[rescue] ultra 1 power supply question

[microcode at zoho.com]

On Sun, May 17, 2015 at 12:19:26PM -0500, George Wyche wrote:
> Nothing happens when I press the switch to "1".
> 
> I've used this Ultra 1 because of its f77 compiler that is married to it
> as per a license we had with Sun back in 1996: 1 user at a time on that
> workstation. So now that I have been porting away 3 fortran programs to
> maintainable Fortran, I only turn the Ultra on every few months. All with
> no problem. We even upgraded the OS to 8 about 10 years ago. All good.
> 
> This morning (to use that f77 compiler) I tried to turn it on. Nothing.
> The 2 power supply fans do not turn. 120VAC does arrive at the power
> connector.
> 
> Do any of you know if that is sufficient to condemn the power supply? For
> instance I would get a bit further even if any of the power supply outputs
> were being shorted?
> 
> Power supplies are still (it seems) available for like $25 before tax &
> shipping which is what I expect to buy if this email comes to nothing.
> 
> ------------------
> I shudder to think what any correspondence with Oracle would be about
> transferring that license to one of the sunblades I have. Any advice about
> that?
> 
> George Wyche

I can't answer the Ultra hardware issue but as far as f77 compilers go I can
make a few possibly bizarre but "that's so crazy it just might work" type of
suggestions if you are not married to Sun's F77 extensions and if you can
get your code off the box somehow (read the disk from another box etc.)

You could get a VAX/VMS hobbyist license and install VMS on simh vax. VMS
had one of the top f77 compilers back in the day and it's just as good now
as ever thanks to HP's VMS Hobbyist program and it comes with the base
install. VMS Fortran almost certainly was the king of f77 extensions so
hopefully anything Sun supported is also supported on VMS Fortran. You might
also be able to find a list member or other pal who would let you into his
emulated or real VAX/VMS system and be able to avoid setting this up if it
isn't your thing.

Probably easier and less arcane is to install a copy of OpenBSD and use the
gnu f77 compiler they still provide through binary packages or the ports
tree.

The source for gnu f77 is available so if you are the kind of person who
doesn't mind and can build gcc then you could probably get a copy of their
f77 on whatever you have lying around.

As you probably know, Sun and most of the compiler vendors still do have
some amount of so-called F77 compatability so the other option might be
using the same toolchain you're porting to to build the old code as you
go. But I guess if that was an option for your particular code you would
have known that already.