I did succeed in booting multi-user using the serial console after taking
Allen's (somewhat
 vague for a neophyte) hint about disabling /dev/ttye0 and enabling /dev/tty00.

I'm not, however, entirely sure I did it the right way. I've looked into
all the NetBSD
and MacBSD web pages I can find but I can't find an answer. Here's what I
did, anyway:

I changed serval lines in  /etc/ttys from this:

------

# Define console that we actually run getty on
ttye0 "/usr/libexec/getty Pc" vt220 on secure
.
.
.
#Hardwired lines are marked off ...
tty00 "/usr/libexec/getty std.9600" unknown off secure
-------

to this:
-------

# Define console that we actually run getty on
ttye0 "/usr/libexec/getty Pc" vt220 off secure
.
.
.
#Hardwired lines are marked off ...
tty00 "/usr/libexec/getty std.9600" unknown on secure


---

That is, I just swapped "on" and "off" on those two lines. It was my first
attempt
to implement Allen's somewhat vague (for a neophyte) suggestion, and it allows
me to boot multi-user anyway.



BTW, NetBSD is a lot more fun once you can boot multi-user!


I know several other PB 140/170/1xx users who are very interested to know
about the prospects
for getting multiuser boot without having to use the serial console. I'm
willing to help however I
can, though I'm not sure how I can given my paltry salary and  ignorance in
programming. I'm
open to suggestions though.

Brian