is >>>
I'm not versed in _nix commands and can't find mucn on the compaq/dec site sto get me over this hump. Im trying to get a webserver up for my kids school , don't particularly want to use NT
 
EDIT: Just looked where I told you to look and didnt see any information about it. Not familiar with Alpha hardware really so Im looking to see what I can find 😛

The >>> is probably a prompt. Try typing ? or help to see if those do anything 😛
 
The command I was looking for was "set os_type nt" ( there is a list if you don't get the spelling correct) . It then returns you to a more recognizable boot screen, from which I think I can proceed
 
Oh, why would you specify nt as the OS? Anyhow, the only relevant thing I found was a boot command (similar to sparc I guess).
 
SRM is the normal way to boot unix on an Alpha, I know Linux has milo for booting from AlphaBIOS (really made for Alpha NT) but I didn't think FreeBSD had anything like it.

To boot from the CD from the SRM 3 carrot prompt ('>>>') type 'show devices' and it should list all the disks, cdroms, etc. Then type 'boot dka4' replacing dka4 with whatever the CDROM is, I used dka4 as the example because that was the CDROM on my AlphaServer 1000A.

Depending on whether or not SRM setup to autoboot already you may need to set a few variables in SRM, I don't have them right in front of me but I can get them if you need them.
 
I actually got that far with the boot sequence but my knowledge of the various " set " commands is limited. I would type" boot dka4" and it would try to boot off the cd but get stuck after a few lines . and refuse further input. I'm still trying to get the hang of this.
 
My theory is that it returns you to a similar interface to the previous OS in the case of a _nix interface all you get is a prompt in the case of NT you get a verbose prompt. When you use the set command it saves the input and the next power up it returns you to the type of OS prompt that you have chosen , Thanks for you help Guys
 
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