SGI Indigo acquired! (EDIT: now working)

LarBob

Administrator
Feb 8, 2019
51
27
18
Welp, I've acquired an R3000 Indigo w/ XS LG1 graphics! It's a very pretty machine, here's a picture:

However, I've had basically no luck in getting any meaningful output from the thing.

I've tried multiple SoG capable monitors to no avail through the XS' VGA output and the 13w3 output with a couple of different adapters.
Over serial, luck isn't much better. I managed to find my Apple serial/printer cable and sanity checked it by using ZTerm on a Quadra 610 talking to an Indy and it works perfectly. However, no dice when it comes to the Indigo:
(That square character sometimes shows when I switch the Indigo on, otherwise the cursor blinks a couple times rapidly, so something is happening! :p)
I'm using 96008N1 which I believe should be correct for the Indigo.

For reference, the green light on the CPU board lights up just fine and the hard disk I inserted spins up as well.

I've taken the CPU board and the graphics board out and given the connectors on all of them a good clean. The boards all look pristine and the machine seems to be in pretty nice condition besides the whole "not working" thing.

EDIT: I've just replaced the clock battery, but haven't noticed any difference besides a different character sometimes showing up when I flip the power switch over serial: I almost wonder if `dbaud` has been changed or something, but I've tried multiple different baud rates to no avail.

EDIT 2: Also, I realized that in the owner's guide it mentions that the LED should be amber upon turning the machine on while it does power-on tests, but my Indigo doesn't do this. The LED is simply always green.

EDIT 3: I uploaded a video of the 4.0.5F tour. Somewhat amusing.
 
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Elf

Storybook / Retired, ex-staff
Feb 4, 2019
792
252
63
Mountain West (US)
Hm, if the cursor is blinking rapidly it must be receiving some non-printable characters? Does your terminal emulator let you show those raw? If not I think there are ones that do, or alternatively you could try a logic analyzer with RS-232 decode. Still may not get you too much closer to figuring out the issue though...
 

dexter1

New member
Jul 26, 2019
12
11
3
Zoetermeer, the Netherlands
Is there a 93cs56 eeprom present in the backplane? If you look inside with the main board removed there should be a small "bug" at the lower left of the PCB backplane, right next to the white barcode label
 

LarBob

Administrator
Feb 8, 2019
51
27
18
Is there a 93cs56 eeprom present in the backplane? If you look inside with the main board removed there should be a small "bug" at the lower left of the PCB backplane, right next to the white barcode label
Yep, I can see it in there.
 

dexter1

New member
Jul 26, 2019
12
11
3
Zoetermeer, the Netherlands
Pull out the graphics board and hook up the serial nullmodem cable. There is a problem with the Indigo not defaulting to serial (console d) when the graphics board is in place, instead it remains on "console g"

With the XS24 board removed you should be able to connect to the PROM and issue "setenv console d"

Then turn off the indigo, put the GFX board back in and start it. The console should now stick to the serial port
 
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LarBob

Administrator
Feb 8, 2019
51
27
18
Pull out the graphics board and hook up the serial nullmodem cable. There is a problem with the Indigo not defaulting to serial (console d) when the graphics board is in place, instead it remains on "console g"

With the XS24 board removed you should be able to connect to the PROM and issue "setenv console d"

Then turn off the indigo, put the GFX board back in and start it. The console should now stick to the serial port
I tried that a few days ago to no avail. Also, I dumped the EPROM on the mainboard earlier and it's seemingly corrupted, so I think that might be the issue? I'm attempting to erase the EPROM now.
 
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LarBob

Administrator
Feb 8, 2019
51
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Okay, here's an update:

I wrote this dump: http://mirror.rqsall.com/prom/IP12_Indigo/ip12prom.070-8088-002.u56 (SGI Version 4.0.1 Rev D LG1/GR2, Mar 24, 1992) and managed to get the boot chime and the light to turn yellow like it was running power on diagnostics, but garbage was outputted over serial ( ). After this semi-successful power on, I've had no luck since. The front light stays green and there is no chime.

EDIT: We have liftoff! I reseated the EPROM and all of the boards:
 
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LarBob

Administrator
Feb 8, 2019
51
27
18
Huh? You switched graphics boards? The PROM states an LG1.

Although reflashing the PROM means that you now have the ability to run the XS24
I was just basing it off of the XS badge on the front, to be honest. Now I know. :p

The first thing I'd like to upgrade in the machine if anything is the RAM.
 

dexter1

New member
Jul 26, 2019
12
11
3
Zoetermeer, the Netherlands
Badges were used on the R4000 Indigo's, the R3000 Indigo's had silk screening "XS8" "XS24" and "Elan" in calligraphic writing on the front door.
The badges are becoming uncommon, but that can be said for Indigo's in general.

R3000 Memory is special, you need to get some from resellers or get lucky from Ebay.
 

LarBob

Administrator
Feb 8, 2019
51
27
18
Badges were used on the R4000 Indigo's, the R3000 Indigo's had silk screening "XS8" "XS24" and "Elan" in calligraphic writing on the front door.
The badges are becoming uncommon, but that can be said for Indigo's in general.
Er, yeah, I meant the silkscreened XS on the front. Whoops.

dexter1 said:
R3000 Memory is special, you need to get some from resellers or get lucky from Ebay.
Indeed it is, luckily I'm in no rush to find more. Someday!
 

ghost180sx

Active member
Dec 13, 2019
144
55
28
The Great White North
Wow that's crazy! Someone in my town has what I'm quite sure is an R3K for sale. They want $300, but offered me $250 or so when I contacted them. i haven't bit yet.

Interestingly, she says it has low-end graphics, but also has the XS badging on the case. Perhaps they were all like this?
 

massiverobot

irix detailer
Feb 8, 2019
121
108
43
Philly
twitter.com
OMG grab that. I really want a R3000 Indigo, I have the R4000 Elan and of course I'd rather have a stock system that is more 'original.' The R4000 Elan is cool that it supportes OGL 1.0, but it's really just like a I2 in Indigo skins....

Yeah my Indigo was prob upgraded, it does not have the cute plastic external Elan badge.....

Also what larbob has done is amazing.
 

neilo40

New member
Jul 28, 2020
2
3
3
Hi there,

I have an R4K Indigo showing exactly the same behavior (light stays green, never amber). I took a dump of the EPROM and I see exactly what Elf mentioned:

Code:
neil@neil-desktop:~/IRIX/Indigo$ strings ip20prom.070-8116-004.BE.bin | head
5)43
5)C2
!H$5)
%)#
?X+9J
(!4E 
@`!4
Memory diagnostic (memory probe) *FAILED*
    No usable memory found.  Make sure you have a full bank (4 SIMMs).

neil@neil-desktop:~/IRIX/Indigo$ strings dump.bin | head
)534   
)52C   
$H)5
+XJ9
!(E4 
    #"0
$ ?
eMomyrd aingsoit cm(mero yrpbo)e* AFLIDE
oNu aslb eemomyrf uodn .M ka eusery uoh va e aufllb na k4(S MIsM.)
aBkn
Hopefully when my eraser arrives I'll be able to recover it in the same way...
 
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