On Fri, 3 Oct 1997, Jonathan D Woytek wrote:

> 
> Greetings.  I am attempting my first install of NetBSD onto an old DecStation
> 5000/240, currently running Ultrix.  I was able to successfully create the
> label for the disk and get the miniroot over to that disk.  In fact, I was 
> even able to boot from the miniroot.  However, as soon as the kernel should
> begin showing me device probes, the console goes awry and become unreadable,
> followed by it blanking-out completely.  From here I can't specify exactly
> which framebuffer I have, since I am not anywhere near the machine.  However,
> I can specify that it is a b&w controller, with just a single bnc-type
> connector running to the monitor.  According to everything I've read, this
> should have been supported hardware, and the boot should have completed 
> without incident.  The system doesn't lock up when it does this--keypresses
> still stimulate system and disk activity.  I will connect a terminal if I must
> to complete the install, but I would *really* like to avoid doing that.  Even
> more than that, I would really like the console to work in the first place.
> Any help or advice would be appreciated.  Farewell.

I had this happen before a fix was comitted to the mfb code a few months
back.  I believe that the latest network install kernels have the new
code--if you can netboot the machine, they should work (not having checked,
I'm suprised that the latest miniroot doesn't work...)

As an alternative, you could connect the terminal long enough to get the
machine up and recompile the kernel with recent sources (which should fix
the problem if it is an mfb).

-Matthew Schnierle
-pyld@grove.iup.edu
-http://www.iup.edu/~pyld/
-Member, Programmers Local 1036--AFL-CPIO.
-Join the fight.  http://www.cauce.org