Technical data
Managing Peripheral Devices
8.4 Connecting Devices and Loading Device Drivers
Caution
Exercise great care in issuing IO CONNECT and IO LOAD commands.
Incorrect use of these commands could cause the system to fail.
Network Communication Device
To connect the network communications logical device on Alpha, run the
appropriate startup files for the particular network protocol. For example, three
common net stack startups are:
@SYS$STARTUP:TCPIP$STARTUP ! TCP/IP SERVICES
@SYS$STARTUP:NET$STARTUP ! DECnet-Plus
@SYS$STARTUP:STARTNET ! DECnet Phase IV
Example
The commands in the following example autoconfigure the devices physically
attached to the Alpha system, load their drivers, and connect the network
software device:
SYSMAN> IO AUTOCONFIGURE ALL
SYSMAN> EXIT
$ @SYS$MANAGER:STARTNET
Virtual Terminals
For information about connecting virtual terminals and loading their driver, see
Section 8.6.2.
For information about configuring virtual terminals in conjunction with TCP/IP
Services Telnet, see Compaq TCP/IP Services for OpenVMS Management.
8.4.3 Suppressing the Autoconfiguration of Devices
Autoconfiguration of devices saves effort and reduces the possibility of error.
However, you might want to suppress autoconfiguration for the following reasons:
• To customize the order in which you configure devices
• To troubleshoot booting problems
• To allow Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) based workstations to use
devices on another workstation’s SCSI bus without causing conflicts during
boot time
To suppress autoconfiguration, add the following command as the last line of
SYS$MANAGER:SYCONFIG.COM:
$ STARTUP$AUTOCONFIGURE_ALL == 0
Caution
If you set STARTUP$AUTOCONFIGURE_ALL to 0 in the last line of
SYCONFIG.COM, the CONFIGURE phase of STARTUP.COM will not
execute. As a result, DSSI or HSC controllers (except for a controller
through which the system booted) and MSCP-served devices on remote
nodes will not be available and satellite nodes will not be able to access
network devices and boot disks. This could prevent satellite nodes from
booting.
8–10 Managing Peripheral Devices