On Fri, 14 Aug 1998, Anders Dinsen wrote:

> I use a serial console on my NetBSD box, but the console is another
> pc, and I have discovered that NetBSD cannot boot if the pc is turned
> off and that the kernel crashes if the console pc is turned off while
> NetBSD is running.

Yep. It will.

One of the features of serial console is that when a BREAK condition (ten
or more consecutive zero bits I believe) is asserted, it drops you into
the debugger. It's a serial-mode panic switch.

Chances are that when the other PC's off, the line looks like a continuous
stream of zeros, so you get the debugger.

Comment out the call to the debugger on line 1814 of
src/sys/dev/ic/com.c, or just don't compile in DDB. :-)

Take care,

Bill