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Caveats to Read Before You Upgrade

This section documents caveats that can significantly affect the installation process. (This is not a complete list of all known bugs, workarounds, or changes, which are documented in the release notes for each individual product.)

These caveats are cumulative for 6.5 through 6.5.2.

General Caveats to Read Before Upgrading (All Platforms)

Platform-Specific Caveats to Read Before Upgrading

If you have an Indigo R4000, Indigo2, O2, Onyx 2, or Origin2000, please check the relevant caveats below before you begin your installation.
 

Indigo R4000 and Indigo2 R4000 Systems

 If the system you are upgrading has a separate filesystem for / and /usr, then the / filesystem must be at least 25MB in order to do the upgrade. Systems shipped with IRIX 4.0.x were shipped with separate / filesystems of approximately 16MB, which is too small for IRIX 6.5.2. 

To check, use the command df -k /  

% df -k / 

If the output looks similar to this...  
 

Filesystem Type kbytes use avail %use Mounted on
/dev/root efs 15275> 9492 5783 62% /

...the disk will need to be backed up, and repartitioned with the fx command before IRIX 6.5.2 can be installed. See the online book IRIX Admin: Software Installation and Licensing, Troubleshooting section, Using fx to Restore the Swap Partition, for how to do this with the fx command.  
Important: Before you do this, make sure you back up important data! And, instead of the last step, label/create/boot, use the command /repartition/root, then press Enter in answer to the prompt: 

fx/repartition/rootdrive: type of data partition = (xfs) 

Next, answer "yes" to a warning that looks like this: 

Warning: you will need to re-install all software and restore user data from backups after changing the partition layout. Changing partitions will cause all data on the drive to be lost. Be sure you have the drive backed up if it contains any user data. Continue? 

The kbytes number should be at least 25600 in order to install IRIX 6.5.2, and it is recommended that it be at least 40MB, particularly on systems that support running 64 bit address executables (systems where uname -s returns IRIX64, on systems running IRIX 6.2 and later). 
 
Indigo2 Systems The EISA Token Ring driver is not supported in the IRIX 6.5.2 release. 
 
O2 Systems If you program device drivers for the O2 PCI expansion slot, you must use the routines (pciio_pio_*()) described in Chapter 22 of the 6.5 Device Driver Programmers Guide, under the section"PCI Drivers for the IP32 (O2) Platform," to perform PIO (Program IO) accesses. You must use the pciio_pio_* routines for all PIO access to the device, including the PCI config space. These routines were made available in 6.3 via patch2801 (if your PCI device driver is already using these routines then there is nothing more you need to do).  
 
Origin2000 Systems
  • The system reboots on panic without stopping at the PROM menu. This is an IRIX design feature, not a failure. You can stop the system during reboot by pressing ESC at the Starting Up The System message.

    If the system panics on the reboot, the system will go into a panic/reboot loop. If this should happen, press ESC to break the loop. 

    If you do not want the system to reboot on panic, you can override the default reboot_on_panic variable with the PROM variable rebound. To do this, enter the following at the PROM prompt, accessed via option 5 at the PROM menu: 

    setenv rebound n 
     

  • To get the MMSC version number, check the bottom line of the LCS control panel. MMSC version numbers for the IRIX 6.5.2 operating system should be 1.2.E (or higher). Silicon Graphics recommends that you upgrade to version 1.2.E if your version is lower.

    A second way to get the version of all the MMSCs is to connect to the alternate console port on one MMSC and enter the following: 

    ^T track * ver 

    Information on flashing the MMSC Proms can be found in the Origin2000 32- to 128- Processor Upgrade Procedure, and at the following  Web site: 

    http://servinfo.cray.com/o2000/hmu3490/3490.htm 
     

  • There are some potential FLEXlm licensing problems. The Flexible License Manager (FLEXlm) controls the use of certain software products that are asynchronous to the IRIX operating system. 

    A FLEXlm key is generated for each asynchronous software product, based on a unique system identifier. Because the Origin2000 system does not have a unique system identifier, the FLEXlm host ID of the first system module is used to create a FLEXlm key. 

    If an Origin2000 system is reconfigured, a different module with a different FLEXlm host ID could be located in the first position, causing a previously valid FLEXlm key to fail. 

    If a license key problem arises after a system has been reconfigured, a new license must be generated. Contact the vendor of the software product in question and give them the host ID number (the FLEXlm host ID of the first module) of the reconfigured system to generate a new key. 

     

Caveats to Read After You Upgrade

This page documents caveats that could significantly affect the user's experience after upgrading to IRIX 6.5.2. This is not a complete list of all known bugs, workarounds, or changes, which are documented in the release notes for each individual product.

In addition to reviewing this list, you should check Caveat and Release Note Updates at http://support.sgi.com/6.5/ for any late-breaking information.

These caveats are cumulative for IRIX 6.5 through 6.5.2.

% su
# cd /dev
# ./MAKEDEV
# ioconfig -f /hw
# exit

ORIGIN2000 Caveats

The following caveats are for large (64+ processors) Origin2000 Systems.