From: dimitri@dutiws.twi.tudelft.nl (Dimitri Tischenko)
Subject: Re: Exception #2 on attempted boot
Organization: Delft University of Technology
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 09:29:14 GMT

In article <1jnhkjINNg6b@darkstar.UCSC.EDU> isbell@cats.ucsc.edu (Art Isbell) writes:
>
>
>A non-technical client across the country from me was using WordPerfect on
>Saturday when his system froze (don't think we can blame WordPerfect on this
>one :-)  He says that he couldn't get anything to respond including the power
>key, so he pulled the plug.  He tried to boot and was thrown into the ROM
>monitor with an "Exception #2" error message.  I tried to help him reboot by
>having him manually enter various boot commands including booting from his 3.0
>CD-ROM.  Immediately after entering any boot command, the "Exception #2" error
>occurred.
>
>I assumed he had a hardware problem.  He borrowed another NeXT and headed for
>his demos in another state.  Upon returning today, he again tried to boot and
>everything seems normal!  I still suspect a hardware problem, but knowing what
>"Exception #2" means might be a big clue.
>
>If anyone can shed any light on this, please let me know.
>-- 
>
>Art Isbell                                                      Cubic Solutions
>NeXT Registered Developer #745         NeXT software development and consulting
>NeXTmail: isbell@cats.UCSC.EDU                             Voice: (408)335-1154
>USmail: 95018-9442                                           Fax: (408)335-2515

Well, I'm not sure, but these are my experiences:

1) At one occasion, what I experienced was exactly the same as what Art
mentions above (except that WP was not involved). I could boot from CD,
though. The filesystem was OK. So I replaced the boot block
(please use extreme care while doing this!) and everything worked OK.

2) At another occasion, my system came to a halt with this series of
messages:

Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: 1667329652, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block 1667329652, ino 84993
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block 1652571184, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block 1652571184, ino 84993
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -32567613, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -32567613, ino 84993
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -2082471937, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -2082471937, ino 84993
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -134217729, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -134217729, ino 84993
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -32, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -32, ino 84993
Jan 19 01:33:36 dutiea mach: bad block -1987, <3>/: bad block
Jan 19 01:33:39 dutiea syslogd: going down on signal 15

No booting possible, of course. The filessystem was a pretty mess,
too. After manually fsck'ing still no boot. After replacing the kernel
(no message about corruptness od /sdmach given by fsck!) it booted, but
not immediately: an exception #2 arose. But after typing "b" the system
booted normally. Power-off, power-on - again exception #2. Very simple
explanation: in the process of trying everything I turned "boot
diagnostics" boot option on. Since there are no diagnostics to boot, the
boot process gives this exception.

On both occasions, the only part of the system I could blame, is the
disk. Is there any possibility of checking the disk for bad blocks? Or
could it be the faulty internal SCSI connection? I feel rather
incomfortable with this.

Has anybody experienced the same symptoms?

Dimitri
+----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Dimitri Tischenko | D.B.Tischenko@IS.TWI.TUDelft.NL |  NeXTmail preferred! |
+---------------------------------------+------------------------------------+
| Delft University of Technology        | Technische Universiteit Delft      |
| Fac Applied Math & Computer Science   | Fac. Techn. Wiskunde & Informatica |
| The Netherlands                       | Nederland                          |
+---------------------------------------+------------------------------------+
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.hardware