Updated x1
Earlier this morning, I got OpenBSD 4.6 to boot on the Octane2. It installs fine and boots from the hard-drive as well as can be expected. I get all the way to logging in and trying to ping another machine before I notice the problem.

It has no network. This is rather irritating. I shall explore further, and report my findings.

OpenBSD boron.tamber-krain.homeip.net 4.6 GENERIC-IP30#23 sgi


# ifconfig -a
lo0: flags=8049 mtu 33152
priority: 0
groups: lo
inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 0xff000000
inet6 ::1 prefixlen 128
inet6 fe80::1%lo0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x2
enc0: flags=0<> mtu 1536
priority: 0
pflog0: flags=141 mtu 33152
priority: 0
groups: pflog


Another step back. Now it refuses to start. Powers on immediately on applying power, fans spin but it doesn't wake up. Following the troubleshooting chart gives me three potential causes:

• Unseated system module (I have reseated it three or four times, no change.)
• CPU failure
• Front-plane failure

As I believe I have eliminated the first, the only way I can be sure is to replace either the CPU or the front-plane. (I am beginning to wonder whether the spurious IRQs I was seeing might have been a symptom of a dying front-plane. If so, then I can narrow it down a little further.