more trouble with Sun Blade 1000

Hi again.

I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
result in the same thing happening. I was finally able to get the
system to power on and boot, but almost immediately I got a thermal
shutdown notice (citing a temperature of 127--both fans were working
though).

I should point out that my other Blade 1000 showed very similar power-
on difficulties with its dual 750MHz processors. I finally got fed up
with having to hit the power button several times before it would stay
on, and I swapped the HDs and memory from that machine to this current
one which also started with dual 750's. This power-on problem only
started happening again after the upgrade to 900's. With the older
machine, though, I never got thermal warnings after finally powering
on; in fact, if I could actually get it to boot, it would stay up for
days without any problems.

I've seen this sort of behavior (machine will power everything for a
few seconds before shutting down) in an x86 machine that had a faulty
motherboard, but this is now happening in two separate motherboards so
I am skeptical that this is the case here. I found that unplugging
the DVD and disks did not help anyway, so the problem must lie with
the CPUs, motherboard, memory, or power supply.

Does anyone have any ideas? I was hoping that the power-on issues I
was having with my first Blade 1000 would be fixed by moving the ram/
disks to this new one, but now they've cropped up again and I don't
know what component would be at fault here.

Thanks much

glenn k. lockwood

glennklockwood wrote:
> Hi again.
>
> I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
> just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
> fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
> button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
> lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
> come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
> result in the same thing happening. I was finally able to get the
> system to power on and boot, but almost immediately I got a thermal
> shutdown notice (citing a temperature of 127--both fans were working
> though).
>
> I should point out that my other Blade 1000 showed very similar power-
> on difficulties with its dual 750MHz processors. I finally got fed up
> with having to hit the power button several times before it would stay
> on, and I swapped the HDs and memory from that machine to this current
> one which also started with dual 750's. This power-on problem only
> started happening again after the upgrade to 900's. With the older
> machine, though, I never got thermal warnings after finally powering
> on; in fact, if I could actually get it to boot, it would stay up for
> days without any problems.
>
> I've seen this sort of behavior (machine will power everything for a
> few seconds before shutting down) in an x86 machine that had a faulty
> motherboard, but this is now happening in two separate motherboards so
> I am skeptical that this is the case here. I found that unplugging
> the DVD and disks did not help anyway, so the problem must lie with
> the CPUs, motherboard, memory, or power supply.
>
> Does anyone have any ideas? I was hoping that the power-on issues I
> was having with my first Blade 1000 would be fixed by moving the ram/
> disks to this new one, but now they've cropped up again and I don't
> know what component would be at fault here.
>
> Thanks much
>
> glenn k. lockwood


Have you tried each 900 MHz CPU individually? It could of course be a
fault in one of the CPUs. You could also try reducing the RAM, so see if
you could find a dodgy ram module.

I've got a blade 2000 with a pair of 1200's and 8 GB of RAM and never
had any problems like that.



--
I respectfully request that this message is not archived by companies as
unscrupulous as 'Experts Exchange' . In case you are unaware,
'Experts Exchange' take questions posted on the web and try to find
idiots stupid enough to pay for the answers, which were posted freely
by others. They are leeches.

glennklockwood schrieb:
> Hi again.
>
> I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
> just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
> fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
> button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
> lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
> come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
> result in the same thing happening. I was finally able to get the
> system to power on and boot, but almost immediately I got a thermal
> shutdown notice (citing a temperature of 127--both fans were working
> though).
>
> I should point out that my other Blade 1000 showed very similar power-
> on difficulties with its dual 750MHz processors. I finally got fed up
> with having to hit the power button several times before it would stay
> on, and I swapped the HDs and memory from that machine to this current
> one which also started with dual 750's. This power-on problem only
> started happening again after the upgrade to 900's. With the older
> machine, though, I never got thermal warnings after finally powering
> on; in fact, if I could actually get it to boot, it would stay up for
> days without any problems.
>
> I've seen this sort of behavior (machine will power everything for a
> few seconds before shutting down) in an x86 machine that had a faulty
> motherboard, but this is now happening in two separate motherboards so
> I am skeptical that this is the case here. I found that unplugging
> the DVD and disks did not help anyway, so the problem must lie with
> the CPUs, motherboard, memory, or power supply.
>
> Does anyone have any ideas? I was hoping that the power-on issues I
> was having with my first Blade 1000 would be fixed by moving the ram/
> disks to this new one, but now they've cropped up again and I don't
> know what component would be at fault here.
>
> Thanks much
>
> glenn k. lockwood
Blade 1000/2000 CPU modules are very sensitive. Have you used the
provided tool to attach them? In my experience your kind of problems is
caused by badly fixed CPUs. You should try to remove them and insert
them again (one by one).

Regards
Andreas

On 2009-07-05, Dave <> wrote:
> glennklockwood wrote:
>> Hi again.
>>
>> I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
>> just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
>> fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
>> button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
>> lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
>> come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
>> result in the same thing happening.

I have exactly the same problem with my (now retired) S/B 2000. Tightening
the CPU mounting screws reduced it from "every time" to "occasionally" so
I really ought to take them out and reseat them.

BTW, the machine is for sale (I'm in the UK) if anyone wants it.

--
http://hyperangry.blogspot.com/
[email me, if you must, at huge {at} huge (dot) org <dot> uk]

Andreas Wacknitz wrote:
> glennklockwood schrieb:
>> Hi again.
>>
>> I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
>> just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
>> fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
>> button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
>> lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
>> come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
>> result in the same thing happening. I was finally able to get the
>> system to power on and boot, but almost immediately I got a thermal
>> shutdown notice (citing a temperature of 127--both fans were working
>> though).
know what component would be at fault here.
>>
>> Thanks much
>>
>> glenn k. lockwood
> Blade 1000/2000 CPU modules are very sensitive. Have you used the
> provided tool to attach them? In my experience your kind of problems is
> caused by badly fixed CPUs. You should try to remove them and insert
> them again (one by one).
>
> Regards
> Andreas

Intersting you say that. I've a Blade 2000 with a couple of 1200 MHz
CPUs and on two or 3 occasions it has crashed with an error indicting a
CPU problem.

That said, I've had the machine at least 3 years, so once/year is not
too serious an issue me what basically is a home computer. If they are
as sensitive as you say, I might end up making it worst. Since it
happens so rarely, I'd never really know if I fixed it anyway.

On at least as many occasions the machine has crashed when the mains
power failed (it's not on a UPS any longer, after two Compaq 5 kW UPSs I
owned have blown up.)

So I'll leave well alone, despite the very occasional crash which
appears to be CPU related.

--
I respectfully request that this message is not archived by companies as
unscrupulous as 'Experts Exchange' . In case you are unaware,
'Experts Exchange' take questions posted on the web and try to find
idiots stupid enough to pay for the answers, which were posted freely
by others. They are leeches.

Huge wrote:
> On 2009-07-05, Dave <> wrote:
>> glennklockwood wrote:
>>> Hi again.
>>>
>>> I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
>>> just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
>>> fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
>>> button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
>>> lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
>>> come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
>>> result in the same thing happening.
>
> I have exactly the same problem with my (now retired) S/B 2000. Tightening
> the CPU mounting screws reduced it from "every time" to "occasionally" so
> I really ought to take them out and reseat them.
>
> BTW, the machine is for sale (I'm in the UK) if anyone wants it.
>

As a matter of interest, what are you replacing it with? I assume it's
not going to be Microsoft's Windows Vista 7!

I'm thinking of retiring my Blade 2000 on the grounds that buying a
newer machine will actually pay for itself in reduced electricity costs.
I've never actually measured what my Blade 2000 users in power, but a
medium size room gets very hot with it going. It pretty well packed,
with a pair of 147 GB 15,000 rpm disks, 2 x 1200 MHx and 8 GN RAM,
SunPCi card, DVD drive (IDE based with SCSI -> IDE convert), tape drive etc.

Not sure if my wife will buy the 'save electricity' excuse for an
upgrade, but that thing sure uses some power.

Dave
--
I respectfully request that this message is not archived by companies as
unscrupulous as 'Experts Exchange' . In case you are unaware,
'Experts Exchange' take questions posted on the web and try to find
idiots stupid enough to pay for the answers, which were posted freely
by others. They are leeches.

On 2009-07-05, Dave <> wrote:
> Huge wrote:
>> On 2009-07-05, Dave <> wrote:
>>> glennklockwood wrote:
>>>> Hi again.
>>>>
>>>> I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
>>>> just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. The system worked
>>>> fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
>>>> button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
>>>> lights up), then it shut off. There isn't enough time for anything to
>>>> come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
>>>> result in the same thing happening.
>>
>> I have exactly the same problem with my (now retired) S/B 2000. Tightening
>> the CPU mounting screws reduced it from "every time" to "occasionally" so
>> I really ought to take them out and reseat them.
>>
>> BTW, the machine is for sale (I'm in the UK) if anyone wants it.
>>
>
> As a matter of interest, what are you replacing it with? I assume it's
> not going to be Microsoft's Windows Vista 7!

Tee-hee. No, Ubuntu Linux.

> I'm thinking of retiring my Blade 2000 on the grounds that buying a
> newer machine will actually pay for itself in reduced electricity costs.

Exactly the same thinking as myself. Plus a 3GHz Core Duo runs rings round
a 2x1200MHzCu SPARC, I'm afraid. And there's a lot more desktop software
available for Linux than Solaris.

I'd still run Solaris for servers, though.

--
http://hyperangry.blogspot.com/
[email me, if you must, at huge {at} huge (dot) org <dot> uk]

On 2009-07-05, Huge <> wrote:

>> As a matter of interest, what are you replacing it with? I assume it's
>> not going to be Microsoft's Windows Vista 7!
>
> Tee-hee. No, Ubuntu Linux.

One thing I forgot to mention - it isn't "replacing" but "replaced". I've
been running Ubuntu since just before Xmas and I'm mostly very happy
with it. The S/B 2000 is a doorstop, now.

I have an 8mm DAT drive, a 6 way multipack and a PCI SCSI card for sale,
too. And a big stack of 9Gb SCSI disks.

--
http://hyperangry.blogspot.com/
[email me, if you must, at huge {at} huge (dot) org <dot> uk]

On Jul 5, 2:36*am, Andreas Wacknitz <a.wackn...@gmx.de> wrote:
> glennklockwood schrieb:
>
> > Hi again.
>
> > I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
> > just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. *The system worked
> > fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
> > button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
> > lights up), then it shut off. *There isn't enough time for anything to
> > come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
> > result in the same thing happening. *I was finally able to get the
> > system to power on and boot, but almost immediately I got a thermal
> > shutdown notice (citing a temperature of 127--both fans were working
> > though).
>
> > I should point out that my other Blade 1000 showed very similar power-
> > on difficulties with its dual 750MHz processors. *I finally got fed up
> > with having to hit the power button several times before it would stay
> > on, and I swapped the HDs and memory from that machine to this current
> > one which also started with dual 750's. *This power-on problem only
> > started happening again after the upgrade to 900's. *With the older
> > machine, though, I never got thermal warnings after finally powering
> > on; in fact, if I could actually get it to boot, it would stay up for
> > days without any problems.
>
> > I've seen this sort of behavior (machine will power everything for a
> > few seconds before shutting down) in an x86 machine that had a faulty
> > motherboard, but this is now happening in two separate motherboards so
> > I am skeptical that this is the case here. *I found that unplugging
> > the DVD and disks did not help anyway, so the problem must lie with
> > the CPUs, motherboard, memory, or power supply.
>
> > Does anyone have any ideas? *I was hoping that the power-on issues I
> > was having with my first Blade 1000 would be fixed by moving the ram/
> > disks to this new one, but now they've cropped up again and I don't
> > know what component would be at fault here.
>
> > Thanks much
>
> > glenn k. lockwood
>
> Blade 1000/2000 CPU modules are very sensitive. Have you used the
> provided tool to attach them? In my experience your kind of problems is
> caused by badly fixed CPUs. You should try to remove them and insert
> them again (one by one).
>
> Regards
> Andreas

As an update, it in fact was an issue with a CPU module. In this
case, apparently one of the 900MHz processors I bought was bad. I did
try re-seating and re-torquing each module using the cylindrical
torque wrench provided in the SB2k's, and I found that the system
would not boot with one specific module in either CPU0 or CPU1. It's
strange that the module did work the first few times after it arrived
but broke very soon after. The guy who sold it to me must've cracked
an egg into its radiator.

Now I am left with the choice of using one working 900MHz module or a
pair of 750MHz modules. Given the electricity that these things pull
and the trouble I've been having with hardware, though, maybe it's
time I just sold these two Blade 1000's off and save the money I've
been spending on their maintenance on a new x86.

Thanks for the insight, everyone.

glenn k. lockwood

On Jul 5, 11:05*am, glennklockwood <glennklockw...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Jul 5, 2:36*am, Andreas Wacknitz <a.wackn...@gmx.de> wrote:
>
>
>
> > glennklockwood schrieb:
>
> > > Hi again.
>
> > > I've been having a peculiar problem with my Sun Blade 1000, which I
> > > just upgraded to dual 900MHz US-III Cu processors. *The system worked
> > > fine for a few days, but today I found that when I pressed the power
> > > button, it powered on for two to three seconds (fans start, front
> > > lights up), then it shut off. *There isn't enough time for anythingto
> > > come across the serial console, and subsequent attempts to power on
> > > result in the same thing happening. *I was finally able to get the
> > > system to power on and boot, but almost immediately I got a thermal
> > > shutdown notice (citing a temperature of 127--both fans were working
> > > though).
>
> > > I should point out that my other Blade 1000 showed very similar power-
> > > on difficulties with its dual 750MHz processors. *I finally got fedup
> > > with having to hit the power button several times before it would stay
> > > on, and I swapped the HDs and memory from that machine to this current
> > > one which also started with dual 750's. *This power-on problem only
> > > started happening again after the upgrade to 900's. *With the older
> > > machine, though, I never got thermal warnings after finally powering
> > > on; in fact, if I could actually get it to boot, it would stay up for
> > > days without any problems.
>
> > > I've seen this sort of behavior (machine will power everything for a
> > > few seconds before shutting down) in an x86 machine that had a faulty
> > > motherboard, but this is now happening in two separate motherboards so
> > > I am skeptical that this is the case here. *I found that unplugging
> > > the DVD and disks did not help anyway, so the problem must lie with
> > > the CPUs, motherboard, memory, or power supply.
>
> > > Does anyone have any ideas? *I was hoping that the power-on issues I
> > > was having with my first Blade 1000 would be fixed by moving the ram/
> > > disks to this new one, but now they've cropped up again and I don't
> > > know what component would be at fault here.
>
> > > Thanks much
>
> > > glenn k. lockwood
>
> > Blade 1000/2000 CPU modules are very sensitive. Have you used the
> > provided tool to attach them? In my experience your kind of problems is
> > caused by badly fixed CPUs. You should try to remove them and insert
> > them again (one by one).
>
> > Regards
> > Andreas
>
> As an update, it in fact was an issue with a CPU module. *In this
> case, apparently one of the 900MHz processors I bought was bad. *I did
> try re-seating and re-torquing each module using the cylindrical
> torque wrench provided in the SB2k's, and I found that the system
> would not boot with one specific module in either CPU0 or CPU1. *It's
> strange that the module did work the first few times after it arrived
> but broke very soon after. *The guy who sold it to me must've cracked
> an egg into its radiator.
>
> Now I am left with the choice of using one working 900MHz module or a
> pair of 750MHz modules. *Given the electricity that these things pull
> and the trouble I've been having with hardware, though, maybe it's
> time I just sold these two Blade 1000's off and save the money I've
> been spending on their maintenance on a new x86.
>
> Thanks for the insight, everyone.
>
> glenn k. lockwood

As an afterthought, has anyone tried swapping the physical chip from a
US III Cu module onto a non-Cu module? I have quite a few extra
(working) 750MHz modules, and if my 900MHz chip itself is still
working, it would be worth my while to transplant it onto one of these
other working modules and just toss the non-Cu chip. There are no
apparent physical differences between the Cu and non-Cu modules, but
I'd hate to damage something further by trying something which should
not be done.