yup, flipping that switch fixed it! 
thanks!
(though, a CXA16 seemed to crash the machine a lot when i put one of those
in on top of the cxy08... it has identical switch packs and seems to be
considered the same kind of card by a manual i found later for a 
decserver 550, which doesnt really distinguish between cxy08's and cxa16's)
happy hacking,
isildur

On Thu, 7 Nov 2002, Antonio Carlini wrote:

> 
> >Is there any major difference between a CXY08 and a DHV11? I have been 
> 
> A CXY08 can be operated in either DHV11 or DHU11 mode. Preferred mode,
> according to the user guide, is DH*U*11. Maybe yours is set that way?
> 
> Switchpack E36 (10 switches, on the left when handles are "up") should
> have switch 1 ON for DHV11 mode. For switchpack E38 (8 switches) a
> vector of 300(octal) has switches 4 & 5 on. Switch 1 must be ON,
> switch 2 must be OFF.
> 
> >'problematic' system is a BA213 s-box (independent of this, ive decided
> 
> >that s-box power supplies suck.), KFQSA & RF72, KA650, 16MB, DELQA, and
> 
> 
> Never had a problem with those PSUs. YMMV (obviously!).
> 
> >so, i suspect that the real culprit is that the CXY08 is _not_
> identical to the DHV11 after all. 
> >Anybody know for sure, and also know if there's a 
> >way around this? 
> 
> A *quick* skim through the user guide didn't yield anything useful.
> The DHV11 tech manual can be found here
> http://www.spies.com/~aek/pdf/dec/qbus/.
> I cannot find the CXY08 manual anywhere right now.
> 
> Antonio
>