Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Alexander Voropay]

Hi!

 I've just got (for free :) an ancient MIPS ACER PICA 61 motherboard.

 Can anyone help/guide me to run Linux-MIPS on this machine ?
Is it still possible to run Linux on this architecture ?

 The motherboard is old (~1993) and it is very difficult to find
any documentations... AFAIK, this is version of ARC MIPS.
(mipsel)


 This is Full-size AT board, AT power supply, 5 ISA slots, 8 SIMM
slots. The CPU is PACEMIPS R4000-50Mhz (x2=100 internal ???) by
Performance Semiconductor Corp.. NatSemi Ethernet/AUI onboard.
No IDE connector. One additional slot is not ISA, but maked as
IO an contains SCSI/Floppy/Serial/Perallel/Mice card. Another slot
is like reversed EISA (double) and marked as VIO (locabus video?).
Unfortunately, the original videocard is lost. :( However it works fine
with old CirrusLogic VGA card in ISA slot (old ISA Trident 8900/9000
does not works).




St.Petersburg, Russia
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-=AV=- 

Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Alexander Voropay]

Hi!

 I've just got (for free :) an ancient MIPS ACER PICA 61 motherboard.

 Can anyone help/guide me to run Linux-MIPS on this machine ?
Is it still possible to run Linux on this architecture ?

 The motherboard is old (~1993) and it is very difficult to find
any documentations... AFAIK, this is version of ARC MIPS.
(mipsel)


 This is Full-size AT board, AT power supply, 5 ISA slots, 8 SIMM
slots. The CPU is PACEMIPS R4000-50Mhz (x2=100 internal ???) by
Performance Semiconductor Corp.. NatSemi Ethernet/AUI onboard.
No IDE connector. One additional slot is not ISA, but maked as
IO an contains SCSI/Floppy/Serial/Perallel/Mice card. Another slot
is like reversed EISA (double) and marked as VIO (locabus video?).
Unfortunately, the original videocard is lost. :( However it works fine
with old CirrusLogic VGA card in ISA slot (old ISA Trident 8900/9000
does not works).




St.Petersburg, Russia
--
-=AV=- 

Re: Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Ralf Baechle]

On Tue, Jun 22, 2004 at 08:23:57PM +0400, Alexander Voropay wrote:

>  I've just got (for free :) an ancient MIPS ACER PICA 61 motherboard.
> 
>  Can anyone help/guide me to run Linux-MIPS on this machine ?
> Is it still possible to run Linux on this architecture ?
> 
>  The motherboard is old (~1993) and it is very difficult to find
> any documentations... AFAIK, this is version of ARC MIPS.
> (mipsel)
> 
> 
>  This is Full-size AT board, AT power supply, 5 ISA slots, 8 SIMM
> slots. The CPU is PACEMIPS R4000-50Mhz (x2=100 internal ???) by
> Performance Semiconductor Corp.. NatSemi Ethernet/AUI onboard.
> No IDE connector. One additional slot is not ISA, but maked as
> IO an contains SCSI/Floppy/Serial/Perallel/Mice card. Another slot
> is like reversed EISA (double) and marked as VIO (locabus video?).
> Unfortunately, the original videocard is lost. :(

Great.  Because that was a S3 968 video card which for it's time was
delivering quite a nice performance.

> However it works fine with old CirrusLogic VGA card in ISA slot (old
> ISA Trident 8900/9000 does not works).

Linux has code for this system but it's suffering from severe bitrot.
I still have the documents here so I could help you a bit if you were
willing to resurrect the kernel - which should be relativly easy, also
due to the system's similarity to another, somewhat better supported
system, the Olivetti M700-10.

  Ralf

RE: Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Alexander Voropay]

Hi!

>Linux has code for this system but it's suffering from severe bitrot.
>I still have the documents here so I could help you a bit if you were
willing to
>resurrect the kernel - which should be relativly easy, also due to the
>system's similarity to another, somewhat better supported system,
>the Olivetti M700-10.

  I'm trying to cross-compile a kernel from the linux-mips CVS.

  Unfortunately, the build script does not provide a selection for the
SCSI driver for the ACER PICA  (/linux/drivers/scsi/NCR53C9x.h ??)
and SONIC DP83932 Ethernet controller.


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-=AV=-

RE: Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Alexander Voropay]

Hi!

>Linux has code for this system but it's suffering from severe bitrot.
>I still have the documents here so I could help you a bit if you were
willing to
>resurrect the kernel - which should be relativly easy, also due to the
>system's similarity to another, somewhat better supported system,
>the Olivetti M700-10.

  I'm trying to cross-compile a kernel from the linux-mips CVS.

  Unfortunately, the build script does not provide a selection for the
SCSI driver for the ACER PICA  (/linux/drivers/scsi/NCR53C9x.h ??)
and SONIC DP83932 Ethernet controller.


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-=AV=-

RE: Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Alexander Voropay]

Hi!

>  Unfortunately, the build script does not provide a selection for the
SCSI driver for
>the ACER PICA 

 It seems, this is a typo in Kconfigs... The JAZZ machine name is a
"MACH_JAZZ",
not a  "MIPS_JAZZ"


[root@monitor linux]# find . -name "Kconfig" | xargs grep MIPS_JAZZ
./drivers/net/Kconfig:config MIPS_JAZZ_SONIC
./drivers/net/Kconfig:  depends on NET_ETHERNET && MIPS_JAZZ
./drivers/scsi/Kconfig: depends on MIPS_JAZZ && SCSI
./linux/drivers/net/Kconfig:config MIPS_JAZZ_SONIC
./linux/drivers/net/Kconfig:    depends on NET_ETHERNET && MIPS_JAZZ
./linux/drivers/scsi/Kconfig:   depends on MIPS_JAZZ && SCSI


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-=AV=-

RE: Howto run Linux on ACER PICA 61

[Alexander Voropay]

Hi!

>  Unfortunately, the build script does not provide a selection for the
SCSI driver for
>the ACER PICA 

 It seems, this is a typo in Kconfigs... The JAZZ machine name is a
"MACH_JAZZ",
not a  "MIPS_JAZZ"


[root@monitor linux]# find . -name "Kconfig" | xargs grep MIPS_JAZZ
./drivers/net/Kconfig:config MIPS_JAZZ_SONIC
./drivers/net/Kconfig:  depends on NET_ETHERNET && MIPS_JAZZ
./drivers/scsi/Kconfig: depends on MIPS_JAZZ && SCSI
./linux/drivers/net/Kconfig:config MIPS_JAZZ_SONIC
./linux/drivers/net/Kconfig:    depends on NET_ETHERNET && MIPS_JAZZ
./linux/drivers/scsi/Kconfig:   depends on MIPS_JAZZ && SCSI


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