[Simh] Unable to locate boot file

Tue Jun 21 02:42:22 EDT 2016

Trying to outsmart AUTOGEN and CLUSTER_CONFIG is never a good idea. 
After the disk image transfer, you are no longer running a 6220, but a 
3900. After the disk image transfer and first (minimal) boot, you should 
AUTOGEN and, as you found out, NETCONFIG. Then your cluster boot master 
should be OK.

Next, remove the VAX4000 from the cluster using CLUSTER_CONFIG, and 
re-add it using the same procedure. This ensures all (device) pointer 
and names are OK. DSVCONFIG should not be needed for the cluster 
satellite loads, only for serving DECserver image loads.

*Wilm*

Daniel Parrott schreef op 20-6-2016 om 22:16:
>
> I have two physical systems, a VAX 6220 and a VAX 4000-300. The latter 
> system is set up to do a network bootstrap off the 6220 using an EZA0 
> network device.
>
>
> First, using vddriver and backup/image, I generated and retrieved disk 
> images of the RA92 drives from the 6220.  With these disk images, and 
> specifying MicroVAX 3900 on the SimH simulator, I am able to boot up 
> an emulated version of the 6220 on my laptop.  So far so good.
>
>
> My first goal is to get the physical VAX 4000-300 to do its network 
> bootstrap off the emulated 6220 rather than the physical 6220.  By the 
> way, I am running SimH 4.0 on Windows 8, it seems to work OK.
>
>
> The first problem I ran into was that the simulator presents a 
> different network adapter to the emulated 6220 than it is accustomed 
> to seeing.  It typically sees a "BNA-0" interface, but the simulator 
> uses "QNA-0", as derived from the XQA0 device.  So, I found out that I 
> needed to run netconfig.com. When I ran that script, it brought the 
> circuit online.
>
>
> But when I tried to do network boot of the physical VAX 4000-300 off 
> the emulated 6220, it kept saying 'retrying network bootstrap'.  So 
> evidently that was not sufficient. Then I came to discover that the 
> 6220 uses DECserver, and there is a dsvconfig.com script.  Once again, 
> because the simulator presented a different network device than the 
> 6220 was accustomed to seeing, the configuration had to be updated.  
> So okay, I ran the dsvconfig.com script, and made it aware of the fact 
> that it is now a "QNA-0" device rather than a "BNA-0" device.
>
>
> So after running both netconfig.com and dsvconfig.com on the emulated 
> 6220, the physical 4000-300 no longer says "retrying network 
> bootstrap".  Instead it now appears to be able to communicate, but it 
> says "unable to locate boot file":
>
>
> >>> b eza0
>
> (BOOT/R5:0 EZA0)
>
>
>   2..
>
> -EZA0
>
>   1..0..
>
>
> %VAXcluster-I-SYSLOAD, system loaded from node ORION (AA-00-04-00-B6-11)
>
>
> %VAXcluster-F-BADOPEN, unable to locate BOOT file
>
> ?06 HLT INST
>
>                 PC = 00007395
>
> >>>
>
>
> Using Wireshark, I captured some of the packets to try to glean some 
> more details, and I see messages like "VAXcluster-F-NOSUCHDEV, 
> nonexistent drive" and "VAXcluster-F-READERR, I/O error reading boot 
> file".
>
>
> I am really stumped on this one because basically the disk images 
> should be one-to-one copies of what is on the physical VAX 6220, so 
> other than having to tell it that it has a different network adapter 
> (QNA-0 rather than BNA-0), why shouldn't it just work?  Does SimH not 
> support MOP or DECserver?  I did check, and the sysboot.exe file is 
> present in dua0:[sys14.syscommon.sysexe], and sys14 is the directory 
> for the VAX 4000-300 to use for its network boot.  So I believe the 
> boot file is available.
>
>
> By the way, the VAX 6220 is running VMS 5.5-2H.  And I have set 
> VAXCLUSTER to 2.
>
>
> Oh and one more thing, when the 4000-300 fails to boot, on the 
> simulator side of things I see the following:
>
>
> %%%%%%%%%%%% OPCOM  20-JUN-2016  15:10:06.58 %%%%%%%%
>
> Message from user DECNET on ORION
>
> DECnet event 0.3, automatic line service
>
> From node 4.438 (ORION), 20-JUN-2016 15:10:06.58
>
> Circuit QNA-0, Load, Requested, Node = 4.764 (GUINAN)
>
> File = DISK$VMSRL5:<SYS14.>, Operating system, Ethernet address = 
> 08-00-2B-23-9A-F4
>
>
> %%%%%%%%%%%% OPCOM  20-JUN-2016  15:10:11.58 %%%%%%%%
>
> Message from user DECNET on ORION
>
> DECnet event 0.3, automatic line service
>
> From node 4.438 (ORION), 20-JUN-2016 15:10:06.75
>
> Circuit QNA-0, Load, Successful, Node = 4.764 (GUINAN)
>
> File = DISK$VMSRL5:<SYS14.>, Operating system, Ethernet address = 
> 08-00-2B-23-9A-F4
>
>
> %PEA0, Port has Closed Virtual Circuit - REMOTE NODE GUINAN
>
> So it almost looks like it has done a successful load of the system 
> software to the 4000-300, but then the port closes presumably due to 
> not being able to locate the boot file.
>
>
> My thoughts are that maybe:
>
> 1) there is some other config script that needs to be run when using 
> disk images from one VAX system (physical 6220) to another (simulated 
> MicroVAX 3900)
>
> 2) SimH on Windows 8 does not really support MOP or DECserver stuff?
>
> 3) there is some permissions issue with the boot file (sysboot.exe?), 
> but since it is off a disk image (which should be a one-to-one exact 
> copy), how so?
>
>
> Any ideas?  Thanks in advance.
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Simh mailing list
> Simh at trailing-edge.com
> http://mailman.trailing-edge.com/mailman/listinfo/simh