Recently aquired an M3000. Wanted to get a desktop environment
running, but this machine has no usb ports usable for keyboard
or mouse. Looked at the HCL pages for Sol 10, but the cards
listed are few, difficult to find and expensive.
The problem seems to be that usb 2 cards are now essentially
obsolete + none of the USB 3 cards worked at all. I did try
a full height usb 2 card, which worked, so the solution seems
to be finding a 2 card with the right chip set, is pci-e and
low profile. Not an easy task.
Eventually found a card from a dealer in .de with the same chip
set, on the usual site. Card is a Exsys EX-11064. Chip set is an
NEC D720101. The other card which worked, a Startech PEX400USB2
has the same chip set, but is full height. Since it's the chip set
that matters to the Os drivers, any other card with the same chip
set should work. The dealer i .de has a load of these cards for
sale and there are other vendors as well.
On boot, the gui doesn't start, but this is apparently a known
bug, which doesn't start the gui if the input and output devices
in OBP are set to serial console. For reasons best known to
Fujitsu Sun, those settings have been removed from the OBP syntax.
The solution is:
add a link in /dev, then enable the cde-login service:
cd /dev
ln -s ./fbs/nfb0 fb
svcadm enable gdm-login
Anyway, the M3000 is a fast machine with good single thread
performance. Interactively and subjectively, as fast or faster
that the quad core Xeon box in the lab. Perhaps useful to others
and or, for possible inclusion in the Sol 10 HCL ?...
Chris<xxx.syseng.yyy@gfsys.co.uk> writes:
Recently aquired an M3000. Wanted to get a desktop environment
running, but this machine has no usb ports usable for keyboard
or mouse. Looked at the HCL pages for Sol 10, but the cards
listed are few, difficult to find and expensive.
Does it even have a graphic console or are you using a remote
type of (X) terminal?
The problem seems to be that usb 2 cards are now essentially
obsolete + none of the USB 3 cards worked at all. I did try
a full height usb 2 card, which worked, so the solution seems
to be finding a 2 card with the right chip set, is pci-e and
low profile. Not an easy task.
Solaris supports uhci, ohci, ehci and xhci which support
USB 1.1, USB 1.1, USB 2.0 and USB 3.0, respectively.
It should also work in Solaris 11 ....
Thanks for the information. I find the M3000 is bit loud but I
use one as a Sun Ray server.
Casper
On 05/24/17 08:38, Casper H.S. Dik wrote:
Chris<xxx.syseng.yyy@gfsys.co.uk> writes:
Recently aquired an M3000. Wanted to get a desktop environment
running, but this machine has no usb ports usable for keyboard
or mouse. Looked at the HCL pages for Sol 10, but the cards
listed are few, difficult to find and expensive.
Does it even have a graphic console or are you using a remote
type of (X) terminal?
Put an XVR300 in the box for local gui, which is convenient for
multi terminal sessions. Haven't tried Xvnc yet, but on another
machine using the same graphics card and local keyboard, it was
subjectively faster than the local graphics card. Lightly loaded
network though.
The problem seems to be that usb 2 cards are now essentially
obsolete + none of the USB 3 cards worked at all. I did try
a full height usb 2 card, which worked, so the solution seems
to be finding a 2 card with the right chip set, is pci-e and
low profile. Not an easy task.
From what I can see, USB3 arrived at a similar time to the mass
uptake of pci-e. The the result that USB2 became orphaned off, as
it was not longer economic to make the cards. Problem is that the
HCL has not been updated to reflect that and is still stuck in
USB2 land.
Solaris supports uhci, ohci, ehci and xhci which support
USB 1.1, USB 1.1, USB 2.0 and USB 3.0, respectively.
Perhaps it does, but the HCL provides no translation between
the supported modes and relevant chip sets, which is what matters
to the OS drivers, not the card manufacturer.
It should also work in Solaris 11 ....
Thanks for the information. I find the M3000 is bit loud but I
use one as a Sun Ray server.
Casper
I do this for fun now, but some of us will always want to use Sun
boxes as workstations and run Sparc architecture. Most server class
machines are noisy, but that can be solved by racking up in an
adjacent room and drilling a hole in the wall for the cables :-).
The M3000 is a it of a sleeper. Great performance for workstation
use and well down the price curve now if you shop around...
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