Instruction fault panic while installing 6.2 on VMware Server

[ghozzy]

Hi,

On 2/23/07, Greg Larkin <glarkin at sourcehosting.net> wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> I'm creating a standard FreeBSD 6.2 ISO image that I can use to
> perform unattended installations into VMware Server virtual machines.
> I'm using VMServer 1.0.1, and I've hit a roadblock when sysinstall
> attempts to create the root filesystem.
>
> The first thing to mention is that VMServer is running on a CentOS 4.4
> host OS, and the CPU architecture is a Via C3 Nehemiah.  Technically,
> the VMServer software is not supposed to work on the Via C3 line, but
> the Nehemiah apparently supports the CMOV instruction that VMServer
> requires.  I've been able to install Fedora Core 6 successfully and
> run it with no problems, so I'm wondering if I just need to find the
> right options to configure FreeBSD 6.2 to get it to work.
>
> Anyway, the VM boots fine, loads the FreeBSD ISO, and launches
> sysinstall, but as soon as newfs is invoked to make the root
> filesystem, I get this:
>
> Making a new root filesystem on /dev/ad0s1a
> Panic: privileged instruction fault
> (auto reboot)
>
> I've tried installing from the standard 6.2 release ISO as well as a
> custom ISO with a recompiled kernel, but I get the same error either
> way.  I also tried disabling ACPI during boot with no success.
>
> My custom kernel config is included below.  My first thought was that
> if I explicitly set the CPU to I486, that might help avoid the
> instruction fault, but that doesn't work.  I didn't see any other
> options that looked like they would fix the fault, but I'm not very
> experienced at kernel configuration either.
>
> Does anyone have an idea how to troubleshoot this problem? Thank you
> for any help!
>
> Regards,
> Greg Larkin

I have experienced similar problem in VMware Workstation under Windows XP
on Via C3 Nehemiah processor since FreeBSD 5.x. In my case privileged
instruction fault shot somewhere in rc boot process. Tracing down the cause of
fault i found out that it was xstore instruction, which VMware did not emulate.
It turned out to be the merit of new random generator appeared somewhere in
5.x, which detected the Via processor and tried to use its hardware random
number generator. My workaround was to patch kernel to disable using this Via
processor feature completely. The result was successful booting and running
FreeBSD 5.x and 6.x under VMware on this machine.

Attached is the patch i use for 6.x kernel.

Hope this helps.

--
ghozzy
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