I have a Sun Ultra Enterprise 3000 that currently has Solaris 7 running on it, and I want to install the latest version of Debian on it. I found on the Debian website the sparc CD's for a CDrom installation. I start the machine and use the BREAK commant to get the 'ok' prompt. With the first CD in the CD-Rom drive, I type "boot cdrom" , but all I get is the output below and the screen just idles and doesn't respond to any key strokes.

Boot device: /sbus@3,0/SUNW,fas@3,8800000/sd@6,0:f File and args:


Typing probe-scsi-all and show-disks gives

{6} ok probe-scsi-all
/sbus@3,0/SUNW,fas@3,8800000
Target 0
Unit 0 Disk SEAGATE ST32171W SUN2.1G74629723Q85307
Copyright (c) 1997 Seagate
All rights reserved
Target 1
Unit 0 Disk SEAGATE ST19101W 0011LH001684
Copyright (c) 1997 Seagate
All rights reserved
Target 2
Unit 0 Disk SEAGATE ST19101W 0011LH006291
Copyright (c) 1997 Seagate
All rights reserved
Target 3
Unit 0 Disk SEAGATE ST118202LC 0004NK005409
Copyright (c) 1998 Seagate
All rights reserved
Target 6
Unit 0 Removable Read Only device TOSHIBA XM5701TASUN12XCD099704/09/97


Target a
Unit 0 Disk SEAGATE ST318203LC 0001LR092730
Copyright (c) 1999 Seagate
All rights reserved

{6} ok show-disks
a) /sbus@3,0/SUNW,fas@3,8800000/sd
q) NO SELECTION
Enter Selection, q to quit: q
{6} ok


Any suggestions? Also, is there a special way you have to burn the first CD to make it a bootable disk before this will work? I have a Mac to make a new CD, but I am not sure if there is a difference between a bootable disk and a regular disk, if there even is a difference.

thanks

Using whatever CD burning software is on a Mac, you want to "Create CD from image". If you open the CD you created in your file browser and see a single *.iso file, you did it incorrectly. If you open the CD and see a bunch of files, then you're okay.

Ok, I see a bunch of little files when I open the CD in Finder.

I don't know much about Solaris, so I can't help you with that part. But if you continue to have problems with the regular CD install, you can try using a netboot image or doing a cross install.

I'd also check out the release notes and installation guide for sparc.

I'm probably not going to be much help
Your boot device is which translates as SCSI device target 6, your Toshiba CDROM so you're trying to boot from the correct device.
You can check all your configured boot devices by typing I've got an Ultra2 running Gentoo (Haven't really done much with it since 2007!!)
This boots using SILO, The Sparc Improved boot LOader. It's a two stage boot process and I notice that I have a couple of files on by Live Install CD marked "First" and "Second" You mention that you've got multiple files on your install CD, what are the top level ones, including directories (Not what's in the directories)
I've had a quick look at the Debian Sparc manual but it looks a bit complicated.
I'm not sure if this is relevant but I had to upgrade the OpenBoot firmware on my Ultra 2 to get it to support a 64 bit kernel. I don't know if the E3000 was ever 32 bit only.

Play Bonny!

Here is the ls -ls:
total 956
20 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 9394 Jun 26 19:30 README.html
272 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 137318 Jun 26 05:52 README.mirrors.html
144 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 72789 Jun 26 05:53 README.mirrors.txt
4 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 417 Jun 26 19:27 README.source
12 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 5933 Jun 26 19:30 README.txt
4 dr-xr-xr-x 2 root wheel 2048 Jun 26 19:27 boot
4 dr-xr-xr-x 2 root wheel 2048 Jun 26 19:27 css
0 lr-xr-xr-x 1 root wheel 1 Jun 26 19:27 debian -> .
4 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 984 Feb 6 2009 dedication.txt
4 dr-xr-xr-x 3 root wheel 2048 Jun 26 19:27 dists
12 dr-xr-xr-x 6 root wheel 6144 Jun 26 19:27 doc
4 dr-xr-xr-x 2 root wheel 2048 Jun 26 19:27 install
460 -r--r--r-- 1 root wheel 234816 Jun 26 19:30 md5sum.txt
8 dr-xr-xr-x 2 root wheel 4096 Jun 26 19:27 pics
4 dr-xr-xr-x 3 root wheel 2048 Jun 26 19:27 pool

I don't see any executable files on the top (root) level. The system will attempt to boot from the root directory unless you tell it differently and specify a path to the boot file. Is there anything usefull in the READMEs? Which CDs did you download? I see there's a netbootable one which gives a minimal system and pulls any other required stuff from the internet. Have you tried it? What's the name of the .iso file you used to build the CDs?

Let me know.

Play Bonny!