[9fans] pxe booting net4801

[9fans] pxe booting net4801

[frank]

Hi,

I can't get a Soekris net4801 box to boot Plan 9 via PXE.

On my Plan 9 fileserver (which also runs ip/dhcpd and ip/tftpd), I
created /cfg/pxe/<MAC of the first interface on the net4801>, which is
almost identical to the file I use for a diskless terminal. The only
differences are that I put mouseport, monitor and vgasize in
comment. The remaining things, bootfile and nobootprompt are the same
as for the terminal. I first tried to boot /386/9pc.gz and then
/386/9pccpu.gz (see below). I also added *nomp=1 but that doesn't seem
to get it any further. The console output looks as follows:

--- begin ---
Plan 9 from Bell Labs by PXE

no vga; serial console only
soekris 505
ns83815: auto neg timed out
ns83815: auto neg timed out
ether#0: 83815: port 0xE100 irq 10: 000024c15308
mercurius (192.168.1.12!67): /cfg/pxe/000024c15308
cpu0: 266MHz AMD Geode GX1 loop 11972
dev A0 port 1F0 config 848A capabilities 0200 mwdma 0000
mercurius (192.168.1.12!67): /386/9pccpu.gz
gz...944713 => 946607+854152+313028=2113787
entry: f0100020
---  end  ---

Any idea what might be wrong?


Kind regards,

--
Frank Lenaerts ---------------------------------------- frank@inua.be

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[erik quanstrom]

> I can't get a Soekris net4801 box to boot Plan 9 via PXE.
>
> On my Plan 9 fileserver (which also runs ip/dhcpd and ip/tftpd), I
> created /cfg/pxe/<MAC of the first interface on the net4801>, which is
> almost identical to the file I use for a diskless terminal. The only
> differences are that I put mouseport, monitor and vgasize in
> comment. The remaining things, bootfile and nobootprompt are the same
> as for the terminal. I first tried to boot /386/9pc.gz and then
> /386/9pccpu.gz (see below). I also added *nomp=1 but that doesn't seem
> to get it any further. The console output looks as follows:

the output stops after the jump to the kernel proper.  so
either the jump the kernel, or the very early boot process before
the "Plan 9" print hung, or the serial console isn't working in the
kernel proper.

have you set up the serial console in your pxe'd plan9.ini?
that would cover the second case.  if you're using the distribution
9load, serial baud setting is via baud=.  the kernel baud setting
is , e.g. "console=0 b19200".  i changed 9load in 9atom to recognize
kernel-style console configuration when i was booting soekris
boxen.

i haven't used a soekris for quite some time.  (too slow!)  iirc,
some versions of bios are more friendly than others.  iirc 1.33
was a problem with plan 9 on my particular hardware.

as a wild guess, one might disable the functions in cga.c
obviously, there's no cga.

- erik

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[frank]

On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 11:29:49PM -0400, erik quanstrom wrote:
> > I can't get a Soekris net4801 box to boot Plan 9 via PXE.
> >
> > On my Plan 9 fileserver (which also runs ip/dhcpd and ip/tftpd), I
> > created /cfg/pxe/<MAC of the first interface on the net4801>, which is
> > almost identical to the file I use for a diskless terminal. The only
> > differences are that I put mouseport, monitor and vgasize in
> > comment. The remaining things, bootfile and nobootprompt are the same
> > as for the terminal. I first tried to boot /386/9pc.gz and then
> > /386/9pccpu.gz (see below). I also added *nomp=1 but that doesn't seem
> > to get it any further. The console output looks as follows:
>
> the output stops after the jump to the kernel proper.  so
> either the jump the kernel, or the very early boot process before
> the "Plan 9" print hung, or the serial console isn't working in the
> kernel proper.
>
> have you set up the serial console in your pxe'd plan9.ini?

No, because the plan9.ini manpage seems to indicate that the default
is b9600 l8 pn s1 (which is also how I used it with Linux and
OpenBSD). Is the kernel expecting 19200 baud being used by default?

> that would cover the second case.  if you're using the distribution
> 9load, serial baud setting is via baud=.  the kernel baud setting
> is , e.g. "console=0 b19200".  i changed 9load in 9atom to recognize
> kernel-style console configuration when i was booting soekris
> boxen.

> - erik

--
Frank Lenaerts ---------------------------------------- frank@inua.be

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[erik quanstrom]

> No, because the plan9.ini manpage seems to indicate that the default
> is b9600 l8 pn s1 (which is also how I used it with Linux and
> OpenBSD). Is the kernel expecting 19200 baud being used by default?

no, the plan 9 default is 9600 baud.

- erik

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[frank]

On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 11:29:49PM -0400, erik quanstrom wrote:
> > I can't get a Soekris net4801 box to boot Plan 9 via PXE.
> >
> > On my Plan 9 fileserver (which also runs ip/dhcpd and ip/tftpd), I
> > created /cfg/pxe/<MAC of the first interface on the net4801>, which is
> > almost identical to the file I use for a diskless terminal. The only
> > differences are that I put mouseport, monitor and vgasize in
> > comment. The remaining things, bootfile and nobootprompt are the same
> > as for the terminal. I first tried to boot /386/9pc.gz and then
> > /386/9pccpu.gz (see below). I also added *nomp=1 but that doesn't seem
> > to get it any further. The console output looks as follows:
>
> the output stops after the jump to the kernel proper.  so
> either the jump the kernel, or the very early boot process before
> the "Plan 9" print hung, or the serial console isn't working in the
> kernel proper.
>
> have you set up the serial console in your pxe'd plan9.ini?

For the record... although 9600 baud, 8 bits and 1 stopbit is the
default for serial lines, the default console is cga... Adding
console=0 to the pxe'd plan9.ini solved the issue.

> that would cover the second case.  if you're using the distribution
> 9load, serial baud setting is via baud=.  the kernel baud setting
> is , e.g. "console=0 b19200".  i changed 9load in 9atom to recognize
> kernel-style console configuration when i was booting soekris
> boxen.
>
> i haven't used a soekris for quite some time.  (too slow!)  iirc,

Good enough to play around and learn something new. I would like to
turn it into an auth-only server booting from a fileserver, as
indicated on [*]. More specifically, I wonder if this would be safe:
on the one hand, an auth server actually shouldn't provide other
services, on the other hand it would get everything via the
network. Another thing to check would be the usage of a piece of a CF
card as NVRAM.

[*] http://www.plan9.bell-labs.com/wiki/plan9/Configuring_a_standalone_CPU_server/index.html

> some versions of bios are more friendly than others.  iirc 1.33
> was a problem with plan 9 on my particular hardware.
>
> as a wild guess, one might disable the functions in cga.c
> obviously, there's no cga.

Thanks for mentioning this as it caught my eye when re-reading the
console part of the plan9.ini manpage.

> - erik

--
Frank Lenaerts ---------------------------------------- frank@inua.be

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[erik quanstrom]

> network. Another thing to check would be the usage of a piece of a CF
> card as NVRAM.

the CF shows up as /dev/sdC0.

- erik

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[David du Colombier]

> Another thing to check would be the usage of a piece of a CF
> card as NVRAM.

I use a NVRAM on the CompactFlash on my Soekris net5501.

I created a FAT partition on the CompactFlash holding the file "plan9.nvr",
then I added the following lines to my CPU server plan9.ini.

nvram=#S/sdC1/dos!plan9.nvr
nvrlen=512
nvroff=0

It works like a charm.

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[erik quanstrom]

On Wed Sep 22 18:37:17 EDT 2010, 0intro@gmail.com wrote:
> > Another thing to check would be the usage of a piece of a CF
> > card as NVRAM.
>
> I use a NVRAM on the CompactFlash on my Soekris net5501.
>
> I created a FAT partition on the CompactFlash holding the file "plan9.nvr",
> then I added the following lines to my CPU server plan9.ini.
>
> nvram=#S/sdC1/dos!plan9.nvr
> nvrlen=512
> nvroff=0
>
> It works like a charm.

why not partition the CF like a normal disk?

- erik

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[David du Colombier]

> why not partition the CF like a normal disk?

You means creating a NVRAM partition?

That could be another option.

In this case, the "nvram" variable will be:

nvram=#S/sdC1/nvram

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[David du Colombier]

> i haven't used a soekris for quite some time.  (too slow!)  iirc,

I would like to know if you are aware of any faster alternative
to the Soekris.

For me, the Soekris have the following characteristics:

 - multiple network interfaces (up to four, plus one PCI slot),
 - small,
 - low power,
 - fanless.

But the processor (AMD Geode LX up to 500 MHz) and the network
interfaces (100 Mb/s) are slow.

I have few FabiaTech FX5624 running Plan 9 at work. The processor
(AMD Celeron-M 600MHz) is fairly faster and there is two 1 Gb/s
network interfaces (plus four 100 Mb/s).

SuperMicro Atom motherboards like X7SLA, X7SPA and X7SPE are
really nice. They are faster, but they have only two network
interfaces and the cases are usually larger.
The need of a small fan is not problematic compared to the gain
in processor speed.

--
David du Colombier

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[erik quanstrom]

> I have few FabiaTech FX5624 running Plan 9 at work. The processor
> (AMD Celeron-M 600MHz) is fairly faster and there is two 1 Gb/s
> network interfaces (plus four 100 Mb/s).
>
> SuperMicro Atom motherboards like X7SLA, X7SPA and X7SPE are
> really nice. They are faster, but they have only two network
> interfaces and the cases are usually larger.
> The need of a small fan is not problematic compared to the gain
> in processor speed.

the x7sp[ae], of course, are fanless.  i use one for a terminal.
i have also been using the openrd platform for this kind of stuff.

- erik

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[erik quanstrom]

On Thu Sep 23 02:36:00 EDT 2010, 0intro@gmail.com wrote:
> > why not partition the CF like a normal disk?
>
> You means creating a NVRAM partition?
>
> That could be another option.

yes.  if you do find a need for the extra space
(most CF these days are 1gb or bigger), it's
much easier with partitions.  doing those
calculations by hand can be tedious, error
prone and fragile.

by the way, if you never plan to share a machine
with another operating system, you don't
need an fdisk partition table at all.

- erik

Re: [9fans] pxe booting net4801

[David du Colombier]

> the x7sp[ae], of course, are fanless.  i use one for a terminal.
> i have also been using the openrd platform for this kind of stuff.

Yes, absolutely, I forgot these newer models where fanless.
I currently have only a X7SLA-H.

--
David du Colombier