What kernel to use to install RH on a R4400 ?

Hi.

I got as far as booting Linux via bootp on my Indy, but after the remote root-fs is mounted, the kernel dies with an "Aieee" and something about irq request handler.

I tried booting with the 2.1.131-Kernel from ftp.linux.sgi.com, but that one doesn't try to mount the root-fs via NFS.

What kernel should I use to actually see a prompt on my Indy ?

Bye,
LeX, determined to get Linux on there :)

Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.

I should rebuild that kernel to have root nfs in it, although my kernel tree's currently wrapped up with gross graphics.o modularization stuff.

I'll see what I can do.

- Alex

Alex deVries, puffin on LinuxNet.
I know exactly what I want in life.

Alexander,

I'm having similar problems with my R4400. I was trying to boot from another Indy. Now I went and got a PC and loaded linux on it. This should put my config as much like everyone elses as I can make it. Will try the boot later tonight.

I've asked this list for anyone else running linux on an R4400. I've gotten no responses. You and I may be the only ones.

Chad

--
-----------------------------------------------------
Chad Carlin Special Systems
Silicon Graphics Inc. 972.205.5911
Pager 888.754.1597 VMail 800.414.7994 X5344
[email protected] http://reality.sgi.com/chad
-----------------------------------------------------
"flying through hyper space ain't like dusting crops, boy"

On Tue, 2 Feb 1999, Chad Carlin wrote:

->Alexander,
->
->I'm having similar problems with my R4400. I was trying to boot from ->another Indy. Now I went and got a PC and loaded linux on it. This ->should put my config as much like everyone elses as I can make it. ->Will try the boot later tonight.
->
->I've asked this list for anyone else running linux on an R4400. I've ->gotten no responses. You and I may be the only ones.
->

no siree, me too .. just that I have not gotten around to reporting on my attempts ..

yeah the 2.1.131 kernel seemed to detect my SCSI devices and just stop .. not being NFS bootable would explain that ..

Shrijeet

he who one day will find the time to build a cross-compile environment :-()

Shrijeet,

Have you ever gotten your R4400 to boot *any* Linux kernel? I was starting think that through some strange conspiracy that the entire linux-mips community has R4600 CPUs.

As long as we are on the subject of hardware..... There are many different rev levels of gfx, cpu and prom for Indy. Has anyone ever tracked a particular problem to harware revision levels?

Chad

--
-----------------------------------------------------
Chad Carlin Special Systems
Silicon Graphics Inc. 972.205.5911
Pager 888.754.1597 VMail 800.414.7994 X5344
[email protected] http://reality.sgi.com/chad
-----------------------------------------------------
"flying through hyper space ain't like dusting crops, boy"

It should not just stop but print a message like ``Cannot mount root filesystem''.

Ralf

Hi

Im having the same problem on my Indy(R4400). The kernel boots ok, but after the remote root-nfs is mounted it dies with something about irq request handler. Im using a PC running Linux to boot from.

//Jonas

Ouch. It was actually supposed to work on Indys, regardless of the processor type. Since it's no longer working things must somewhow got broken again. I'll try to fix it but it's going to be hairy since I don't have an R4400SC processor module.

Can you send me:

- the exact screen output. Especially the register dump following the Aiee message is important.
- the output of the hinv command. Hinv is an IRIX command.

In nomeni patrii et filiae et spiritus pinguini ;-)

Ralf

Ralf,

Got a chance to try again last night using a i686 as a bootserver. I got the same aieee message. Will get you my hinv and my particular register dump.

Chad

--
-----------------------------------------------------
Chad Carlin Special Systems
Silicon Graphics Inc. 972.205.5911
Pager 888.754.1597 VMail 800.414.7994 X5344
[email protected] http://reality.sgi.com/chad
-----------------------------------------------------
"flying through hyper space ain't like dusting crops, boy"

kernel 2.1.100 (the one from the HardHat.tgz)
---snip---
VFS: Mounted root (nfs filesystem)
Adv: done running setup()
Freeing unused kernel memory: 44k freed
page fault from irq handler: 0000
$0 : 00000000 88180000 0000062d 00000000
$4 : 00000000 1004fc00 00000000 00000000
$8 : 00000000 00000000 00000000 abf3f822
$12: 6f2e7072 8bf3d87c 8bf3d800 00000000
$16: 8bf4f000 8bf3b220 0000062d 8815238c
$20: abf4f040 bfb94000 00000000 bfbd4000
$24: 00000000 8bf85b58
$28: 88008000 88009d90 0000000e 880e3f38
epc : 880e3e74
Status: 1004fc02
Cause : 00000008
Aiee, killing interrupt handler.

Kernel panic: Attempted to kill the idle task!

In swapper task - not syncing
---snip---

And then the machine stops dead.

Output from hinv:
---snip---
Iris Audio Processor: version A2 revision 4.1.0 1 200 MHZ IP22 Processor
FPU: MIPS R4000 Floating Point Coprocessor Revision: 0.0
CPU: MIPS R4400 Processor Chip Revision: 6.0 On-board serial ports: 2
On-board bi-directional parallel port
Data cache size: 16 Kbytes
Instruction cache size: 16 Kbytes
Secondary unified instruction/data cache size: 1 Mbyte Main memory size: 64 Mbytes
Integral ISDN: Basic Rate Interface unit 0, revision 1.0 Integral Ethernet: ec0, version 1
Integral SCSI controller 0: Version WD33C93B, revision D Disk drive / removable media: unit 2 on SCSI controller 0 Disk drive: unit 1 on SCSI controller 0
Graphics board: Indy 8-bit
Vino video: unit 0, revision 0, IndyCam connected ---snip---

Bye,
LeX

Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.

2.1.100 is known to fail on R4400. This is supposed to be fixed in .131 which is why I'm worried about the other bug report. Your case is obvious - use a newer kernel.

Ralf

I tried that, but .131 doesn't support nfs-root. It keeps failing to mount the root device.
Can I bake my own kernel for the Indy on my PC with the right compiler ?

Bye,
LeX

Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.

I've uploaded my current development kernel with support for bootp and nfs-root compiled it:

ftp://ftp.linux.sgi.com/pub/linux/mips/test/vmlinux-indy-990205.gz

BTW I want to make sure, that the kernel also boots headless (Challange S simulation), can I just remove the newport from the Indy ?

sure, but be prepared to do some hacking. There is no out of the box cross compiling stuff.

Thomas.

   This device has completely bogus header. Compaq scores again :-|
It's a host bridge, but it should be called ghost bridge instead ;^)
                                        [Martin `MJ' Mares on linux-kernel]

Does this mean that I should be able to use .131 kernel in conjunction with a local e2fs filesystem with the contents of root-be-0.04.cpio installed on it? And it should work?

Chad

--
-----------------------------------------------------
Chad Carlin Special Systems
Silicon Graphics Inc. 972.205.5911
Pager 888.754.1597 VMail 800.414.7994 X5344
[email protected] http://reality.sgi.com/chad
-----------------------------------------------------
"flying through hyper space ain't like dusting crops, boy"

Ralf and all,

Now I'm in a jam. I can't use these instructions:

irix-indy #./mke2fs drive
irix-indy #./installer drive
cjwsh> MAKEDEV
cjwsh> cpio root-be-0.04.cpio
[piles of cpio extraction information]
cjwsh> exit
[ a moderately lengthy pause, and possibly a bus error -- don't worry
about it ]
irix-indy #

to make the root filesystem on the indy because I can't make the device files with proper major|minor numbers from the installer utility from IRIX. Since nfsroot directive does not work on .131 and R4400 doesn't work on any other kernels, I think I'm up against a brick wall. Anyone have any ideas.

Any chance of fixing nfsroot in the .131 kernel? I think that might get me there.

Bootless,
Chad

--
-----------------------------------------------------
Chad Carlin Special Systems
Silicon Graphics Inc. 972.205.5911
Pager 888.754.1597 VMail 800.414.7994 X5344
[email protected] http://reality.sgi.com/chad
-----------------------------------------------------
"flying through hyper space ain't like dusting crops, boy"

looks like someone is eating my emails to this list.

Please try:

ftp://ftp.linux.sgi.com/pub/linux/mips/test/vmlinux-indy-990212.gz

Thomas.

   This device has completely bogus header. Compaq scores again :-|
It's a host bridge, but it should be called ghost bridge instead ;^)
                                        [Martin `MJ' Mares on linux-kernel]