This was supposed to go out well before my last email, I thought it went out hours ago, and just realized I’d not sent it. The hazards of doing too many things today.
> On Apr 21, 2019, at 2:36 PM, Mark Pizzolato <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Sunday, April 21, 2019 at 11:28 AM, Zane Healy wrote: >> I have a DL380 on the way to add to my ESXI cluster here at home. As a >> result >> I’m looking to finish virtualizing my DEC HW. What is the best way to >> convert >> a physical SCSI HD to a disk image for SIMH? I need to do this for both VAX >> and PDP-11. > > If these are SCSI disks, AND you have a host system with a SCSI host adapter > that can connect to these disks (i.e. it is the correct SCSI width, and > type), > then you can do this directly using simh from the host system. Okay, I thought that might be possible, but I wasn’t sure. This is venturing into areas that I’ve never messed with, with any of the DEC emulation software. > Warning: If you try to do this under some complicated set of layered > virtual systems, then you are on your own (recall your VNC experience). Reading up more on SDL2, I don’t think virtualization was the issue, rather my lack of understanding as to what LibSDL2 provides. > Depending on your host system the OS will have some name for the > above mentioned SCSI disk(s) which you've connected. > When you connect these disks to the host system, BE SURE not to > perform any action on these drives BEFORE you let simh see them. > Be sure you identify the raw device name that the OS sees the newly > connected SCSI disks as. Knowing that name the following should work > with a VAX or PDP11 simulator. Note that this will probably have to > be done as root in order to access the physical devices. > > # vax > sim> ATTACH RQ0 -c <rawdevicename> disk1.vhd > sim> DETACH RQ0 > > This will produce a "disk1.vhd" container file with all of the bits that can > be read from the original SCSI disk. > Repeat as necessary for each original disk. Interesting, I may be better off doing this with a SparcStation then, as I seem to remember the OBP would make ID’ing things easier. In any case, this isn’t a quick fix. I should have all the bits and pieces, but find them will likely be a challenge. >> One of the main systems that I want to Virtualize is a VAXstation 4000/60 >> with a BA350 shelf. The only HD connected to the system is a RZ28-VA SBB >> (2GB) as DKA200:, so yesterday I added a RZ29-VA SBB (4GB) as DKA100:. I >> setup Standalone Backup on the RZ29 and booted into Standalone backup. >> >> I tried to run the following: >> backup/image/verify dka200: dka100:[000000]20190420-system.sav/sav >> >> I ended up with a very strange “No valid storage bitmap found” error, and it >> failed to copy anything. >> >> Facility: BACKUP, Backup Utility >> Explanation: Software bad block data is not present on the volume. The >> volume has been initialized with no bad blocks. >> User Action: Execute the Bad Block Locator utility before using the volume. >> NOBITMAP, no valid storage bitmap found on 'device-name’ >> >> I tried ANALYZE/MEDIA, but may not have been doing things right. This is a >> Genuine RZ29-VA, but it was originally used as part of a disk array for a Sun >> Sparc system. > > This exercise will merely put a backup saveset on another disk which I don't > see getting you very far towards making it accessible from simh. I should be able to then transfer the resulting file over to a SIMH/VAX disk, boot up SIMH in StandAlone Backup, and restore it. (I’ve now verified this works for an Alpha). > Meanwhile, I suspect you are seeing a failure under standalone backup due > to the fact that after you added the DKA100 disk drive to the system you > didn't initialize the disk. You can't initialize a target disk under > standalone > backup, so you'll have to do that with full VMS running before you attempt > the backup again. I wish it were this simple. The disk was already initialized before I installed it, though oddly enough, unused (so I’m not sure what I’d previously intended it for). In addition I did an INIT on it from VAX/VMS 5.5-2, and I did it an INIT a second time on an installation of StandAlone Backup. I’m not sure if I’m running into a VAX/VMS 5.5-2 bug, or a problem with the destination Hard Drive. I need to try a different RZ29-VA drive. Zane _______________________________________________ Simh mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.trailing-edge.com/mailman/listinfo/simh
