[9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Ram'on Garc'ia Fern'andez]

I downloaded a recent Plan9 distribution. I attempted to reinstall
completely my Plan9 system. I found that the installation failed.
aux/vga complained that it could not find my card in /lib/vgadb .
The command pci lists my card with the correct Vendor ID for NVidia
cards 0x10DE .

So this must be a bug in a recent aux/vga.

My card is a Riva TN2. I have already Plan9 installed with it, and
it works perfectly with Rio.

Ramon

Re: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[David Presotto]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 164 bytes --]

I stuck a link in the download pages that lets you download an
experimental diskette image instead of the normal one.  Try that
and see if it recognizes your vga.

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From: Ram'on Garc'ia Fern'andez <ramon-news.no.spam@juguete.quim.ucm.es>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.
Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2003 11:05:37 GMT
Message-ID: <bfgh5d$irl$1@thule.sim.ucm.es>

I downloaded a recent Plan9 distribution. I attempted to reinstall
completely my Plan9 system. I found that the installation failed.
aux/vga complained that it could not find my card in /lib/vgadb .
The command pci lists my card with the correct Vendor ID for NVidia
cards 0x10DE .

So this must be a bug in a recent aux/vga.

My card is a Riva TN2. I have already Plan9 installed with it, and
it works perfectly with Rio.

Ramon

Re: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Rob Ristroph]

>>>>> "Ram'on" == Ram'on Garc'ia Fern'andez <ramon-news.no.spam@juguete.quim.ucm.es> writes:
Ramon>
Ramon> I downloaded a recent Plan9 distribution. I attempted to
Ramon> reinstall completely my Plan9 system. I found that the
Ramon> installation failed.
Ramon>
Ramon> aux/vga complained that it could not find my card in /lib/vgadb .
Ramon> The command pci lists my card with the correct Vendor ID for NVidia
Ramon> cards 0x10DE .
Ramon>
Ramon> So this must be a bug in a recent aux/vga.
Ramon>
Ramon> My card is a Riva TN2. I have already Plan9 installed with it,
Ramon> and it works perfectly with Rio.
Ramon>
Ramon> Ramon

I also have a Riva TNT which stopped being recognized after I did a
pull and recompiled my kernel sometime last month.

But the install floppy always recognized it and brought it up into rio
just fine; it was the stuff installed to the harddrive that failed.

I downloaded the experimental floppy and tried it out just now -- I
don't think it ever got to the part where it runs aux/vga:

1262958 => 744660|1113032+83740=1941432
entry: 80100020
cpu0: 401MHz AuthenticAMD AMD-K6_III (cpuid: AX 0x0591 DX 0x8021BF)
ELCR: 0A00
#l0: rtl8139: 100Mbps port 0xE800 irq 9: 00904703FA06
19313 free pages, 77252K bytes, 309252K swap
boot: can't connect to file server: '/bzroot' file does not exist
panic: boot process died: unknown
cpu0: exiting

Where there changes made to vga in May or early June ?  I think
something in Plan 9 changed in that period that made the nvidia not
work from a clean install.

--Rob

Re: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[andrey mirtchovski]

On 21 Jul 2003, Rob Ristroph wrote:

> Where there changes made to vga in May or early June ?  I think
> something in Plan 9 changed in that period that made the nvidia not
> work from a clean install.

there was a merge between nvidia drivers adding support for GeForce4s, I
believe. maybe that's what caused it.

Re[2]: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Martin Althoff]

I can join the TNT2 woes...
Downloaded a "current" CD image a few days back and had no luck with
it. Also think it never got to actually running aux/vga. Stuck with
current offical distro and that fine.

Monday, July 21, 2003, 5:33:58 PM, you wrote:

> On 21 Jul 2003, Rob Ristroph wrote:

>> Where there changes made to vga in May or early June ?  I think
>> something in Plan 9 changed in that period that made the nvidia not
>> work from a clean install.

> there was a merge between nvidia drivers adding support for GeForce4s, I
> believe. maybe that's what caused it.

Re: Re[2]: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Rob Ristroph]

>>>>> "Martin" == Martin Althoff <martin.althoff@tiscali.co.uk> writes:
Martin>
Martin> I can join the TNT2 woes...
Martin> Downloaded a "current" CD image a few days back and had no
Martin> luck with it. Also think it never got to actually running
Martin> aux/vga. Stuck with current offical distro and that fine.

What do you mean by "current official" Plan 9 ?

--Rob

Re[4]: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Martin Althoff]

I mean the download you get directed to when "just" (sorry to sound so
simplistic) downloading plan9 at the default links ("Download the
Distribution"). This is in contrast to the daily build (in additonal
downloads the "Sources Snapshot") that is also advertised at the Bell
Labs download site.

Hope that clarifies stuff! I had assumed you failed with one of the
snapshots. The standard works fine for my TNT2. However I also tried
with a ATI Mach64: fine during installation, but after first "real"
boot, it just produces rubbish. Didn't pursue that as my TNT2 works
fine. Except on a motherboard that has an onboard Intel vga....

As an aside - great work you did on the mbr testing. I'll follow up on
that another time. It buggers me as well and I want to do more testing
there myself. Strange thing too, that (like with my Mach64) the
install situation is not quite the same as the HDD full boot
situation. Or whatever you want to call that ...

Later
Martin

Monday, July 21, 2003, 6:44:44 PM, you wrote:

>>>>>> "Martin" == Martin Althoff <martin.althoff@tiscali.co.uk> writes:
Martin>>
Martin>> I can join the TNT2 woes...
Martin>> Downloaded a "current" CD image a few days back and had no
Martin>> luck with it. Also think it never got to actually running
Martin>> aux/vga. Stuck with current offical distro and that fine.

> What do you mean by "current official" Plan 9 ?

> --Rob

[9fans] Experimental floppy failed.

[Ram'on Garc'ia Fern'andez]

It complained that the kernel could not connect to the file server
because it couldn't find /bzroot. Did you test the experimental disk?

Ramon

Re: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[David Presotto]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 424 bytes --]

It looks like my experimental floppy is a complete flop.

However, this is more info.  I didn't realize that the old
boot floppy worked but that the installed stuff didn't.
That makes my life easier.  Ramon's "I found that the
installation failed" was a git incomplete.

I do see that rsc installed a new nvidia.c on June 1.
The changes look more rather than less inclusive but I'll
give them a closer look tonight.

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 3599 bytes --]

From: rgr@sdf.lonestar.org (Rob Ristroph)
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.
Date: 21 Jul 2003 11:06:31 -0500
Message-ID: <87ptk3g8zc.fsf@rgristroph-austin.ath.cx>

>>>>> "Ram'on" == Ram'on Garc'ia Fern'andez <ramon-news.no.spam@juguete.quim.ucm.es> writes:
Ramon>
Ramon> I downloaded a recent Plan9 distribution. I attempted to
Ramon> reinstall completely my Plan9 system. I found that the
Ramon> installation failed.
Ramon>
Ramon> aux/vga complained that it could not find my card in /lib/vgadb .
Ramon> The command pci lists my card with the correct Vendor ID for NVidia
Ramon> cards 0x10DE .
Ramon>
Ramon> So this must be a bug in a recent aux/vga.
Ramon>
Ramon> My card is a Riva TN2. I have already Plan9 installed with it,
Ramon> and it works perfectly with Rio.
Ramon>
Ramon> Ramon

I also have a Riva TNT which stopped being recognized after I did a
pull and recompiled my kernel sometime last month.

But the install floppy always recognized it and brought it up into rio
just fine; it was the stuff installed to the harddrive that failed.

I downloaded the experimental floppy and tried it out just now -- I
don't think it ever got to the part where it runs aux/vga:

1262958 => 744660|1113032+83740=1941432
entry: 80100020
cpu0: 401MHz AuthenticAMD AMD-K6_III (cpuid: AX 0x0591 DX 0x8021BF)
ELCR: 0A00
#l0: rtl8139: 100Mbps port 0xE800 irq 9: 00904703FA06
19313 free pages, 77252K bytes, 309252K swap
boot: can't connect to file server: '/bzroot' file does not exist
panic: boot process died: unknown
cpu0: exiting

Where there changes made to vga in May or early June ?  I think
something in Plan 9 changed in that period that made the nvidia not
work from a clean install.

--Rob

Re: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[David Presotto]

Looking at the changes it looks like a problem with the change in
/lib/vgadb that lists the nvidia as


ctlr
	vid=0x10DE did=*			# NVidia cards all talk the same
	link=vga
	ctlr=nvidia linear=1
	hwgc=nvidiahwgc

instead of listing each did separately.  The code in aux/vga for did=* looks
wrong to me.  I asked jmk to look at it since I don't know that code
very well.

Re: Re[4]: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Rob Ristroph]

>>>>> "Martin" == Martin Althoff <martin.althoff@tiscali.co.uk> writes:
Martin>
Martin> I mean the download you get directed to when "just" (sorry to
Martin> sound so simplistic) downloading plan9 at the default links
Martin> ("Download the Distribution"). This is in contrast to the
Martin> daily build (in additonal downloads the "Sources Snapshot")
Martin> that is also advertised at the Bell Labs download site.
Martin>
Martin> Hope that clarifies stuff!

It does; thanks !

Martin> I had assumed you failed with one of the snapshots. The
Martin> standard works fine for my TNT2. However I also tried with a
Martin> ATI Mach64: fine during installation, but after first "real"
Martin> boot, it just produces rubbish. Didn't pursue that as my TNT2
Martin> works fine. Except on a motherboard that has an onboard Intel
Martin> vga....

I believe I used the "standard" one.  I'll try the snapshot later this
week.

Martin> As an aside - great work you did on the mbr testing. I'll
Martin> follow up on that another time. It buggers me as well and I
Martin> want to do more testing there myself. Strange thing too, that
Martin> (like with my Mach64) the install situation is not quite the
Martin> same as the HDD full boot situation. Or whatever you want to
Martin> call that ...

It's likely a matter of different kernels and aux/vga on the install
floppy versus the main system.

I'd like to fix the floppy if I get the time.  I would need to test on
both large (LBA) and older smaller drives, and I would need to
investigate how to detect what MBR to put on in each case (presuming
that one needs different ones).  I won't be able to fiddle with that
for a bit however.

--Rob

Re[6]: [9fans] Installation fails with NVIDIA card: aux/vga does not find the card.

[Martin Althoff]

> I'd like to fix the floppy if I get the time.  I would need to test on
> both large (LBA) and older smaller drives, and I would need to
> investigate how to detect what MBR to put on in each case (presuming
> that one needs different ones).  I won't be able to fiddle with that
> for a bit however.

It well worth to also look in great detail at the partition table.
Use a tool of your choice. The dos prog PART (Ranish) does a good job
or fdisk from Linux. I am using Timo Linux Rescue CD. I found what
gets written into the partition table during the install has some
great variance (sorry to be vage, I'll detail it later), eg. entry
present, but no type set.

Can you or anybody tell me what prog/script actually controlls the
installation process? I mean calling fdisk, mbr, displaying the
messages... I'd like to have a close look there to understand why
certain errors appear. Besides, instal's are a bit of a hobby... :)