Perhaps what I am about to write is a well known issue. If, however, it can help even one system manager or support person, then the effort will have been worth while.
Last evening I went to one of our customers to do an annual full image backup of the system disk. The console there is a PC graphics terminal and NOT a VT.
I booted from the CD and the system refused to come up. It seemed to "hang" just after both CPUs were joined.
I tried a different CD - same reult.
At this point I had a suspicion that perhaps the graphics console was the problem. So we connected a VT320 to the serial connector. However, this did not immediately help, until I realized that I had to issue the follwing command at the boot prompt:
>>>set console serial
AND to do a "hard" restart of the ALPHA.
After the ALPHA came up again to boot prompt the system came up successfully from the CD.
Take note that if the PC console is to be reestablished then a
>>>set console graphics
MUST be issued, and the ALPHA hard restarted.
Hope this may be of help to someone!
Chaim
