Hello, I have more information on the Soekris 5501 boot problem using a Transcend TS4GCF266 CF.
I purchased a cheap SYBA IDE2UCF1 ide to compact flash adapter. I installed my Transcend TS4GCF266 CF into and put in a system with a pc with about a 5 year old mother board. The CF was recognize without any problem and immediately boot FreeBSD without a hitch. I also booted it up on a 2 year old Biostar TForce 6100-939 mainboard without a hitch. To me this appears to point to a problem with the Soekris Combios or the Net 5501 hardwares implementation of its CF to IDE interface. I know Soekris says use Sandisk but a 4 GB sandisk CF cost $10 more and is half as fast as the Transcend - 20mbs vs 40mbs. Steve Steve Clark wrote: > Hello, > > Well I tried 1.33c on my 5501 with my Transcend TS4GCF266 CF and it made > things > worst. I was unable to get FreeBSD to boot - it always hangs at mountroot > saying it > can't find the root device. > > When the 5501 is cold booted I get about a 10-15 sec pause before it > recognizes the CF device > with either 1.33c or 1.33b. With both 133.b and 133.c it will start loading > the FreeBSD kernel > then there will be a long pause FreeBSD is trying to detect the hard drive > > atapci0: <AMD CS5536 UDMA100 controller> port > 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6,0x170-0x177,0x376,0xe000-0xe00f at device 20.2 on pci0 > ata0: <ATA channel 0> on atapci0 > ata1: <ATA channel 1> on atapci0 > > then it will continue on detecting other devices and when it gets to the > point to mount the root filesystem > it says it can't find it. > > If at this point with 1.33b I press the reset button on the 5501 the > Transcend CF is immediately recognized and > FreeBSD boots up to completion with no problems. > > With 1.33c if I press the reset button - there again is a long pause during > POST before the CF is recognized and > again FreeBSD hangs at can't mountroot. > > I tried several time with 1.33c before downgrading the bios back to 1.33b > which then immediately boot up fine. > > There are voluminous specs for the Transcend CF online at the Transcend web > site. > > Steve > > Wim Vandeputte mailinglist only wrote: > >>That is a BIOS problem. >> >>You see this with 1.33c? Please send you info to [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> >>On Thu, Jul 17, 2008 at 03:47:33PM -0400, Steve Clark wrote: >> >> >>>Wim Vandeputte mailinglist only wrote: >>> >>> >>>>hey, >>>> >>>>This is actually the same error you see with FreeBSD and OpenBSD when >>>>the BIOS has problems recognising the CF. You can spot it when there is >>>>a 20 second delay when detecting the CF and when the bootloader tries >>>>any disk activity >>>> >>>>comBIOS ver. 1.33c 20080626 Copyright (C) 2000-2008 Soekris Engineering. >>>> >>>>net5501 >>>> >>>>0256 Mbyte Memory CPU Geode LX 434 Mhz >>>> >>>>Pri Mas SILICONSYSTEMS INC 1GB LBA Xlt 1015-32-63 1023 Mbyte >>>> >>>>Slot Vend Dev ClassRev Cmd Stat CL LT HT Base1 Base2 Int >>>>------------------------------------------------------------------- >>>>0:01:2 1022 2082 10100000 0006 0220 08 00 00 A0000000 00000000 10 >>>>0:06:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E101 A0004000 11 >>>>0:07:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E201 A0004100 05 >>>>0:08:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E301 A0004200 09 >>>>0:09:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E401 A0004300 12 >>>>0:20:0 1022 2090 06010003 0009 02A0 08 40 80 00006001 00006101 >>>>0:20:2 1022 209A 01018001 0005 02A0 08 00 00 00000000 00000000 >>>>0:21:0 1022 2094 0C031002 0006 0230 08 00 80 A0005000 00000000 15 >>>>0:21:1 1022 2095 0C032002 0006 0230 08 00 00 A0006000 00000000 15 >>>> >>>>1 Seconds to automatic boot. Press Ctrl-P for entering Monitor. >>>>Using drive 0, partition 3. >>>>Loading... >>>>probing: pc0 com0 com1 pci mem[639K 255M a20=on] >>>>disk: hd0+* >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>>>OpenBSD/i386 BOOT 3.01 >>>> >>>>open(hd0a:/etc/boot.conf): Unknown error: code 102 >>>>boot> reboot >>>>Rebooting... >>>>exit >>>> >>>> >>>>POST: 012345689bcefghips1234ajklnopqr,,,tvwxy >>>> >>>> >>>>comBIOS ver. 1.33c 20080626 Copyright (C) 2000-2008 Soekris Engineering. >>>> >>>>net5501 >>>> >>>>0256 Mbyte Memory CPU Geode LX 434 Mhz >>>> >>>>Pri Mas SILICONSYSTEMS INC 1GB LBA Xlt 1015-32-63 1023 Mbyte >>>> >>>>Slot Vend Dev ClassRev Cmd Stat CL LT HT Base1 Base2 Int >>>>------------------------------------------------------------------- >>>>0:01:2 1022 2082 10100000 0006 0220 08 00 00 A0000000 00000000 10 >>>>0:06:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E101 A0004000 11 >>>>0:07:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E201 A0004100 05 >>>>0:08:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E301 A0004200 09 >>>>0:09:0 1106 3053 02000096 0117 0210 08 40 00 0000E401 A0004300 12 >>>>0:20:0 1022 2090 06010003 0009 02A0 08 40 80 00006001 00006101 >>>>0:20:2 1022 209A 01018001 0005 02A0 08 00 00 00000000 00000000 >>>>0:21:0 1022 2094 0C031002 0006 0230 08 00 80 A0005000 00000000 15 >>>>0:21:1 1022 2095 0C032002 0006 0230 08 00 00 A0006000 00000000 15 >>>> >>>>1 Seconds to automatic boot. Press Ctrl-P for entering Monitor. >>>>Using drive 0, partition 3. >>>>Loading... >>>>probing: pc0 com0 com1 pci mem[639K 255M a20=on] >>>>disk: hd0+ >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>>>OpenBSD/i386 BOOT 3.01 >>>> >>>>- >>>>com0: 19200 baud >>>>switching console to com0 >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>>>OpenBSD/i386 BOOT 3.01 >>>> >>>>boot> >>>>booting hd0a:/bsd: 5913424+1004644 [52+306864+287943]=0x72a4d4 >>>>entry point at 0x200120?? >>>>[ using 595232 bytes of bsd ELF symbol table ] >>>>Copyright (c) 1982, 1986, 1989, 1991, 1993 >>>> The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. >>>>Copyright (c) 1995-2008 OpenBSD. All rights reserved. >>>>http://www.OpenBSD.org >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>On Thu, Jul 17, 2008 at 10:44:39AM -0700, Chris Babcock wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>>>Eternity wrote: >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>>Hi! >>>>>> >>>>>>I have a problem with a whole bunch of NET5501:s. I have read some posts >>>>>>with similar problems, but not exactly this, I think, so I post my >>>>>>problem: >>>>>> >>>>>>On a Cold boot my CF Card is detected: >>>>>> >>>>>>Pri Mas CF CARD 1GB LBA Xlt 983-32-63 990 Mbyte >>>>>> >>>>>>Then at boot: >>>>>> >>>>>>GRUB Loading stage1.5. >>>>>> >>>>>>GRUB loading, please wait... >>>>>>Error 25 >>>>>> >>>>>>--- >>>>>> >>>>>>If I press ctrl-p, and at once in combios makes a "reboot" everything >>>>>>works OK, and GRUB can load correctly. >>>>>> >>>>>>I have used lots of net5501 boxes with this distribution (same image file >>>>>>I write to the CF card) without any trouble at all. I have tried upgrading >>>>>>BIOS to 1.33c version, but no change. >>>>>> >>>>>>Any ideas? Could it be the flash card? Or some defect on these batch of >>>>>>boards? >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>>It could be the flash or a defective board. If you have a known working >>>>>unit, try swapping the flash into it and see if you get the same >>>>>error. If another known working unit does the same thing, you probably >>>>>have one of the 5501 boards with issues (RMA to resolve). If the error >>>>>persists, it's probably bad CF. One other possibility... Did you image >>>>>the CF or do the install from a different system? If you did, there are >>>>>often disk geometry issues in the install, which can and often do cause >>>>>issues, esp with boot loaders. The only safe way to make sure the >>>>>geometry is correct on a load is to load on the exact same type of >>>>>system (so in this case, another 5501). >>>>> >>>>>Grub manual error code link: >>>>>http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/grub.html#Stage1_002e5-errors >>>>> >>>>>According to the grub manual Error 25 in stage 1.5 is... >>>>> >>>>>25 : Disk read error >>>>> This error is returned if there is a disk read error when trying to >>>>>probe or read data from a particular disk. >>>> >>>>http://lists.soekris.com/mailman/listinfo/soekris-tech >>> >>> >>>Yes that is exactly what I see with my Transcend CF and FreeBSD 6.3 >>> >>>Steve >>> >>>_______________________________________________ >>>Soekris-tech mailing list >>>[email protected] >>>http://lists.soekris.com/mailman/listinfo/soekris-tech >> >> >> > > _______________________________________________ Soekris-tech mailing list [email protected] http://lists.soekris.com/mailman/listinfo/soekris-tech
