Notes about NetBSD 8 on DS20L

[John Klos <john%ziaspace.com@localhost>]

Hi,

Several months ago I wrote about how I've seen lots of issues with disk 
corruption and multiprocessor lockups with DS20L and DS25 Alpha systems.

http://mail-index.netbsd.org/port-alpha/2017/07/13/msg000830.html

I can happily say that the systems are completely stable and happy so long 
as the motherboard ethernet is not used at all.

I got a system up and running on an IDE disk and had it compile for two 
months with a multiprocessing kernel without any problems. I'm now running 
with an SSD on the SCSI bus, also entirely happily.

There is one problem, though, that I can't seem to figure out. Sometimes, 
the machine boots in a state where the time drifts several seconds per 
minute and the times reported in top are "???". This doesn't seem to 
impede the system in any other way. I haven't yet figured out why it 
happens.

So, in case this helps anyone else, I'm putting it here: until someone 
fixes the problems with motherboard ethernet on these systems, just don't 
use motherboard ethernet :)

Thanks!
John