[j-nsp] problem with m40 harddrive

[Richard A Steenbergen]

On Sat, Feb 07, 2004 at 11:09:58AM -0500, sigma at smx.pair.com wrote:
> 
> > I hate Travelstars. I have a pile of failed drives about 10 high from my
> > Thinkpads over the last few years, and another pile almost as high from
> > failures in RE's. I don't know what Juniper was thinking, but if you're 
> > serious about keeping your RE working I recommend replacing them with 
> > Toshiba drives. :)
> 
> Hypothetically speaking - has anyone done this?  The drive is mounted from
> underneath the circuit board, so it looks like it would be difficult to
> replace.  You would have to at least remove the circuit board, remove the
> drive from there, put in a matching drive, get everything back together
> without damaging it, etc.
> 
> Given that these items are really expensive at list price and have a high
> failure rate solely because of the hard drive, it would be really nice to
> take a shot at replacing the drive and putting the unit back into service
> as a spare.  Just a thought.

Do you have a screw driver? Do you know how to operate it? If so, you are
qualified to replace a failed harddrive or compact-flash on a Juniper
routing engine.

Juniper doesn't even manufacture them, the RE you are probably using (2.0,
RE-333) was made by a company called Teknor, later purchased by Kontron, 
who makes hardware for embedded systems. They are actually Intel 6U blade 
servers turned on their side:

http://www.kontron.com/products/pdproductsubcategory.cfm?keyProductCategory=3&kps=681

Every component is modular, including the PCMCIA slot. It uses standard
ram, standard compact flash like you would find in your digital camera,
and a standard laptop harddrive. If you don't have the small capacity
components that Juniper uses handy, everything will work just fine with
larger equivalents (/ is always 64mb, excess on the cf goes into /config,
and likewise excess on the harddrive goes into /var, all automatically).  
You can use 512MB dimms instead of the 256MB ones that jnpr uses on the
RE-333, but only up to a maximum of 768MB total (after that it just starts
ignoring whole dimms). There is even a PS2 keyboard port hidden behind the
shinny brushed metal panel which you would normally see on the outside if
it were in a router (though I've never tried using it). Pretty much the
only thing you can't replace is the processor. :)

DISCLAIMER: If you do any of the things I have mentioned above, and then
you call for support on it, and I meet you later, I will personally slap
you upside the head with an ATM PIC. Knowledge is a useful thing, and
router vendors spend far too much time assuming that their customers are
complete idiots who need to be hand-held every step of the way, but don't
give them an excuse to take away more useful features and functionality
because you are one of those tards who thinks it is funny to call the JTAC
and ask for support on your olive.

-- 
Richard A Steenbergen <ras at e-gerbil.net>       http://www.e-gerbil.net/ras
GPG Key ID: 0xF8B12CBC (7535 7F59 8204 ED1F CC1C 53AF 4C41 5ECA F8B1 2CBC)