Very Computer

My sytem information is included at the end of this message.

Please tell me that my boot disk in not TOAST!

Could anyone give me an opinion of where the trouble is (boot sector
of drive, SCSI bus, CMOS (if such a thing exists on UNIX boxes), ...)

How can I fix it without losing the info on my Hard Disk?

Thanks in advance and here are the specifics.

I was away for about two weeks and powered off my SGI Indy workstation
before leaving. When I tried to boot it up yesterday I received the
following message in a windowed box.

   Cannot load /sash
   No default device and path in environment
   Unable to load bootfile: invalid argument
   Unable to boot; press any key to continue

This came up after the system was beginning/running the power-on
diagnostics.

After I press a key, I get the SGI Maintenance Menu screen with the
options:

   Start System
   Install System Software
   Run diagnostics
   Recover System
   Enter Command Monitor
   Select Keyboard Layout

Here is what happens upon seclection of these menu items.

  START SYSTEM

The following message comes up:

      Cannot load /sash
      No default device and path in environment
      Unable to load bootfile: invalid argument
      Autoboot failed
      Unable to continue; press <enter> to return to the menu :

   INSTALL SYSTEM SOFTWARE

Gives me options to install operating system

   RUN DIAGNOSTICS

The following message comes up:

      Starting diagnostics...
      Booting IDE from distribution CD-ROM

(if the peripherals are not connectet to the machine, I get the
message
      No SystemPartition set
      Unable to continue; press <enter> to return to the menu:)

The screen goes black and the following comes up (hinv info)

      SGI Version 5.3 IP22 IDE field Nov 3, 1994

      System: IP22
      Processor: 134 Mhz R4600, with FPU
      Primary I-cache size: 16 Kbytes
      Primary D-cache size: 16 Kbytes
      Secondary cache size: 512 Kbytes
      Memory size: 64 Mbytes
      Graphics: Indy 24-bit
      SCSI Disk: scsi(0)disk(1)
      SCSI Disk: Controller 0, ID 2, removable media (floptical drive)
      SCSI CDROM: scsi(0)cdrom(3)
      SCSI Tape: scsi(0)tape(4)
      SCSI Disk: scsi(0)disk(6)

The power light then blinks on and of at different frequencies (which
is normal) while the diagnostics are being performed.

After some time the following message comes up:

      dks0d1s10: Media error: No addr mark found in ID field, (data
      byte 39), block#0.

The diagnostics program continues to check everything else and upon
completion gives the following message:

      ERROR: Failure detected in SCSI (CTRL#0: device 1 ).
       press <Enter> to continue.

Upon pressin <Enter>, I am confronted with the maintenance menu once
again.

   RECOVER SYSTEM

Gives me options to recover from CD-ROM or Tape

   ENTER COMMAND MONITOR

In the EPROM command monitor, I have tried the following commands.

"printenv" prints out the wrong environment information (wrong IP
      adress, ...)

"resetenv" gives:
      dks0d1s0: Media error: No addr mark found in ID field,
      (data byte 39), block #0
      warning: unrecognized volume header type

   SELECT KEYBOARD LAYOUT

Options for various types of keyboards.

_____________________________

MACHINE SPECIFICS

The offending system is a SGI Indy workstation running IRIX 5.3. It
has a 1 GB internal Seagate Harddisk, a 1 GB external hard drive, a
SunSystems 4mm 5GB tape backup and an SGI CD-ROM.

We also have an Indy video board (on top of the standart video board
to input A/V signals) to ouput VHS/SVHS signals to TV or VCR. There is
also and IndyCam.

Rod

 ___________________________________________________________

                                                    //\/
 Rodrigue Savoie                                   \/\
 Universite de Moncton                          .... /
 CuSLM, Edmundston, NB                        Lickety split!
 CANADA   E3V 2S8
 ___________________________________________________________

| My sytem information is included at the end of this message.
|
| Please tell me that my boot disk in not TOAST!

No, but block 0 on your system disk seems to be.  This is bad
news, since that's where the partition table lives, and also
the "directory" that tells where to find sash.

You can boot the standalone fx from CDROM, and run a readonly
exercise pass over the drive, to find and spare (forward) the
bad blocks, and then try to repartition the drive, but unless you
manage to repartition it the same as it was before, it won't
find the root filesystem.

It's possible to try changing the partition offset for partition 0
one block at a time until you find a filesystem, but it will be tedious.
It will be simpler if you can mount the drive as a second drive on
another sgi system, and poke around looking for the superblock.  Otherwise
there will be a lot of false starts.  Try using the debug menu in fx
to read in data from the disk, and look for data that "looks like a
superblock".
--

Dave Olson, Silicon Graphics   Guru and busybody at large