Re: initial setup for newbies

Hello Scott,

COmments below...

Scott Walters escreveu:
>> - lspci:
>>
>> 0000:00:00.0 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03ea (rev a1)
>> 0000:00:01.0 ISA bridge: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03e0 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:01.1 SMBus: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03eb (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:01.2 RAM memory: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f5 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:02.0 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f1
>> (rev a3)
>> 0000:00:02.1 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f2
>> (rev a3)
>> 0000:00:04.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f3 (rev a1)
>> 0000:00:05.0 0403: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f0 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:06.0 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03ec (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:07.0 Bridge: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03ef (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:08.0 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f6 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:08.1 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03f6 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:09.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03e8 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:0b.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03e9 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:0c.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 03e9 (rev a2)
>> 0000:00:0d.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation: Unknown
>> device 03d0 (rev a2)
>> 0000:01:06.0 Ethernet controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6105
>> [Rhine-III] (rev 8b)
> 
> The only thing not unknown is the Ethernet card.  What's up with that?
>  Do you have modules installed in /lib/modules for the OpenSSI kernel
> (eg /lib/modules/2.6.14-ssi-686-smp where "2.6.14-ssi-686-smp" matches
> the name of the initrd and vmlinuz in /boot ) ?

Indeed, I was not able to put the onboard ethernet card to work. Just 
cannot load the appropriated kernel module to do that.

> No, that probably isn't it.  I think the nVidia chipsets are just way too new.

Don't know if this is the real reason. I could not compile the .c file 
from Nvidia website, but the kernel from Sarge look like already have 
such module (just don't know if it is the correct version).

To fix that, I just inserted an offboard ethernet card (Rhine-III) and 
everything worked fine.

> Interesting bits of dmesg would be further down.  Feel free to send
> the full dmesg to me directly.

Ok!

> I discovered that it's harder than I would have guessed to figure out
> if Linux supports any given PCI device by ID.  NetBSD hardcodes those
> in .h files.  I couldn't establish that supported devices on my own
> system were supported from looking at the code.  *sigh*  So trying the
> older machine (or else virtual hardware) is your best bet.

Let me know if you need further info.

Anyway, I tested OpenSSI in a very, very old machine here. Let's call it 
"meth" (shorter version of "Methuselah"):

jackal@master:~$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor	: 0
vendor_id	: GenuineIntel
cpu family	: 5
model		: 4
model name	: Pentium MMX
stepping	: 3
cpu MHz		: 233.825
fdiv_bug	: no
hlt_bug		: no
f00f_bug	: yes
coma_bug	: no
fpu		: yes
fpu_exception	: yes
cpuid level	: 1
wp		: yes
flags		: fpu vme de pse tsc msr mce cx8 mmx
bogomips	: 459.77

jackal@master:~$ lspci
0000:00:00.0 Host bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5597 
[SiS5582] (rev 02)
0000:00:01.0 ISA bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS85C503/5513 
(LPC Bridge) (rev 01)
0000:00:01.1 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5513 [IDE] 
(rev d0)
0000:00:0b.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. 
RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
0000:00:14.0 VGA compatible controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 
5597/5598/6326 VGA (rev 65)

Setup in this machine was quite straightforward, without any noise 
besides ipvsadm complain (which was expected, I think).

The only thing that I changed is that I used a Debian Sarge CDROM to 
start the install, then I added the URI below to sources.list:

deb http://archive.debian.org/debian/ Debian-3.1 main contrib # updates 
was not available

The problem was when I tried to boot with the OpenSSI kernel: after 
initial messages from the kernel, the monitor goes black and the machine 
just restarted alone.

After that I tried adding "noapic" option in the menu.lst file, but the 
result was the same. I tried to boot also by using the rescue option 
with the OpenSSI kernel (grub) but again all I got was a black screen 
and a automatic reboot.

Should I try to compile the OpenSSI kernel in this box?

I'll try Fedora in both boxes and I'll let you know about the results.

Thanks for helping,
Alceu


------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Automate Storage Tiering Simply
Optimize IT performance and efficiency through flexible, powerful, 
automated storage tiering capabilities. View this brief to learn how
you can reduce costs and improve performance. 
http://p.sf.net/sfu/dell-sfdev2dev