Re: [Possible spam] Booting a biosless machine (almost done).

Timothy Legge wrote:
>>Hi, I almost managed to run etherboot successfully on a 
>>Compaq T1000 (Windows based terminal). It has no BIOS.
> 
> 
> Wow.  This is great news, I have a Compaq T1510 which I have never been
> able to get to do anything after I put it in Network boot mode.  Can I
> ask you to provide a summarized how to.  I assume that you have used
> Etherboot as the Linux Bios payload but can you provide the steps
> involved.  I would imaginge it is something like:
> 
> 1) Downlaod Etherboot and Linux Bios
> 2) Compile Etherboot and make it an linux Bios payload
> 3) Compile LinuxBios
> 4) Program Linux Bios into the PLCC Eprom 
> 5) Turn on the machine and watch it start
> 
> If you could provide additional steps (as detailed as possible) I can
> take a look.  I would love to get my T1510 running, so I would be
> willing to try a few things.
> 

No no no :). I just use -DLINUXBIOS because it doesn't depend on bios as
much as pcbios. There is still NO BIOS AT ALL in this machine. You could
 do what I did and create a pxe image or something to be used by network
boot mode.
T1000 is windows based, so it requires a whole bunch of weird stuff to
get anything free there. You have a simpler job :).

> 
>>mx98715: [chip: Macronix 98715 PMAC] rev 32 at F800
>>mx98715: Vendor=10D9  Device=0531
>>mx98715: 00:80:64:11:91:BF at ioaddr F800
>>mx98715:  EEPROM default media type 10baseT.
>>Searching for server (DHCP)...\
>>Me: 10.1.6.17, DHCP: 212.191.65.1, TFTP: 10.1.6.7, Gateway 
>>10.1.0.1 Loading 10.1.6.7:/boot/netkernel XXXX(ELF)0907K done
>>
>>And then it powers off.
> 
> 
> What Linux kernel options did you choose?  Once you hit the kernel,
> serial debugging in Etherboot is finished; if I remember correctly there
> are some issues with Geode video and Linux bios.  I wonder how far it
> got loading the kernel before it powered off (was it instant?).  I know
> it is possible to enable serial debugging on the kernel but I have never
> tried it.

Let me clarify that:
- the same /boot/netkernel booted on a normal pc with normal etherboot
gives nice console output on a serial port
- the same kernel booted on Compaq without etherboot starts fine.
- I do not use video card in Compaq at all for now.

Power off is instant (it doesn't even get to startup_32 in kernel - i
tried putting foo: jmp foo there, and it still powered off instead of
stopping. foo:jmp foo worked right before lret in xstart32 in etherboot).

> 
> 
>>What memory map do you think I should provide?
>>Would it be a good idea to prepare etherboot to boot on 
>>biosless machines (-D option in Config etc)?
> 
> 
> Do you mean a set of Config options that would produce a image for this
> particular class of machines?
> 

I think sth like: -DBIOSLESS, and some .h files with memory map
definitions etc.

bye,
Filip Zyzniewski
Ekatalog


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