[H-GEN] Wanted: parts and help to get Unix box working

[Martin Pool]

On Fri, 6 Mar 1998, Ian Lister wrote:

<checks pockets>  Sorry, I don't have any h/w that'll help you, but I do
have some info that may help.

> I have an old IBM RS/6000 workstation which is not in a workable condition
> atm, although afaik all the hardware is working fine.

I don't know if you'll be able to run anything but AIX.  The old ones run
POWER processors that predate the PowerPC architecture.  You may be in
luck.

Otherwise, you can probably get hold of AIX media somewhere.  It's kind of
like BSD, Solaris, HP-UX, OS/400 and OS/2 superimposed.

> My main problem is that the video card in the machine has some kind of
> mini-coax connectors on it and I have nothing that will connect to
> these. 

I think James Lever has a monitor for sale that'll support them.  I
vaguely remember seeing cables to turn them into SVGA output
connected to workstations.

> The machine has only MCA slots. 

RS6000 machines use MCA cards from MCA PS/2s.  You can probably canibalize
one for memory or ethernet cards, if you can find one.  Almost all of them
had VGA on the motherboard, so I think the only video cards were expensive
CAD displays: XGA and 8514/A.  (Not that there's anything wrong with
exotic cards, of course.)

> I guess I either need a new video card or a cable to connect
> the existing card to a monitor. My second problem is that it has a 
> TokenRing card in it, and I want to put an Ethernet card in instead.

You might have more luck using the TR card with a router to connect it to
the ethernet.

> Ian Lister
> Unix user-to-be

--
Martin Pool

----------------------- HUMBUG General List --------------------------------
echo "unsubscribe general" | mail majordomo at humbug.org.au # To Unsubscribe