HPE 9000 and HPE e3000 Servers
1748171 Members
3957 Online
108758 Solutions
New Discussion

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

 
SOLVED
Go to solution
glennes
Frequent Advisor

No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

I have a graphics monitor for my HP 9000 K 370. It was not displaying any output, but I was getting output on my console monitor. I followed the instruction in the Owner's Guide to set the path to my graphics console:

 

pa con 10/8

 

Now, I have no output on my graphics monitor or my console monitor. How do I get the system to output back to the console monitor?

 

Thanks!

Glenn

8 REPLIES 8
glennes
Frequent Advisor

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

I figured out how to get the console output back.

 

I disconnected the graphics display, keyboard, and mouse connections and depressed the TOC button on the rear of the machine, then let it automatically re-boot. My console terminal then began to display the system's output.

 

This still does not solve my problem of how to get the graphics display to work. Evidently, there must be a software driver on one of my install CDs that needs to be installed to get that going. At this point, I only have the install as done from the HP-UX 10.20 Core CD. I have not installed any other software on the machine. If you know which of the install set of CDs I need to install from to get the graphics display working, please respond back.

 

Thanks!

Glenn

Matti_Kurkela
Honored Contributor

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

Unfortunately I don't have the information you asked, but I can supply a few things you're likely to need in the process:

 

Based on the picture you posted earlier (link: http://h30499.www3.hp.com/hpeb/attachments/hpeb/itrc-191/42103/1/IMG_0161.JPG ) your display adapter is A3519A, which is known as Visualize-EG. It seems to be installed in slot 3 of the HSC expansion I/O card, so its hardware path should be "8/12.0".

 

The path 10/8 you tried earlier is true only if the display adapter is installed directly into the core I/O module... which is apparently not an option if the HSC expansion card is present.

 

Are you aware that www.openpa.net has a lot of information on HP PA-RISC servers and their add-on components?

The page on your server model: http://www.openpa.net/systems/hp-9000_k-class.html

It includes working download links to several manuals you might want to read.

 

If you installed the OS using default settings, it is likely that not everything that was on the core CD was installed.

With "swlist", you can get an overview of the installed software components; by adding options, you can drill deeper. (Try "swlist -l product", "swlist -l fileset" or even "swlist -l file".)


To install software components after the initial OS installation, you will need the "swinstall" command. If you run it without any options on a terminal, it will start up a text-based menu interface; you can also use command-line options to specify some or all the information swinstall will need.

 

The menu-based administration tool "sam" is usable on terminals too, and I think you can use it to activate a graphics display if the appropriate software is installed. (Remember, just the fact that some hardware is installed does not mean the system will automatically use it: HP-UX 10.20 is not quite that "plug and play".)

 

Since you installed the OS using the serial console, the graphical display may have been left in a disabled state although the drivers might have been automatically included in the kernel configuration. Run "ls /dev/crt*"; are there any CRT (= display) devices present? If the /dev/crt (or similar) exists, it might be as simple as using SAM to activate the graphical display.

MK
glennes
Frequent Advisor

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

MK

 

Thanks so much for your great detailed information and for responding! I sincerely appreciate it!

 

I have literally a huge plastic bin with dozens of volumes of documentation that I got when I bought the K370 - so much information that it is overwhelming just to try to find out which book I need to look at when I have a question! I also have some 30 to 35 CDs with software for the machine that I got in addition to all the documentation. There is so much software on the CDs that I do not know which to install nor in what order to install it. I have been trying to install the several Support Plus CDs in order of their dates from oldest to newest. Some of these are bootable while others require the CD drive volume to be mounted in order to install them. These Support Plus CDs cross the Y2K boundary, so it is necessary to install some of them to get the system to recognize any dates past 12/31/1999 before installing those dated after 1999.

 

1) I have been having a problem with the mount command as it is listed in the documentation for the 2001 CD. It states it should be structured as:

 

         mount -r /dev/dsk/c3t2d0 /cd rom  (I do know that c3t2d0 is the correct name for the CD device.)

 

but when I do that, the system responds:

 

        mount" /cdrom: No such file or directory

 

When I do it without the /cdrom at the end, the system responds:

 

      mount: /dev/dsk/c3t2d0 was either ignored or not found in /etc/fstab

 

Do I need to edit fstab to make an entry for the CD drive, or is this something that the system should have done on install? I need to be able to mount these non-bootable CDs in order to install the software on them. What can I do to make the mount command work so I can mount and install this other softare? (I tried running mount from the /etc directory where it is located.)

 

2) When running swlist, I get:

 

       B39920CA                         B.10.20          HP-UX Media Kit (Reference Only. See Description)

       HPUXEngCR800              B.10.20          English HP-UX CDE Runtime Environment

       XSW800HWCR1020      B.10.20.38    Extension Software Patch Bundle

 

That does not sound like very many programs were installed by default, so I ran the other variants on swlist that you included and I got literally hundreds of screens of software titles flying by, so an awfully large number of files were installed. The CD I installed was a bootable copy with the title "10.20 Hardware Extensions 2.0" which overwrote what was installed from the HP-UX Core Install CD I used to install the system, and, I assume, added a good bit of software to the system.

 

3) When running ls /dev/crt*, I get:

 

       /dev/crt     /dev/crt0

 

Is this referring to the terminal as 'crt0' or to the graphics monitor as 'crt0'? This is with the console connected via RS-232 serial port, as well as the graphics monitor, keyboard, and mouse connected on the K370's backplane. It would seem that the command is not seeing the graphics console (unless crt0 is the graphics console). When properly installed, will the system output to both the terminal and the graphics monitor at the same time or does the monitor have to be disconnected from the system for the graphics terminal to work?

 

If I run:   pa con 8/12.0   will that connect the system to the graphics monitor? Will it disconnect the system from the terminal console? If it disconnects the terminal console and nothing shows up on the graphics monitor, how do I get the terminal console back? Last time that happened (when I used the pa command with the wrong graphics address) I depressed the TOC button on the back of the machine and the terminal console came back after the system rebooted. Is that just luck, or is it the way it is supposed to be done? I cannot afford to lose my terminal output if the pa command does not work again! I will check the sam command and see if there are any options in it for activating the graphics monitor as well.

 

4) Lastly, I will check out the Open PA website and see what all I can find on it. Thanks for directing me to it!

 

Again, thanks so much for your most informative response and for your valuable time. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your kind help!

Glenn

 

 

Dennis Handly
Acclaimed Contributor

Re: No output to console on HP 9000 K370

>mount" /cdrom: No such file or directory

 

You need to create a mount point: mkdir /cdrom

 

>Do I need to edit fstab to make an entry for the CD drive

 

You can if you want to make the mount/unmount easier next time.  Use noauto:

http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/System-Administration/fstab-mount-options/m-p/3245728#M174491

 

>What can I do to make the mount command work

 

You have to have a mount point.

 

glennes
Frequent Advisor

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

MK -

 

I posted a separate question on this which you might want to look at rather than respond to this message.

 

How do I get SWINSTALL set up to install software from the CD-ROM? It wants a 'Source Depot Type' and gives choices which include 'Local CD-ROM'; however, the CD is not mounted and I do not know how to mount it.

 

It asks for the 'Source Host Name', which is correctly filled in as 'HP9000K'.

 

It asks for the 'Source Depot Path', which I do not know.

 

I suppose if I knew these entries, and the CD is properly mounted, then the software on the CD would become visible for me to install from.

 

What is the process with SWINSTALL to properly mount the CD and install software from it?

Thanks!

Glenn

glennes
Frequent Advisor
Solution

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

I have been successful in mounting the CD.

 

I created the directory   /cdrom   off the root. Then I was able to run the mount command and access the contents of the CD. What I was doing wrong was changing to the /cdrom directory before running the mount command, and the system was returning a 'device busy' message. I learned that you cannot mount the CD from the /cdrom directory or the system will report the device as busy. After running the mount command from the root directory, I could then go to the /cdrom directory and see the contents of the CD, and proceed to install software from there.

 

Thanks to all who responded!

Matti_Kurkela
Honored Contributor

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

Glennes, here are some answers for you Monday's post:

 

1.)

The mount command will always require two pieces of information: what to mount and where it is supposed to be mounted to. You can either specify both on the command line, or specify just one (either one works) and let the mount command fetch the other from /etc/fstab. But if you don't specify both and there is nothing matching in /etc/fstab, then the command will fail.

 

The mount command with both main pieces of information is often used for temporary operations. If you find you're mounting something repeatedly, or want to have it mounted automatically as the system starts up, it is recommended to add the information to /etc/fstab. Then you can use the shorter form of the mount command with that device/mount point.

 

And as Dennis told you, you need a directory before you can mount something. As the mount command is executed, the root directory of the mounted device will overlap the mount point directory and hide whatever was there before. The previous contents are only hidden, not lost: at unmount time, the original contents will be revealed again.

 

This is also the reason why you cannot be cd'd into a directory when mounting something on top of it. In other words, "mount <something> ." is always doomed to fail.

 

2)

I don't recall what was a typical "swlist" top level listing on K-class hardware with 10.20. But on 11.00 at least, I would have expected a bit longer listing right after a default HP-UX installation.

 

The HP-UX swinstall system (by the way, its proper name is Software Distributor, in case you see it mentioned in the documentation) is hierarchical: files are grouped into filesets, which are grouped into products and (optionally) subproducts, which can exist as-is or can be grouped into bundles. Without any options, the swinstall command will only display the "top level" view: the bundles and any products that don't belong to any bundles.

 

3)

The /dev/crt* devices always refer to graphical output devices. /dev/crt is the "default" graphical display, which is probably referring to the same hardware as /dev/crt0; the idea is that if there are multiple graphical output devices, you can make /dev/crt point to whichever device you want, and still keep using /dev/crtN devices for things that are required to be associated with a particular specific display device.

 

The fact that /dev/crt* devices exist on your system suggest that the drivers required to run the graphical output might already be installed and functional, but the local X11 display system is not configured to run. If that is the problem, SAM is probably the easiest way to start it.

 

> pa con 8/12.0   will that connect the system to the graphics monitor?

It should. Perhaps not immediately, but at next reboot/power-up.

 

> If it disconnects the terminal console and nothing shows up on the graphics monitor, how do I get the terminal console back?

Actually you already switched it back once: switching to serial console mode is as easy as disconnecting the graphical display, keyboard and mouse, and powering up the system. If you want to keep a HP-UX system in graphical mode, don't power it up with a keyboard unplugged...

 

But there is nothing that says the console must be the graphical output device: it is possible to activate the graphics monitor as a "secondary head" and keep the console functionality in the console serial port. In that configuration, the downside is that at boot time, you'll see nothing on the graphics monitor until at the very end of the boot sequence when the X11 graphics subsystem starts up. To troubleshoot boot-up issues, you will need to use the serial console in that case.

 

You might want to proceed one step at a time: first activate the graphics display, and after you've seen that it works, transfer the system console functionality to it.

MK
glennes
Frequent Advisor

Re: No Output to Console on HP 9000 K370

MK...

 

Thanks for responding! Your information is great to have.

 

I do have a clarification question to ask you. You stated that "it is possible to activate the graphics monitor as a "secondary head" and keep the console functionality in the console serial port." This is exactly the configuration I would like to have. How do I activate the graphics monitor as a "secondary head" in this scenario?

 

Thanks again!

Glenn