In article <47fd089a@212.67.96.135>,
Dave <foo@coo.com> writes:
> Justin Goldberg wrote:
>> Can I put a any old pci scsi card into a sun ultra 10 workstation as
>> long as my os has drivers? (I will install bsd or linux on it)
>
> I'm not sure why you would want to install Linux or BSD on a Sun. I can
> understand those operating systems might have some advantages (better
> hardware support) on x86 hardware, but on SPARC you are going to have
> far more issues. First Solaris was written for SPARC, and development of
> Linux and BSD on Sun hardware must be very limited. I know some linux
> distros have given up all development. So I think you are a bit unwise
> installing anything other than Solaris.
>
>> What's your experience with scsi on it?
>
> Hardware wise no problem. Software (i.e. drivers in the operating
> system) is another matter altogether. I've used an IBM card and some
> other card in a Sun - having made sure the chip set was the same as one
> supported by Solaris. You will just have to do the same - make sure the
> chipset of the card is supported in whatever OS you use.
>
> I know with Solaris, some 3rd party cards lake the firmware needed to
> boot the OS, but are fine once it is booted.

If you want to boot from the card, it will either need to be
one with openfirmware BIOS (Adaptec have done them in the past,
such as the Adaptec 2940/OF (OF=openfirmware)), or one with a
chip which is directly supported by the openboot firmware (some
of the LSI chips driven by glm(7D) on Solaris).

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]