hello all!

i'm trying to install netbsd1.4 on an old iicx and ran into the
#5-problem in a way not described in any faq...

i did a first installation on an outboard scsi disk - an old dec 1gb
disk - and everything went fine. then i downloaded the x-sets and tried
installing them - crash. unfortunately i dowloaded them as text and not
as binary, my bad, what the hell.

seeing as the disk was a mess, i repartitioned it with the ontrack-tool,
as i had done for the first try, fired up the installer and did a few
sets - without problems - until bedtime. the next morning i wanted to
add the remaining sets, started up the mac, turned on the hard disk and
started the netbsd-install tool. when asked to select the disk, the
outboard showed up, i selected it, hit return, and the little
term-screen filled-up with error #5 - messages and the program halted,
waiting for a retrun. 

not being in a hurry, i decided to just reformat and start over, yet the
mkfs-tool has the same problem: i select the disk, it spits out about 5
read errors (#5) and hangs. the ontrack-tool tells me the disk isn't
ready and won't let me repartition.

i've tried a number of things: turning on the disk before the mac and
the other way around, reseting the scsi bus, parking the disks and
restarting...

the disk itself seems to have no problems, i can fire it up on an old
decstation (it can't read the partition table though) and it has been
working fine for years (literaly).

i'm at a loss, any help welcome....

thanks in advance

pedro gonnet
pgonnet@student.ethz.ch