While fooling around with a new IDE controller (see my recent messages to
port-i386 if you're interested), I tried booting a slightly dated -current
kernel.

It actually seemed to come up and run for a bit (though I'm pretty
convinced that the controller has issues).  However, two odd things
happened:

(a) During the boot, it made some comment about an unrecognized WSCONS
option.  (This was just after the 4 virtual terminals are added).  I don't
remember the exact message, but...I don't think that I've seen it before,
and suspect that it was related to (b):

(b) I could not log in locally.  I tried on the ttyE0, and then flipped to
another console.  It prompts for a login, but then skips the password
prompt and asks for another login.  This is very weird.  On the OTHER
HAND, I can ssh into the machine and login normally.  (Well, I could.
While running bonnie++, the computer dropped an interrupt.  I think that
it's dead until I cycle the power---but it didn't actually *say* that it
was in a panic, it just dropped an interrupt.)


I'm not so worried about (a), except as it relates to (b).

(b) is odd, though.  What could cause NetBSD to refuse local logins?  It
worked quite well on the previous boot; the only change was to boot with
-current.  -current was probably from early January at the latest, maybe
early December at the earliest.  (I can't check readily, as the machine is
currently hung.  Since it takes forever to fsck that thing, and it's not
100% clear that it won't retry the lost interrupt, I'm going to let it
wait a bit longer before I cycle the power...(^&)  The system normally
runs 1.5.2.


(P.S., please keep me in the Cc: list for replies.  I read the list via
the web, and the archives always lag by a certain amount...sometimes more
than others.  (^&)


  ``I probably don't know what I'm talking about.'' --rauch@math.rice.edu