I now also posted the disassembly and look inside the Sgi Octane! ruclips.net/video/l_V7vscKiwA/видео.html and a complete system backup dump for you to restore at home: www.patreon.com/posts/22225530/
The entire machine is designed with quality of the cooling in mind. Please consider using a kind of duct tape seal on the outside to close up the open port? This will help the health of the machine and boards. (PS I used to work in the support department at SGI replacing parts for SGI customer!)
yes, thank you, I indeed have cardboard in the open slot, but it looked too shabby for the video, so I temporarily took it out, ... even the low end 2x195MHz CPU board get's plenty hot though, I wonder how hot the 2x600MHz CPU module gets. Or is the later silicon that much more efficient, that it is "only" similar hot? ;-)
@@renerebe It was mainly the old MGRAS (Madigras) graphics card that got really hot. The later Odyssey V series V8/10/12 cards were a lot smaller and cooler running.
I also had an "Octane" Workstation, it was an "SE R12k 300" model. Bought it back in 2003 for US $500. The list price was US $20k when new in 1997 (quote from SGI) I was able to find a disk set for IRIX 6.5.30. but I never got around to run Linux, but I thought about it & was aware of the MIPS64 port. It's nice to see that you finally got Linux working on this SGI box
thanks, I plan to do, Sgi Octane disassembly comes soon, I just was too curious if the ps3 was still working: ruclips.net/video/6gsosetiTDU/видео.html ;-)
I love my Octane, sadly I don’t have much use for it. Still power it on from time to time and treat myself to some IRIX. Always get a kick out of the fact that I got the machine for 50€ in a yard sale in 2003.
Actually nowadays we use AMD64 which is an instruction set that Intel adopted from AMD... But they decided to call it "x64" because you know... It's never very nice for the corporation's image when you adopt something that a rival came up with. AMD is one of the major innovators in this industry, they always push Intel forward but Intel has it's own research and development of manufacturing processes which is something AMD does not. Reason why AMD is often behind Intel and Nvidia... (Nvidia also has it's own manufacturing processes although they have partners in order to supply worldwide demand.). So yeah AMD is more of a conceptual company, they come up with architectures and concepts such as HBM memory which Nvidia recently adopted, it was originally introduced by AMD. AMD is seriously the only company that always makes stuff that other corporations can use. Freesync for example while Nvidia loves being as proprietary as possible, seriously G-Sync requires Nvidia hardware for the monitor... While Freesync is being proposed as a new standard for all future monitors... And well while Nvidia is very on the proprietary side, Intel actually is a middle ground, they sometimes make things for everybody such as the ATX standard and USB type C but sometimes they also like to try proprietary shit... And also yeah the ATX standard is a very outdated design. The SGI workstations had a better internal design for sure. But it's hard to replace what is already an international standard.
It's more complicated than this; Agner Fog's "Stop the Instruction Set War" blog posts from 2009 go into the details a bit more. A few examples: AMD introduced 3DNow!, and Intel beat it with SSE. (AMD still supported 3DNow! until 2010.) Intel announced AVX, and AMD supported the first draft - but then Intel changed the plans and screwed up AMD's support. With AMD64, you'll recall that Intel tried to push out Itanium before the market was ready to accept 64-bit software, so AMD64's backwards compatibility won the market that time. But I suppose this is a case where convenience is better than having a "light" instruction set. I remember reading that Itanium wasn't considered that good anyway, not enough Ryzen to keep it around (:
Well, x86 is also an overcomplicated CISC chaos. Look at all the variable instruction layouts (1 to 15 ot more bytes), overrides and such. No wonder modern intel CPUs recently have that many bugs. IMHO a modern RISC ISA with the size of the x86 dies could likely be more performant, energy efficiency and have less bugs.
It was interesting listening to you. My version of having fun is my 2005 Powermac g5 that I like . Also have older Clevo laptop running Linux. Thanks for reading.
sadly, SGI wasted their opportunity on migrating from Irix to GNU/Linux - quite sad - and now, sgi.com redirects us to a programmed-obsolescence company named hp...
The NeXT colour machines also use a 13W3 connector. My NeXTstation Color has it directly on the botherboard. My NeXTcube has it on it's Dimension board. To connect these on regular display, you have to make sure the display supports Sync-On-Green (SOG) or buy a SOG adaptor. So, on my Cube, I have a 13W3 board connecting to a 13W3->VGA adaptor like this video shows, and that uses a VGA SOG converter which allows me to connect the cube with any cheap-o-matic display that has simple VGAs. My Cube looks awesome with an ACER V176L 17" LCD display. Looks like it was made for it. Back to SGIs... Some 10 years ago, I gave away an Indigo and Indy workstations to a friend. He sold them both :-(
I was sometimes looking at used NeXTstation sales, but often they ended up going too high in price, ..! :-/ I though you need a special monitor / soundbox to connect the monitor / keyboard to them, no?
Correct. If you have the original greyscale NeXT Megapixel Display, all the keyboard/mouse connectors are on the back. When they went colour, they chose an Italian manufacturer, FIMI, to outsource the screen using a Mitsubishi tube. All the connectors were exteriorized in the SoundBox where the cube connects and the Y cable redirects to the FIMI monitor if you have a NeXTstation Color (black slab). If you have the NeXTcube with a NeXT Dimension board, then the SoundBox connects to the motherboard and the FIMI connects to the NeXT Dimension board using a separate cable. Only the colour machines uses the 13W3 connector. The greyscale machines (or the Cube motherboard if you dont have/use the Dimension board) uses some proprietary connector (DB15 or something like that).
while I usually try to avoid background noise in my videos, I internally wanted to record excessive fa noise in this one. As mentioned in the video, when I brought the Octane 10 years ago I did not expect it to be that loud & heavy, ...
You are awesome with this!!! I do t have a slightest clue what you do but I am fascinated. I use MX Linux in my T430s. Thankyou and I keep wTching trying comprehend and it is interesting.
I used to repair these machines back in the day. I worked for SG in De Meern in The Netherlands. They were used at the Dutch KNMI. The weather organization in The Netherlands
Nice, good work! I was actually looking for Linux on Indigo (not Indigo2) information. I think it might be a lost cause, but if you have any pointers I'd take them.
@@LuisReiss My main site is www.sgidepot.co.uk/sgi.html (with the for sale section link at the top, which has a Contact page; my Yahoo email is the best address to use), but note that the for-sale sections on the SGI forums at forums.sgi.net and forums.sgi.sh will likely have better prices than I can do just now, as I've become unexpectedly busy (atm I'm backlogged with requests until mid-Nov I reckon). Also check ebay, though prices are high there now, supply very low and quality often poor. It's a very different market compared to ten years ago, these days many SGI systems and various parts have become hard to find but are still in commercial demand, so things have become costly.
I was setting up Linux on my Octane Years before. There was not even a bootloader available so i hat to boot it via bootp, have Irix and on a separate Harddrive a Gentoo Linux Installation. Not bootet it for Years. It is simply beautiful. Contact me if you need Irix or some old SCSI Cables. Do you have a PCI Cage?
yeah, I also did it first in ~2006 for t2/#mips64 but it run really unstable back then. I installed Irix in another video (omg was that a pain, ..! ;-) ruclips.net/video/JS7VG-FuLg8/видео.html I unfortunately do not have a PCI Cage, ... yet.
Ironically many of the later 15K disks are near silent. I normally use the Fujitsu MAX3036NC 36GB 15K in Octane, an excellent drive. The MAS3367NC is also good, slightly less clicky, but I reserve those for O2s. Another good model is the Seagate ST336753LC, it runs almost silent, but I use these in IRIS Indigo, Indy and Indigo2 systems since the Fujitsus don't support narrow/SE SCSI (the 68pin versions do, but 68/50pin SCSI adapters are more expensive).
And the IP30 support is now in mainline kernel, since 5.5. I used to follow the development on linux-mips when the original developer was doing the port at 2.6 time. Would have loved to be able to play with it, unfortunately I never got my hands on a Octane.
only platform support was merged, we still need to send all the drivers in, beside maybe eventually writing 3d support, or mode setting ,-) or 8-channel ADAT: ruclips.net/video/_YmgEitnI7E/видео.html
Without 3D acceleration this workstation doesn't mean much I think... CAD was the big deal of these machines back then. 90s PCs weren't even close to offering the same capabilities in CAD as this machine.
Sure, however, each entry level PC is faster today, for me the biggest benefit is having a MIPS64/Linux machine around - for MIPS development and testing - especially for embedded router / wireless boards a decade ago, ... t2sde.org Of course having such an famous machine in the collection is nice in any case. Some people collect vintage cards, others collect vintage computers ;-)
yeah, I often had binaries just segfault, not boot and such with Qemu - it is always something else to have actual hardware for the precision of what the transistors actually do. Also Qemu is not that fast without KVM, e.g. for SPARC it runs more like maybe 100MHz on my Core i7 Surface Pro. Not sure how fast it would be on a high end workstation, maybe like 200MHz? Though in theory Qemu supports SMP threading for some architectures to at least parallel speed this up a bit, But a 2x400 or 2x600 MHz Octane may still be faster that the current emulation. But of course we can also reverse and develop 2d/3d acceleration and of course I have it for my outstanding vintage machine collection in any case ;-)
Pcs and Macs back then was in there stone ages just for office use and basic tasks while big Amiga workstations 3000-4000 and silicon graphics was doing 1992 Jurassic Park fully CGI Amigas for pre render and SGIs from final render
What the purpose of using an SGI if not running IRIX? It is simply not make sense because any new cheaper hardware nowadays runs Linux better and much faster. The beauty of SGI is the IRIX! Much better to invest some time to update parts of IRIX to more modern standards, compile new modern browsers and apps, etc.
the purpose is having a MIPS64 CPU, a modern, and security fixed OS, and in general being able to modify and develop with it ;-) There is zero point in developing for an obsolete OS without any ability to modify the OS and drivers, e.g. add modern X extension to the X server etc.
Can you post your patch set, and details on what toolchain you used to build it? This looks amazing! I had assumed getting modern Linux running on an Octane was a lost cause!
toolchain #t2sde trunk:HEAD should work, kernel patch set sorted in here: t2sde.org/packages/linux-ip30 I usually try to sort everything I do into #t2, next I need to apply for xorg account to push xf86-input-impact API update and the initial hwcursor glue.
I think all the silence truncation is a bit excessive. I like your videos, and really wouldn't mind longer winded talking, It's also really, really, jarring. What a lot of other youtubers seem to do nowadays instead of cuts is to record the video and narrate over it.
thank you for your comment! I think my new editing is much improved, without the gaps that iMovie actually is doing internally on cuts, and I need to do extra work to hide and edit more clever and such. duping audio over it is not only more boring, it is also less authentic and more work. I did this for a few videos, like the Revox one (because my farther was moaning the grass, sigh): ruclips.net/video/051RnAp3XCs/видео.html or the Buggy drive: ruclips.net/video/MNb7P0inplI/видео.html IIRC others voiced they like "white working on it" content, and I personally also find this more authentic.
Currently RAW like onto the HP/PA-RISC: ruclips.net/video/2Ge-0RFnvlU/видео.html I will work on bootable ISOs sometime soon. Sharing, subscribing and Patreon helps: patreon.com/renerebe
yeah, however getting 3d working in Linux will be a major reverse engineering effort. I can certainly try to do this with the original Sgi Irix drivers ;-)
In Irix of course, as Sgi is the creator of OpenGL ;-) on Linux someone would need to finish reverse engineering and write an Mesa 3D driver: www.linux-mips.org/wiki/IMPACT
Do you still have that open XIO slot? I can send you a blanking plate. I probably have a blanking plate for the front panel aswell. Do you also still have the video board? Impressive work!! 8)
Thank you for your comment and thanks for asking Another view already send me an XIO cover a year ago ;-) I also still have the EVO video board: ruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html ruclips.net/video/l_V7vscKiwA/видео.html any particular reason you are asking?
@@renerebe Glad you got a cover for the slot! 8) I was wondering if you'd be willing to swap the video board for something; is there anything you need atm in terms of SGI items? I've been looking for an EVO board so that I can properly test a Cosmo2.
I understand how Linux people think now: these ports here and those ports here [...] can get it working with good knowledge of the kernel in a weekend or so. On a more serious note, can you do some tests on it? Something synthetic or something real world that we can compare to modern PCs or PCs of that time.
It takes way longer than a weekend, I'm not the original author, so I can only guess it took probably a year or two of reverse engineering. It took even me months of testing in 2006 to get it mostly working, and another week or two of off and on time last Decemebr to get it finally 99% okay-ish. I actually started to compile benchmark of all this diverse vintage and modern systems: ruclips.net/video/LMSIng6v-LU/видео.html of course the Sgi 3D hardware was more impressive, but that is hard to benchmark with all the different platforms and APIs of those days, ..!
why not just run the version of irix 6.5 for that machine? I use to use one at work, and it was a very nice version of Unix, and the SDI video card works correctly...
This is the 6.5.12 or so the machine came with - what does not match? I even got the personal “evo” video board to work w/ it a later day: Testing the Sgi Octane Personal Video board w/ the modded PowerVR Kyro II in Irixruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html
you mentioned that spdif worked, and you sounded surprised by it. Did it just 'fall into line' when you got the analogue audio working or did it require extra work from yourself?
the code was in the original port from 2006, but I could not be sure if it was well tested, and as I had to get the sound driver to work anyways, I was surprised there was nothing more to fix for s/pdif to work. Especially, as the s/pdif input of most Intel Mac's does not wotk with the Linux ALSA driver: ruclips.net/video/XgWcIGFSIsw/видео.html
The board you have out is the Octane Personal Video. If you want to sell it I will buy it from you. I've wanted one. It allows video capture and desktop capture.
The Octane has ps2, works just fine. The two matching Sgi keyboard I have are ps2, too. They work on my regular PCs, too. Source told me the Origin should also have ps2, although the manual labels them “reserved” do you know more? Ps: octane manual: “This is a standard pinout for PC PS/2 keyboards and mice. The mouse and keyboard are electrically PS/2 compatible. They also use the same protocol as the PC PS/2 keyboards and mice.” www.sgistuff.net/hardware/systems/documents/007-3435-003-octane.pdf
additionally to as seen in my previous videos, here is my latest motion picture plugging a brand new & beautiful USB/PS2 mechanical keyboard into the Sgi Octane´s PS/2 port and having it just working™ ;-)
Checked the site for that Linux distribution and sadly, my Indigo2 and Sun Sparcstation IPC are not listed. I tried getting IRIX installed on the I2 but alas, no license. I doubt I'll ever have either of them run.
sounds like the Indigo2 should work, you could use #t2sde to cross compile your mips system if nobody else supports it anymore: www.linux-mips.org/wiki/IP22 I actually have an upcoming video with a SPARCStation 2, so stay tuned. Your IPC may be even slower than that, so unfortunately not the most "fun", ...
It doesn't make sense to use an gcc release for improved compile times. If you need to sacrifice optimizations for less waiting around, your best bet is to disable expensive optimization passes, not use an older, buggier compiler.
well, new compiler also sometimes had new bugs, ... even with -O0 it was way slower, also the last maintenance release of a given gcc major version should also have been quite "bug minimized" after all they where usually good enough to build complex projects like the linux kernel, kde, firefox or chome, ...
yep, you do not want to ship it, and I guess the official service manual recommended lifting with two person, ... ;-) "The Octane cases are large (WxHxD: 30x40x35 cm) and heavy (25 kg), yet there are no internal 5.25" drive bays, so external CD-ROM drives must be connected if desired." - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGI_Octane
As the other month was the first time I ever got the Octane mostly stable and everything there is not yet an ISO release. If I would release what I have, you would need to network boot and low level mess around to get it installed on the disk drive. Including knowing about Sgi volume headers, and arcload and such. Do you think you know enough to attempt this? What kind of Octane do you have? I could try to get a fully tested, and installable real ISO build out in a month or two.
I have posted on nekochan a tutorial to use debian for a net install. I have already re-install IRIX, or OpenBSD on my machine. And also boot on a gentoo image. My octane is an octane 1, with MGRAS grahpics, R10k 350Mhz with 384Mo of RAM
well, beside I can get hardly any serious work done on an iPhone (or iPad), if I happen to have any battery charge left in that moment, ... :-/ I can run them even faster on an AMD Ryzen ;-) ruclips.net/video/jZNvj67PAEc/видео.html
ebay, craigslist? I hope you know what you wish for ;-) they are not really quiet, power hungry, heavy, and not that fast by modern standards, ..! Where are you located, and are you a developer?
0:33 Interesting that this other video ruclips.net/video/nC3t7OHxfzQ/видео.html from 1996 is already saying that an NT box is more cost-effective than SGI for running Softimage.
@@renerebe They made a lot of money from selling Windows. And so did Intel from its CPU chips. For the PC sellers, on the other hand, it was a race to the bottom.
What's the point of getting Linux to be stable on this machine, when a $35 raspberry pi can out-perform it? There's ThunderX Cavium systems now. I don't mean to trash this work, but I'm pointing out that the work is wasted. Make a Pineapple-Pi more stable. Everybody would appreciate that!
fun! a nice famous, outstanding, vintage quality Unix machine to collect, admire and get inspiration from ;-) For private MIPS64 fun a used Octane is certainly cheaper than a current Cavium system. I know, however, that some people use their professional solution on Octeon system with our #t2sde ;-) I also made a video regarding the performance of different vintage, high-end and modern systems, including two embedded SoC boards: ruclips.net/video/LMSIng6v-LU/видео.html
while I thought I was joking about it somewhere on twitter: twitter.com/renebln (can't find it right now), I guess it is, as the MIPS R10000 was one of the first CPUs that: "… features aggressive out of order execution including speculative execution of loads and stores." www.linux-mips.org/wiki/R10000
Quel boulot pour faire tourner cette vieille bécane ! Et en plus c'est bruyant. J'avais pensé mettre la main sur un Mac G5, puis, après m'être renseigné sur la consommation électrique et le bruit des ventilateurs, j'ai abandonné cette idée.
Merci for your comment! G5 indeed consume a bit of electricity, ... but maybe less than the Octane and they are way faster ;-) ruclips.net/video/O6gftviaOp4/видео.html
because I'm a Linux developer and use Linux on everything, also Irix is pretty outdated and unmaintained. With Linux I have all the latest and greatest tools and features, GCC, and such, ... ;-)
Sis is thicc high end graphic workstation from back in the day when Silicon Graphics Inc. was leading the game of high end 3D Unix workstation and invented all the fancy 3D hardware stuff and what lead to "Open"GL, ..! ;-)
Bits & more by René Rebe -> I prefer real time OS ‘s. Like. Pebble OS on my pebble time, it’s based out of an OS written by university students in Canada less - it’s called RTos
Yes, But it tastes just like the real thing. BTW. I first learned AT&T Sys V Unix on 3B and DEC PDP 11 Machines while working at AT&T in the early/mid 1980's. Don't get more *real* than that. I now admin AIX and Linux boxen. Also, what current OS would you consider real Unix? Because AT&T Sys V, *the* real Unix is long gone. All current Unixy OSes are fake to me. And Linux taste as much like the real thing to me as any. Even tastes better than the real thing with things like LVM, dynamic kernel modules and such. I do wish RedHat hadn't replaced init with upstart then systemd. But that is what Slackware is there for.
@@KevinHudsonL Any descendant of OpenSolaris, like Illuminos is 10000% more real UNIX that wanna-be Linux. Linux used to be OK in the 90s when the only thing community wanted was to COPY commercial UNIX. After commercial UNIX died by 2005 some very bad people took over Linux userland, people who either plain hated UNIX philosophy (and worshipped MACOS and Windows) or at least were not familiar with it. Now I feel the urge to wash my hands with soap after using modern Linux at work. I sickens me.
@@renerebe weiß ich doch... Hört man irgendwie bei jedem Deutschen (einschließlich mir, schätze ich) schon 5km gegen den Wind 😉 schönes Video btw. Wenn ich so an die Zeiten zurück denke, wo wir in den 90ern zur CeBIT sabbernd vor den sgi Maschinen standen 😁✌...
Yep, a second Octane found it's way to me with much better graphics (and slightly faster CPU): ruclips.net/video/0dchE5DHSIc/видео.html also tested and got the personal video option working: ruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html
An Sgi is not "nothing" ;-) many other people also apparently like it, however - one of my more successful videos, ..! Anything more specific you did not like?
Ich finde eher grauenhaft, dass man eine Octane mit Linux vergewaltigt und als Fazit 'nearly everything works, except graphics' herauskommt. Es gibt für MIPSlinux keine Software und ohne hw-3D, wofûr die Geräte designed wurden, sehe ich keinen Sinn in der Aktion. Was ich machen würde: Ausräumen, ATX Einschub und eine ordentliche Grafik rein, Quadro zB, dann ein Linux drauf, dann wäre es für mich ein sinnvolles Projekt - bzw wird es das. Was hatte die Octane für eine Grafikkeistung, 10GFlops vlt, mittlere Karten heute haben 5-20TFlops und es gibt gute Treiber!
I now also posted the disassembly and look inside the Sgi Octane! ruclips.net/video/l_V7vscKiwA/видео.html and a complete system backup dump for you to restore at home: www.patreon.com/posts/22225530/
The entire machine is designed with quality of the cooling in mind. Please consider using a kind of duct tape seal on the outside to close up the open port? This will help the health of the machine and boards. (PS I used to work in the support department at SGI replacing parts for SGI customer!)
yes, thank you, I indeed have cardboard in the open slot, but it looked too shabby for the video, so I temporarily took it out, ... even the low end 2x195MHz CPU board get's plenty hot though, I wonder how hot the 2x600MHz CPU module gets. Or is the later silicon that much more efficient, that it is "only" similar hot? ;-)
@@renerebe It was mainly the old MGRAS (Madigras) graphics card that got really hot. The later Odyssey V series V8/10/12 cards were a lot smaller and cooler running.
My hats off to you, the work involved with what you have done, is astounding. great job, i thought i was a nerd. Sheesh
thanks, original RE work (c) 2004-2007 Stanislaw Skowronek
I also had an "Octane" Workstation, it was an "SE R12k 300" model. Bought it back in 2003 for US $500. The list price was US $20k when new in 1997 (quote from SGI) I was able to find a disk set for IRIX 6.5.30. but I never got around to run Linux, but I thought about it & was aware of the MIPS64 port. It's nice to see that you finally got Linux working on this SGI box
RenéRebe please always continue your videos - they usually different/interesting relative to much of what else is on RUclips.
thanks, I plan to do, Sgi Octane disassembly comes soon, I just was too curious if the ps3 was still working: ruclips.net/video/6gsosetiTDU/видео.html ;-)
now also a disassembly and look inside the Octane ;-) ruclips.net/video/l_V7vscKiwA/видео.html
Linux saved this machine.
Nice. SGIs were always the coolest machines. I only briefly used AVS on an SGI at a visualisation course at Manchester University.
I love my Octane, sadly I don’t have much use for it. Still power it on from time to time and treat myself to some IRIX. Always get a kick out of the fact that I got the machine for 50€ in a yard sale in 2003.
Beautiful machine. Imagine if these became the top machines, instead of stupid x86 intels
Actually nowadays we use AMD64 which is an instruction set that Intel adopted from AMD... But they decided to call it "x64" because you know... It's never very nice for the corporation's image when you adopt something that a rival came up with. AMD is one of the major innovators in this industry, they always push Intel forward but Intel has it's own research and development of manufacturing processes which is something AMD does not. Reason why AMD is often behind Intel and Nvidia... (Nvidia also has it's own manufacturing processes although they have partners in order to supply worldwide demand.). So yeah AMD is more of a conceptual company, they come up with architectures and concepts such as HBM memory which Nvidia recently adopted, it was originally introduced by AMD. AMD is seriously the only company that always makes stuff that other corporations can use. Freesync for example while Nvidia loves being as proprietary as possible, seriously G-Sync requires Nvidia hardware for the monitor... While Freesync is being proposed as a new standard for all future monitors... And well while Nvidia is very on the proprietary side, Intel actually is a middle ground, they sometimes make things for everybody such as the ATX standard and USB type C but sometimes they also like to try proprietary shit... And also yeah the ATX standard is a very outdated design. The SGI workstations had a better internal design for sure. But it's hard to replace what is already an international standard.
It's more complicated than this; Agner Fog's "Stop the Instruction Set War" blog posts from 2009 go into the details a bit more. A few examples: AMD introduced 3DNow!, and Intel beat it with SSE. (AMD still supported 3DNow! until 2010.) Intel announced AVX, and AMD supported the first draft - but then Intel changed the plans and screwed up AMD's support.
With AMD64, you'll recall that Intel tried to push out Itanium before the market was ready to accept 64-bit software, so AMD64's backwards compatibility won the market that time. But I suppose this is a case where convenience is better than having a "light" instruction set. I remember reading that Itanium wasn't considered that good anyway, not enough Ryzen to keep it around (:
Well, x86 is also an overcomplicated CISC chaos. Look at all the variable instruction layouts (1 to 15 ot more bytes), overrides and such. No wonder modern intel CPUs recently have that many bugs. IMHO a modern RISC ISA with the size of the x86 dies could likely be more performant, energy efficiency and have less bugs.
Personally, I just don't like cisc. It is the inferior architecture, but, became the market winner due to lower cost.
@@renerebe The more I look at Apple's A12 & A12X the more I believe that modern RISC is a force to be reckoned with.
It was interesting listening to you. My version of having fun is my 2005 Powermac g5 that I like . Also have older Clevo laptop running Linux. Thanks for reading.
Oh a g5 I got too ruclips.net/video/aW559f6IRas/видео.html thanks for watching ;-)
sadly, SGI wasted their opportunity on migrating from Irix to GNU/Linux - quite sad - and now, sgi.com redirects us to a programmed-obsolescence company named hp...
YaY :D I just got me two of these Octane last weekend for my collection; this will tempt me to do some videos about SGIs as well :D
The NeXT colour machines also use a 13W3 connector. My NeXTstation Color has it directly on the botherboard. My NeXTcube has it on it's Dimension board.
To connect these on regular display, you have to make sure the display supports Sync-On-Green (SOG) or buy a SOG adaptor.
So, on my Cube, I have a 13W3 board connecting to a 13W3->VGA adaptor like this video shows, and that uses a VGA SOG converter which allows me to connect the cube with any cheap-o-matic display that has simple VGAs.
My Cube looks awesome with an ACER V176L 17" LCD display. Looks like it was made for it.
Back to SGIs...
Some 10 years ago, I gave away an Indigo and Indy workstations to a friend. He sold them both :-(
I was sometimes looking at used NeXTstation sales, but often they ended up going too high in price, ..! :-/ I though you need a special monitor / soundbox to connect the monitor / keyboard to them, no?
Correct. If you have the original greyscale NeXT Megapixel Display, all the keyboard/mouse connectors are on the back. When they went colour, they chose an Italian manufacturer, FIMI, to outsource the screen using a Mitsubishi tube. All the connectors were exteriorized in the SoundBox where the cube connects and the Y cable redirects to the FIMI monitor if you have a NeXTstation Color (black slab). If you have the NeXTcube with a NeXT Dimension board, then the SoundBox connects to the motherboard and the FIMI connects to the NeXT Dimension board using a separate cable. Only the colour machines uses the 13W3 connector. The greyscale machines (or the Cube motherboard if you dont have/use the Dimension board) uses some proprietary connector (DB15 or something like that).
Great video! May I suggest noise gating your mic so when you cut and edit your footage and audio, there are no jarring jumps in background noise?
while I usually try to avoid background noise in my videos, I internally wanted to record excessive fa noise in this one. As mentioned in the video, when I brought the Octane 10 years ago I did not expect it to be that loud & heavy, ...
You are awesome with this!!! I do t have a slightest clue what you do but I am fascinated. I use MX Linux in my T430s. Thankyou and I keep wTching trying comprehend and it is interesting.
This is really awesome!
thanks ;-)
I used to repair these machines back in the day. I worked for SG in De Meern in The Netherlands. They were used at the Dutch KNMI. The weather organization in The Netherlands
Amazing! Would love to hear details ;-)
Nice, good work! I was actually looking for Linux on Indigo (not Indigo2) information. I think it might be a lost cause, but if you have any pointers I'd take them.
I would love to get my hands on any SGI machine.
I have plenty available. :)
@@mapesdhs597 How can I reach you?
@@LuisReiss My main site is www.sgidepot.co.uk/sgi.html (with the for sale section link at the top, which has a Contact page; my Yahoo email is the best address to use), but note that the for-sale sections on the SGI forums at forums.sgi.net and forums.sgi.sh will likely have better prices than I can do just now, as I've become unexpectedly busy (atm I'm backlogged with requests until mid-Nov I reckon). Also check ebay, though prices are high there now, supply very low and quality often poor. It's a very different market compared to ten years ago, these days many SGI systems and various parts have become hard to find but are still in commercial demand, so things have become costly.
I was setting up Linux on my Octane Years before. There was not even a bootloader available so i hat to boot it via bootp, have Irix and on a separate Harddrive a Gentoo Linux Installation. Not bootet it for Years. It is simply beautiful. Contact me if you need Irix or some old SCSI Cables. Do you have a PCI Cage?
yeah, I also did it first in ~2006 for t2/#mips64 but it run really unstable back then. I installed Irix in another video (omg was that a pain, ..! ;-) ruclips.net/video/JS7VG-FuLg8/видео.html I unfortunately do not have a PCI Cage, ... yet.
Man, a cast iron chassis would certainly cut down on noise and vibe. Of course, old fans and 10k disks undo all of that.
Ironically many of the later 15K disks are near silent. I normally use the Fujitsu MAX3036NC 36GB 15K in Octane, an excellent drive. The MAS3367NC is also good, slightly less clicky, but I reserve those for O2s. Another good model is the Seagate ST336753LC, it runs almost silent, but I use these in IRIS Indigo, Indy and Indigo2 systems since the Fujitsus don't support narrow/SE SCSI (the 68pin versions do, but 68/50pin SCSI adapters are more expensive).
Linux 4.1x running on a 21 year old machine. You are insane :o
;-) even older but not as new kernel ruclips.net/video/A3O1YVUI9N4/видео.html
insanely awesome
I used to dream about these machines.....
And the IP30 support is now in mainline kernel, since 5.5. I used to follow the development on linux-mips when the original developer was doing the port at 2.6 time. Would have loved to be able to play with it, unfortunately I never got my hands on a Octane.
only platform support was merged, we still need to send all the drivers in, beside maybe eventually writing 3d support, or mode setting ,-) or 8-channel ADAT: ruclips.net/video/_YmgEitnI7E/видео.html
Without 3D acceleration this workstation doesn't mean much I think... CAD was the big deal of these machines back then. 90s PCs weren't even close to offering the same capabilities in CAD as this machine.
Sure, however, each entry level PC is faster today, for me the biggest benefit is having a MIPS64/Linux machine around - for MIPS development and testing - especially for embedded router / wireless boards a decade ago, ... t2sde.org Of course having such an famous machine in the collection is nice in any case. Some people collect vintage cards, others collect vintage computers ;-)
yeah, I often had binaries just segfault, not boot and such with Qemu - it is always something else to have actual hardware for the precision of what the transistors actually do. Also Qemu is not that fast without KVM, e.g. for SPARC it runs more like maybe 100MHz on my Core i7 Surface Pro. Not sure how fast it would be on a high end workstation, maybe like 200MHz? Though in theory Qemu supports SMP threading for some architectures to at least parallel speed this up a bit, But a 2x400 or 2x600 MHz Octane may still be faster that the current emulation. But of course we can also reverse and develop 2d/3d acceleration and of course I have it for my outstanding vintage machine collection in any case ;-)
Pcs and Macs back then was in there stone ages just for office use and basic tasks while big Amiga workstations 3000-4000 and silicon graphics was doing 1992 Jurassic Park fully CGI Amigas for pre render and SGIs from final render
What the purpose of using an SGI if not running IRIX? It is simply not make sense because any new cheaper hardware nowadays runs Linux better and much faster. The beauty of SGI is the IRIX!
Much better to invest some time to update parts of IRIX to more modern standards, compile new modern browsers and apps, etc.
the purpose is having a MIPS64 CPU, a modern, and security fixed OS, and in general being able to modify and develop with it ;-) There is zero point in developing for an obsolete OS without any ability to modify the OS and drivers, e.g. add modern X extension to the X server etc.
@@renerebe imagine making an Irix version of chrome with video acceleration and NUMA memory
Awesome video! What kind of I/O does that video board you removed have? Never seen one of those before
It's the Octane Personal Video board: www.siliconbunny.com/data_sheets/octane_personal_video.pdf
Can you post your patch set, and details on what toolchain you used to build it? This looks amazing! I had assumed getting modern Linux running on an Octane was a lost cause!
toolchain #t2sde trunk:HEAD should work, kernel patch set sorted in here: t2sde.org/packages/linux-ip30 I usually try to sort everything I do into #t2, next I need to apply for xorg account to push xf86-input-impact API update and the initial hwcursor glue.
if you have an Octane, a whole backup dump is not available for the audience to restore: www.patreon.com/posts/22225530/
I think all the silence truncation is a bit excessive. I like your videos, and really wouldn't mind longer winded talking, It's also really, really, jarring.
What a lot of other youtubers seem to do nowadays instead of cuts is to record the video and narrate over it.
thank you for your comment! I think my new editing is much improved, without the gaps that iMovie actually is doing internally on cuts, and I need to do extra work to hide and edit more clever and such. duping audio over it is not only more boring, it is also less authentic and more work. I did this for a few videos, like the Revox one (because my farther was moaning the grass, sigh): ruclips.net/video/051RnAp3XCs/видео.html or the Buggy drive: ruclips.net/video/MNb7P0inplI/видео.html IIRC others voiced they like "white working on it" content, and I personally also find this more authentic.
I like MIPS..yeah
Hi. Do these Sun 13W3-F to HD15-M VGA adapters work with every monitor?
Not necessary, if the graphic card outputs sync on green the monitor needs to support it too ...
Dank workstation
Could you perhaps do a video explaining how to install Linux on an octane?
Currently RAW like onto the HP/PA-RISC: ruclips.net/video/2Ge-0RFnvlU/видео.html I will work on bootable ISOs sometime soon. Sharing, subscribing and Patreon helps: patreon.com/renerebe
backup dump now online: www.patreon.com/posts/22225530/
That Personal Video board is so difficult to find...
Yeah, I guess I keep it for now ;-) ruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html
Get 3d acceleration working and then run quake
yeah, however getting 3d working in Linux will be a major reverse engineering effort.
I can certainly try to do this with the original Sgi Irix drivers ;-)
would the card support OpenGL ?
In Irix of course, as Sgi is the creator of OpenGL ;-) on Linux someone would need to finish reverse engineering and write an Mesa 3D driver: www.linux-mips.org/wiki/IMPACT
And before it was OpenGL, it was just GL. I used to do a tiny bit of programming with the Performer libraries some years ago.
You can run Doom Quake on Octane, on Irix.
ruclips.net/video/6RjCMPyM7nA/видео.html
8 channel adat is probably usable with things like RME external dacs
yep, got some Behringer ADC for testing: ruclips.net/video/_YmgEitnI7E/видео.html
Do you still have that open XIO slot? I can send you a blanking plate. I probably have a blanking plate for the front panel aswell. Do you also still have the video board?
Impressive work!! 8)
Thank you for your comment and thanks for asking Another view already send me an XIO cover a year ago ;-) I also still have the EVO video board: ruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html ruclips.net/video/l_V7vscKiwA/видео.html any particular reason you are asking?
@@renerebe Glad you got a cover for the slot! 8) I was wondering if you'd be willing to swap the video board for something; is there anything you need atm in terms of SGI items? I've been looking for an EVO board so that I can properly test a Cosmo2.
Cool
I understand how Linux people think now: these ports here and those ports here [...] can get it working with good knowledge of the kernel in a weekend or so. On a more serious note, can you do some tests on it? Something synthetic or something real world that we can compare to modern PCs or PCs of that time.
It takes way longer than a weekend, I'm not the original author, so I can only guess it took probably a year or two of reverse engineering. It took even me months of testing in 2006 to get it mostly working, and another week or two of off and on time last Decemebr to get it finally 99% okay-ish. I actually started to compile benchmark of all this diverse vintage and modern systems: ruclips.net/video/LMSIng6v-LU/видео.html of course the Sgi 3D hardware was more impressive, but that is hard to benchmark with all the different platforms and APIs of those days, ..!
Alter! Geiler Scheiß!
why not just run the version of irix 6.5 for that machine?
I use to use one at work, and it was a very nice version of Unix, and the SDI video card works correctly...
This is the 6.5.12 or so the machine came with - what does not match? I even got the personal “evo” video board to work w/ it a later day: Testing the Sgi Octane Personal Video board w/ the modded PowerVR Kyro II in Irixruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html
you mentioned that spdif worked, and you sounded surprised by it. Did it just 'fall into line' when you got the analogue audio working or did it require extra work from yourself?
the code was in the original port from 2006, but I could not be sure if it was well tested, and as I had to get the sound driver to work anyways, I was surprised there was nothing more to fix for s/pdif to work. Especially, as the s/pdif input of most Intel Mac's does not wotk with the Linux ALSA driver: ruclips.net/video/XgWcIGFSIsw/видео.html
cheers :) good vid!
The board you have out is the Octane Personal Video. If you want to sell it I will buy it from you. I've wanted one. It allows video capture and desktop capture.
Yep I googled sgi video boards and found the spec, too: ruclips.net/video/l_V7vscKiwA/видео.html
Why use Linux on a Unix workstation? :) You have lots of BSD distributions you can use.
Petar Lončarević because I like it more, and maintain a whole distribution (#t2sde). This is my mips64 reference test hardware ;-)
Unfortunately only OpenBSD seems to be able to run, and that's without X.
Those actually are not ps2 ports they are proprietary ports for sgi computer and keyboards. DO NOT PLUG IN A STANDARD PS2 KEYBOARD IT WILL FRY IT.
The Octane has ps2, works just fine. The two matching Sgi keyboard I have are ps2, too. They work on my regular PCs, too. Source told me the Origin should also have ps2, although the manual labels them “reserved” do you know more? Ps: octane manual: “This is a standard pinout for PC PS/2 keyboards and mice. The mouse and keyboard are electrically PS/2 compatible. They also use the same protocol as the PC PS/2 keyboards and mice.” www.sgistuff.net/hardware/systems/documents/007-3435-003-octane.pdf
additionally to as seen in my previous videos, here is my latest motion picture plugging a brand new & beautiful USB/PS2 mechanical keyboard into the Sgi Octane´s PS/2 port and having it just working™ ;-)
Checked the site for that Linux distribution and sadly, my Indigo2 and Sun Sparcstation IPC are not listed. I tried getting IRIX installed on the I2 but alas, no license. I doubt I'll ever have either of them run.
sounds like the Indigo2 should work, you could use #t2sde to cross compile your mips system if nobody else supports it anymore: www.linux-mips.org/wiki/IP22
I actually have an upcoming video with a SPARCStation 2, so stay tuned. Your IPC may be even slower than that, so unfortunately not the most "fun", ...
Mh the heavy german accent, delicious!
It doesn't make sense to use an gcc release for improved compile times. If you need to sacrifice optimizations for less waiting around, your best bet is to disable expensive optimization passes, not use an older, buggier compiler.
well, new compiler also sometimes had new bugs, ... even with -O0 it was way slower, also the last maintenance release of a given gcc major version should also have been quite "bug minimized" after all they where usually good enough to build complex projects like the linux kernel, kde, firefox or chome, ...
25KG! 😱
yep, you do not want to ship it, and I guess the official service manual recommended lifting with two person, ... ;-) "The Octane cases are large (WxHxD: 30x40x35 cm) and heavy (25 kg), yet there are no internal 5.25" drive bays, so external CD-ROM drives must be connected if desired." - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SGI_Octane
I just realised they were made in Switzerland! instagram.com/p/Brf045shPdi/
I only found t2sde unstable 9.0 for mips32r2 ... which one for my octane? Did you try some apps like firefox or another window manager?
As the other month was the first time I ever got the Octane mostly stable and everything there is not yet an ISO release. If I would release what I have, you would need to network boot and low level mess around to get it installed on the disk drive. Including knowing about Sgi volume headers, and arcload and such. Do you think you know enough to attempt this? What kind of Octane do you have? I could try to get a fully tested, and installable real ISO build out in a month or two.
I have posted on nekochan a tutorial to use debian for a net install. I have already re-install IRIX, or OpenBSD on my machine. And also boot on a gentoo image. My octane is an octane 1, with MGRAS grahpics, R10k 350Mhz with 384Mo of RAM
full backup image for restore now available: www.patreon.com/posts/t2-sde-linux-for-22225530
And now you can run the programs faster on you iPhone
well, beside I can get hardly any serious work done on an iPhone (or iPad), if I happen to have any battery charge left in that moment, ... :-/ I can run them even faster on an AMD Ryzen ;-) ruclips.net/video/jZNvj67PAEc/видео.html
How much do these cost? I really want one!
ebay, craigslist? I hope you know what you wish for ;-) they are not really quiet, power hungry, heavy, and not that fast by modern standards, ..! Where are you located, and are you a developer?
@@renerebe a random.fan, random.wish. they want try everything they don't understand.
0:33 Interesting that this other video ruclips.net/video/nC3t7OHxfzQ/видео.html from 1996 is already saying that an NT box is more cost-effective than SGI for running Softimage.
it's no secret Bill Gates & Microsoft were always good in copying quickly and outselling competition and dumping prices ;-)
@@renerebe They made a lot of money from selling Windows. And so did Intel from its CPU chips. For the PC sellers, on the other hand, it was a race to the bottom.
What's the point of getting Linux to be stable on this machine, when a $35 raspberry pi can out-perform it?
There's ThunderX Cavium systems now.
I don't mean to trash this work, but I'm pointing out that the work is wasted. Make a Pineapple-Pi more stable. Everybody would appreciate that!
fun! a nice famous, outstanding, vintage quality Unix machine to collect, admire and get inspiration from ;-) For private MIPS64 fun a used Octane is certainly cheaper than a current Cavium system. I know, however, that some people use their professional solution on Octeon system with our #t2sde ;-) I also made a video regarding the performance of different vintage, high-end and modern systems, including two embedded SoC boards: ruclips.net/video/LMSIng6v-LU/видео.html
But... is it affected by the Specter problem? ;)
while I thought I was joking about it somewhere on twitter: twitter.com/renebln (can't find it right now), I guess it is, as the MIPS R10000 was one of the first CPUs that: "… features aggressive out of order execution including speculative execution of loads and stores." www.linux-mips.org/wiki/R10000
Quel boulot pour faire tourner cette vieille bécane ! Et en plus c'est bruyant. J'avais pensé mettre la main sur un Mac G5, puis, après m'être renseigné sur la consommation électrique et le bruit des ventilateurs, j'ai abandonné cette idée.
Merci for your comment! G5 indeed consume a bit of electricity, ... but maybe less than the Octane and they are way faster ;-) ruclips.net/video/O6gftviaOp4/видео.html
What a nice machine, but why to use linux on it ?
because I'm a Linux developer and use Linux on everything, also Irix is pretty outdated and unmaintained. With Linux I have all the latest and greatest tools and features, GCC, and such, ... ;-)
wat is sis?
Sis is thicc high end graphic workstation from back in the day when Silicon Graphics Inc. was leading the game of high end 3D Unix workstation and invented all the fancy 3D hardware stuff and what lead to "Open"GL, ..! ;-)
2 64 bit cpu running att almost 300 Mhz ....
So.. like a really underclocked adreno
Not really, but also two decades later.
@@renerebe I bet the ipc is better on the adreno
What do you even mean? The GPU or Arduino?
@@renerebe no the ipc of the cpu:s respective
@@matsv201 Adreno is a GPU, not a CPU. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adreno
Your english is very german.
Thank you!
Leave him alone, idiot. Where is your channel? Considering you are looking up $200 macbooks, you seem very poor, including in the brain. Idiot.
linux is fake UNIX
You mean a modern, rewritten from scratch with extended APIs reimplementation? What else do you prefer?
Bits & more by René Rebe -> I prefer real time OS ‘s. Like. Pebble OS on my pebble time, it’s based out of an OS written by university students in Canada less - it’s called RTos
Yes, But it tastes just like the real thing. BTW. I first learned AT&T Sys V Unix on 3B and DEC PDP 11 Machines while working at AT&T in the early/mid 1980's. Don't get more *real* than that. I now admin AIX and Linux boxen. Also, what current OS would you consider real Unix? Because AT&T Sys V, *the* real Unix is long gone. All current Unixy OSes are fake to me. And Linux taste as much like the real thing to me as any. Even tastes better than the real thing with things like LVM, dynamic kernel modules and such. I do wish RedHat hadn't replaced init with upstart then systemd. But that is what Slackware is there for.
Slackware and t2 ;-)
@@KevinHudsonL Any descendant of OpenSolaris, like Illuminos is 10000% more real UNIX that wanna-be Linux. Linux used to be OK in the 90s when the only thing community wanted was to COPY commercial UNIX. After commercial UNIX died by 2005 some very bad people took over Linux userland, people who either plain hated UNIX philosophy (and worshipped MACOS and Windows) or at least were not familiar with it. Now I feel the urge to wash my hands with soap after using modern Linux at work. I sickens me.
This has no future... next to today's computers, it's a toy! Trash
You never go to a Museum or read a history book?
@@renerebe ...the world changed!
the world changed and now noone reads books and visits museums anymore?
@@renerebe ...is now just visit the grave of Steve Jobs 1955-2011
Gottverdammt... Learn to pronounce "TH" in a less german way ;-)
Gottverdammt nein, as I'm German ;-)
@@renerebe weiß ich doch... Hört man irgendwie bei jedem Deutschen (einschließlich mir, schätze ich) schon 5km gegen den Wind 😉 schönes Video btw. Wenn ich so an die Zeiten zurück denke, wo wir in den 90ern zur CeBIT sabbernd vor den sgi Maschinen standen 😁✌...
Yep, a second Octane found it's way to me with much better graphics (and slightly faster CPU): ruclips.net/video/0dchE5DHSIc/видео.html also tested and got the personal video option working: ruclips.net/video/gJsC_lKMQHM/видео.html
god you talk to much , about nothing
An Sgi is not "nothing" ;-) many other people also apparently like it, however - one of my more successful videos, ..! Anything more specific you did not like?
Dein englisch ist grauenhaft
Merci. Dein Kommentar auch ;-)
Ich finde eher grauenhaft, dass man eine Octane mit Linux vergewaltigt und als Fazit 'nearly everything works, except graphics' herauskommt.
Es gibt für MIPSlinux keine Software und ohne hw-3D, wofûr die Geräte designed wurden, sehe ich keinen Sinn in der Aktion.
Was ich machen würde: Ausräumen, ATX Einschub und eine ordentliche Grafik rein, Quadro zB, dann ein Linux drauf, dann wäre es für mich ein sinnvolles Projekt - bzw wird es das.
Was hatte die Octane für eine Grafikkeistung, 10GFlops vlt, mittlere Karten heute haben 5-20TFlops und es gibt gute Treiber!