More Info: Sun Blade100s and 150s: IDPROMs

From: Richard Shoemaker <Richard.Shoemaker_at_colorado.edu>
Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2005 12:24:41 -0600

Dear All:

Regarding my earlier postings about the IDPROMs (NVRAM chips) on the Sun
Blade-100 and -150 workstations:

I just received my IDPROM chips from Sun (Sun Part# #100-6889), and they (at
least the one that I used) is indeed programmed with a new MAC address and
HostID. I replaced the chip, and the workstation booted up good as new.
Since none of my software is tied to the HostID (and I don't care about the
MAC address) it is back in business.

Unlike older Suns (i.e. Ultra-series), the firmware required to program the
NVRAM chip yourself is no longer included for these Blades. There may be
ways to work around this, and folks at Varian are looking into this.

So a $24 chip and 3-WEEKS of waiting was all it took to get this Blade-100
back in service. I was going to sermonize about Sun's customer service, but
I'll refrain.

Cheers,

-Rich Shoemaker

---
Richard K. Shoemaker, Ph.D.
NMR Facility Manager
University of Colorado at Boulder
Phone:  (303) 492-7062	Fax: (303) 492-5894
E-Mail: Richard.Shoemaker_at_Colorado.edu  
-----Original Message-----
From: Richard Shoemaker [mailto:Richard.Shoemaker_at_Colorado.edu] 
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2005 12:32 PM
To: 'ammrl_at_chemnmr.colorado.edu'
Subject: Followup: Sun Blade100s and 150s: IDPROMs
Dear All:
Regarding my message about the IDPROMs on Blade100/150s, it's clear that
many (like I) didn't know about this; however, many did.  Gareth Morris
added the following, which would be very useful to those who want to retain
their previous MAC address and hostID:
>From Gareth:
It is relatively easy to reprogram the the chip yourself - provided you 
make a note of the MAC address and hostid before the battery runs out! 
We've done it a number of times on ageing Sparc 1's etc.  Details at 
http://www.squirrel.com/squirrel/sun-nvram-hostid.faq.html.
Thanks Gareth!!
-Rich Shoemaker
---
Richard K. Shoemaker, Ph.D.
NMR Facility Manager
University of Colorado at Boulder
Phone:  (303) 492-7062	Fax: (303) 492-5894
E-Mail: Richard.Shoemaker_at_Colorado.edu  

Received on Thu Oct 20 2005 - 12:41:16 MST