OT: Irix

I hate to write such an OT post but I couldn't find a better newsgroup on my
ISP's news server and you chaps seems to be pretty knowledgeable in the
computer department. I'll be running this machine from my adsl connection if
that makes this post any more "on topic"? ;o)

I was recently given an old Challenger S SGI server, it was used as a web
server until 1998 and it's been collecting dust ever since. Anyway, after a
lot of farting around (and buying various serial cables and adaptors) I
managed to get a login prompt through the serial interface using hyperterm
in Windows (what's the Linux equivalent to hyperterm?). The problem is, I
nor anybody else, knows the root password (or any account password).
Can anybody suggest a way to get in through the serial interface? The
machine has no removable media drives and even if it did, I don't have Irix
6.2 so couldn't reinstall it anyway.

Aside from this, the machine is in perfect working order, I'd hate to have
to get rid of it just because of a password. I was/am looking forward to
using a computer with 256meg of RAM, built when 4meg was enough to run
Windows and 28.8kbps was blisteringly fast!

Thanks for any help,

Treefrog (No, I don't go out very often )

In article <3fab858d$(E-Mail Removed)>, Treefrog
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I hate to write such an OT post but I couldn't find a better newsgroup on my
>ISP's news server and you chaps seems to be pretty knowledgeable in the
>computer department. I'll be running this machine from my adsl connection if
>that makes this post any more "on topic"? ;o)

Not really. You should have posted to <comp.sys.sgi.misc> instead.

>I was recently given an old Challenger S SGI server, it was used as a web
>server until 1998 and it's been collecting dust ever since.

>The problem is, I nor anybody else, knows the root password (or any
>account password). Can anybody suggest a way to get in through the
>serial interface?

If you have access to the PROM monitor, issue the 'single' command,
which will take you to single-user mode. Newer versions of IRIX require
the root password to do this, and if yours is one of them, you may need
to reinstall the operating system, or boot into single-user mode from an
installation CD, mount the filesystem, and edit the password database.

If the PROM monitor has been assigned a password, you need to locate the
password jumper and use it before you will be able to continue:

<http://www.parallab.uib.no/SGI_books.../ChallS_OG/sgi
_html/ch08.html#id5462324>

The URL above is part of the Challenge S Owner's Guide, so if you
haven't read the full thing yet, it's a good idea to.

>The machine has no removable media drives and even if it did, I don't
>have Irix 6.2 so couldn't reinstall it anyway.

You can easily add an SCSI CD-ROM in an enclosure like a Sun 411: you
will need to check whether the one you want to use supports 512-byte
blocks -- most consumer drives don't -- or you may not be able to boot
from it.

You will definitely need to get hold of an optical drive and IRIX 6.5
media at some stage, so you may as well do it now.

--
James MacDonald

On Fri, 7 Nov 2003, Treefrog wrote:

> I was recently given an old Challenger S SGI server, it was used as a web
> server until 1998 and it's been collecting dust ever since. Anyway, after a
> lot of farting around (and buying various serial cables and adaptors) I
> managed to get a login prompt through the serial interface using hyperterm
> in Windows (what's the Linux equivalent to hyperterm?).

There are several. The most common is minicom

> The problem is, I
> nor anybody else, knows the root password (or any account password).
> Can anybody suggest a way to get in through the serial interface? The
> machine has no removable media drives and even if it did, I don't have Irix
> 6.2 so couldn't reinstall it anyway.

You might be able to boot into single user mode from the PROM if you have
an older version of the OS.

For a newer version you will either have to boot from another media (CD?)
and mount the filesytem, change the password manually, and reboot.

Jason Clifford
--
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