When I run "setconsole ttya" I get the following error message: /proc/openprom/options does not exist -- cannot setup console For hosts without displays that are placed in machine rooms, it is very important that one can bypass the network and connect directly to their serial ports in order to reboot them when they hang. The setconsole script is a hack, but on Red Hat 5.1 it did work. Now it seems to be broken.
I'm assuming that you're running on a sparc :-) Can you verify whether openpromfs is loaded by typing lsmod? Here's what I see: [jbj@orleans jbj]$ lsmod Module Size Used by openpromfs 11988 4 (autoclean) ipip 5964 2 nfsd 153892 8 (autoclean) If openpromfs is not loaded, you will need to load. Try insmod openpromfs
If you are running on an i386 platform, then setconsole is not for you. You need to use lilo boot options to set the serial parameters. Setconsole works only on sparcs.