console login without CDs

[dsr at tao.merseine.nu]

On Fri, Dec 20, 2002 at 02:49:01PM -0500, Wizard wrote:
> Ok, I just had someone hand me an Alpha 2100 4/233 without any CDs (or
> anything other than the box, for that matter). I have a few questions:
> 1.> Are the peripherals standard (keyboard, monitor, mouse)? The ports look
> standard. I can't get the Compaq/HP sites serial# search to work, so I
> haven't been able to get the info from there.

Yup. This was a fairly nice machine, in its day.

> 2.> It has what looks like a standard IEC cord connector on the PS, but
> there is no sticker (it may have been peeled - there are remnants). Any way
> to tell if this is 120VAC other that trial and error (it's the 'error' I'm
> worried about)?

If it shipped in the US, it is definitely 120VAC.

> 3.> I'll need to boot single user, with no root password. Can I even do this
> without the CD? I'm guessing that it's running OSF/1, but I did notice that
> the filesys is listed on the outside of the box as BSDsomething, so I could
> be wrong.

BSD Fast Filesystem is one of the choices for OSF/1 / Digital UNIX. You
can boot single user from the BIOS, which is more Sun-like than PC-like.

You can get the latest firmware from
http://ftp.digital.com/pub/DEC/Alpha/firmware/

I recommend replacing the OS with Debian/Alpha. 
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/alpha/install

You can put any old SCSI CD-ROM drive on it.


> 4.> It comes with 3 SCSI RZ28M-VA drives. Does anyone know what size these
> are?

Those are 2.1GB, 5400RPM, narrow SCSI. 


-- 
Network engineer looking for work in Boston area.
Resume at http://tao.merseine.nu/~dsr/