CDROM Boot Hangs But Only Under 6.x

[Ted Mittelstaedt]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-freebsd-questions at freebsd.org
> [mailto:owner-freebsd-questions at freebsd.org]On Behalf Of Tim Daneliuk
> Sent: Tuesday, December 25, 2007 10:53 PM
> To: FreeBSD Mailing List
> Subject: Re: CDROM Boot Hangs But Only Under 6.x
> 
> 
> illoai at gmail.com wrote:
> > On 25/12/2007, Tim Daneliuk <tundra at tundraware.com> wrote:
> >> I am building a new server out of both older and brand new
> >> components.  It is based on a Pentium D 925 and ABIT LG-95Z
> >> mobo.  The DVD-RW is a Lite-On about a year old with very
> >> low hours on it.
> >>
> >> So ... here's a fun one:  I can boot and install FreeBSD 4.x (CD)
> >> or Novell SUSE Enterprise Linux Desktop 10 SP1 (DVD) via the
> >> DVD.  But attempting to do this with 6.x (I have tried 6.2R and
> >> 6.3-PRE disk #1) causes a hang during boot.  The loader gets
> >> as far as showing the vertical bar that ordinarily "spins"
> >> to show intitial kernel loading progress and the the machine
> >> just sits there.  There is some further activity on the optical
> >> drive at this point and then the cursor sort of jumps around a bit.
> >>
> >> I've not yet tried swapping the optical drive out - though I doubt
> >> this is the problem since I can load the other OSs.  I've tried
> >> removing and moving memory sticks in case this is a flakey
> >> memory problem - no change.  I've tried removing the only
> >> two cards in the machine: 3COM 905C-TX and an Adaptec 2940UW -
> >> no change.
> >>
> >> I have one last ditch thing I will try later tonight which is
> >> to force the DVD IDE port into PIO mode and out of DMA mode.
> >> But that's it.  I am stumped.  Ideas anyone?
> >>
> > 
> > If it is not hardware, check your bios settings (and mayhap
> > set back to default or very conservative) (of which the PIO
> > trick may work).
> 
> Well ... no amount of BIOS fiddling fixes this problem.
> 
> > 
> > Also, 7.0 ran extremely well for me back in Sept., you might
> > try it as an alternative.
> > 
> 
> I downloaded 7.0-BETA4 and burned the CD - This exhibits the
> exact same boot time behavior as the earlier 6.x releases.
> 
> In summary:
> 
> 1) I can boot 4.x or Linux install CDs.   I cannot boot 6.x or 7.x
>     install CD - system hangs at the beginning of loading the kernel
>     and the video cursor starts jumping around - presumably because
>     the program has lost its way.  (I am assuming that the "program"
>     having trouble is the loader itself, since the kernel is not yet
>     loaded at this point.)
> 
> 2) Changing optical drives made no difference.
> 

The boot was changed from 4.x to the later series.  I think it was
changed from "floppy emulation boot" to "cd boot" or some such
nonsense.  You can get more info by reading up in the handbook
where it talks about how to create a distribution CD.  One of the
options on the cdburn controls this.

If your MB is new it should work.  Older MB's have problems with
the "new way" to boot off an optical cd.  You can try BIOS/CMOS
updates from the motherbard mfg if they are available.  Sometimes
even back-flashing to older BIOS fixes it.

> 3) Reordering/removing memory sticks made no difference.  I am running
>     a memory test ATM just to be sure, but so far, the memory seems fine.
> 
> 4) No amount of poking around in the BIOS settings seems to help either.
> 
> I am starting to suspect the MOBO.  If I stick a couple of cards in the
> two available PCI slots, the system has trouble taking me into the BIOS
> screen.  I have to remove the cards to reliably get into the BIOS
> settings menu.  I wonder if this is one of those situations where there
> are not enough IRQs to go around.
> 

If it's a new MB the PCI cards are probably too old/slow to work right.

Another thing to check is if the MB has any overclock settings turned
on, these will screw up booting, going into BIOS, and some PCI cards.
Go to BIOS and select "reset to factory settings" which turns off all
the go-fast stuff.  And make sure you confirm the CPU speed in BIOS
with the actual speed stamped on the CPU.

Sometimes you just got to stick a floppy disk drive on the thing and
boot from the 4 boot floppies then do an FTP install.  I have about
a dozen servers among the collection I manage that are like this - 
some are even newer ones.

Ted