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Matt Turner <mattst88@g.o> writes: |
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> Hello, |
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> |
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> Our build and testing machine which was graciously hosted for free for |
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> many years has been decommissioned. I had planned to host an |
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> AlphaServer ES47 and a DS20L at a local university, but the DS20L blew |
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> a capacitor and the ES47 has never been stable enough to warrant using |
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> it for much more than a personal testing machine. I personally have |
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> other machines (UP1500, PC164{,LX,BX,SX}, DP264) but they're not ideal |
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> for building installation media and offering remote build testing |
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> access to multiple developers. I also have 2x 600MHz DS10Ls which |
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> could presumably be hosted at OSUOSL, but again, single CPU 600MHz |
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> systems are pretty useless as a replacement for our quad-CPU ES40. |
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> |
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> Ideally we'd have the DS20L fixed and the ES47 stabilized and then |
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> continue using them. That would require: |
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> |
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> (1) I would be able to replace the capacitors on the DS20L and have it |
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> working again, but I tried and the new ones blew up too, so that's |
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> evidently just a symptom of the problem and not the problem itself. |
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> Electrical engineering advice required if this is to be fixed. |
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Capacitors generally explode only from overvoltage. Without seeing the |
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circuit, it's hard to give more specific advice. |
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> (2) I would be able to figure out what's causing the ES47 to be |
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> unstable. It seems to lock up under load but I haven't really made |
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> much progress beyond that. |
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Power supply? Maybe a bad capacitor. |
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> So we're considering various options. Should we stop alpha support all |
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> together? Should we replace stable alpha keywords with ~alpha? Should |
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> we make the alpha profiles unstable and allow dependency breakage? |
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> Should we try to find another suitable build machine and host it? |
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> |
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> I guess the answer to some of these will depend on how many |
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> Gentoo/alpha users there are. I personally would like to keep alpha |
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> support alive, while reducing the amount of work to keep it going. |
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> |
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> So, do we have users? Do they have opinions? Can they offer help? |
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I have an Alpha with Gentoo, but I can't really say I use it. |
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-- |
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Måns Rullgård |
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