Ok, I've got this 2100 here that I'm installing (or attempting to).

It's a 2100 w/ 16Mb + an RZ23 at id0 + id1&2=SUN0207 (a Maxtor ~200Mb).

I got my snapshot from ftp.netbsd.org:/pub/NetBSD/arch/pmax/snapshot,
with the nfsnetbsd.ecoff from the directory above. 

I'm netbooting via 10base-2 from a NetBSD/alpha box. I'm booting with
> boot -f tftp()

It sees the bootp server I have running and it loads the kernel. I'm using
the nfsnetbsd.ecoff kernel because it is under a meg in size. One thing
it prints in startup is:
boot device: <unknown>

My root is NFS mounted. My /usr will be as well (until the boot disk is
intact). 

I bring it up in single-user mode and attempt to ping the boot server.
# ping 10.0.0.9
PING 10.0.0.9 (10.0.0.9): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 10.0.0.9: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=7.813 ms
ping: failed to clear cached route: Network is unreachable.

Funny, this worked earlier today and all I did is reboot.

Yet I'm still running and accessing the NFS root. ???

Also, earlier when I had it working I had /usr mounted. I was using
disklabel to label the disk. I accidently labeled drive 0 as an rz25
instead of rz23. Now I can't relabel it will a correct label due to
it complaining that an open partition would move or shrink. Except
that I'm not accessing the disk -- there shouldn't be any open
partitions.

I am unable to dd the disks, I'm told that the disks are read-only
filesystems (two of them don't even have labels!). 

So my problems are 1) can't ping or NFS mount /usr and 2) can't fix
disklabel.

Ideas?

Oh, and about the diagram describing how to convert a DECstation to a
DECsystem: it won't work on my machine.

I have monochrome video but I don't seem to have a video "board". I have
this thing that looks like a VSIMM of some sort. If I remove it then
the machine fails it's self tests before it ever touches the console
(tty). The mouse loopback seems to work. So I'm stuck with a big honking
monitor on my machine. *groan* As if my room wasn't small enough (and
it's actually pretty large considering). 

Anybody ever heard of a 2100 that couldn't become a DECsystem?
--
XCOMM Kevin P. Neal, Junior, Comp. Sci.     -   House of Retrocomputing
XCOMM  mailto:kpneal@pobox.com              -   http://www.pobox.com/~kpn/
XCOMM  kpneal@eos.ncsu.edu              Spoken by Keir Finlow-Bates:
XCOMM "Good grief, I've just noticed I've typed in a rant. Sorry chaps!"