on 11/15/00 12:07 PM, Chuck McManis at cmcmanis@mcmanis.com wrote something
like:

> Hello everyone, I seem to have been given a "vax" which turned out to be a
> DECStation 5000/260. I'm going to see if I can get NetBSD up on it but
> since I have no experience using these things I need to know a couple of
> newbie kind of things:

    I'll take it if you don't want it!!! You have your hands on the fastest
DEC MIPS box made. A 60MHz R4400 with a MB or so of L2 cache.

    The system model page and peripheral info is at
http://www.netbsd.org/Ports/pmax => Model Support page.

> 1) How do I configure it for serial console and where do I plug in?

    Easiest way to do it is to remove the frame buffer if one is installed.
It will then default to the RS-232C Port 3. Similar to vax, 9600-N-8-1
XON/XOFF with DTR/DSR handshake should get you going fine. The SCCs should
be able to handle 38400 if needed. To make the system stay a serial console
you need to type setenv console s <CR> at the >> prompt. Then you can
reinstall the frame buffer if one was in there earlier.

> 2) How do I determine the frame buffer it has installed?

    Look on the three slots in the rear bulkhead. If you see PMAGx-x or
PMAG-x, that is a frame buffer. PMAZ-X is a second SCSI controller, PMAD-A
is a second NIC. Detailed specs are on the model support page mentioned
above

> 3) Is there an external marking on the memory and/or what is the prom
> command to identify memory (sho mem?)

    Yes; but no, the PROM is nothing like the Vaxen despite the >> prompt.
"?" or help (forget which) will get you started. the command to see the
memory would be cnfg 3 <CR> where the number is the TurboChannel slot that
the device lives at. Just typing cnfg <CR> will list all the TurboChannel
devices installed and what slots they are in. Then you can cnfg X and see
more info on what it is. Typing test at the >> will do a system test. The
RAM chips are 40-bit ECC, so if you have a few MB it'll go through the test
quickly, but if you have the full 480MB it could take anywhere from 1-3
hours for a single cycle of the test. To my knowledge there is no way to
tell which memory module is which, as they don't carry anything but the DEC
54xxxx... part number. Easiest thing to do is cnfg 3 and it'll tell you what
size the modules are. (Have to be all 8 or all 32, no intermixing [yet].)

    Hope that starts you off. I'll gladly buy it off you if you don't need
it :-)



    Chris