Linux on SNI RM300E ?

Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Thomas Kunze]

Hi,

i've tried to install Debian Woody MIPS on my SNI RM300E but i can't get it work.
bootp() and tftp() works. the bios load's the tftpboot.img over the net. after that
only an exception appears on the screen. the boot screen looks like this:

Obtaining /tftpboot/sash_pci from server
2027520+1762928+95120 entry 0x8800246C

EXCEPTION: <vector=UTLBMiss>
EXCEPTION pc: 0x8800246C
Cause register: 0x800C
Status register: 0x200010003
Bad Vaddress: 0x3C40

is anybody out there how can help me?

with best regards
thomas

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Re: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Ralf Baechle]

On Tue, Jul 06, 2004 at 01:12:20AM -0800, Thomas Kunze wrote:

> i've tried to install Debian Woody MIPS on my SNI RM300E but i can't get
> it work.

I support the RM200C in the little endian configuration and I'm probably the
only user of Linux on an RM machine at all.  Afaik no little endian systems
have been shipped since SNI and Microsoft axed NT for MIPS making my
configuration extremly rare and I've not been able to obtain the big endian
firmware for the system - which is showing signs of upcoming hardware death
so whenever that happens I won't be able to support the SNI [1] code anymore.
Just to make life a little bit more misserable I only have hardware
documentation on the RM200/300 C (possibly D, would have to check) series
so I have not idea to what degree the architecture differs the RM300.

Conversion of the existing code to work on a big endian RM200/300C would
be easy to do though and I can help whoever wants to try ...

  Ralf

[1] RM hardware dumped in front of my door accepted ;-)

RE: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Thomas Kunze]

Quoting Alexander Voropay <a.voropay@vmb-service.ru>:

>  AFAIK, the RM300E is an ARC compatible. (?)
i don't no. i saw something like that on the net. but nothing about that in the manuals
that i have.
> 
>  So, try to load "arcdiag" utility instead of kernel :
> 
> ftp://ftp.sra.co.jp/pub/os/NetBSD/misc/arc/
> 
i've downloaded the arcdiag-0.2 and served it via tftp. but the RM300E don't like that
file. it only says "Bad magic number". what does this mean (little/bigendian)? 

the same error-message appears when the to load mipsel boot-images.

with best regards
thomas

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Re: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Thiemo Seufer]

Thomas Kunze wrote:
> Quoting Alexander Voropay <a.voropay@vmb-service.ru>:
> 
> >  AFAIK, the RM300E is an ARC compatible. (?)
> i don't no. i saw something like that on the net. but nothing about that in the manuals
> that i have.

It is, AFAIK. But the woody kernel is for a SGI Indy/Indigo2, not for
RM300E. The linux-mips.org tree has only support for RM200C, adding
support for RM300E is probably not that complicated if it is similiar
enough.

> >  So, try to load "arcdiag" utility instead of kernel :
> > 
> > ftp://ftp.sra.co.jp/pub/os/NetBSD/misc/arc/
> > 
> i've downloaded the arcdiag-0.2 and served it via tftp. but the RM300E don't like that
> file. it only says "Bad magic number". what does this mean (little/bigendian)? 

Wrong endianness. Your machine apparently has big endian firmware.


Thiemo

Re: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Thomas Kunze]

Quoting Thiemo Seufer <ica2_ts@csv.ica.uni-stuttgart.de>:

> It is, AFAIK. But the woody kernel is for a SGI Indy/Indigo2, not for
> RM300E. The linux-mips.org tree has only support for RM200C, adding
> support for RM300E is probably not that complicated if it is similiar
> enough.

OK. what are the next steps to get a bigendian bootimage for the RM300E? 
are there any sources available to compile for the RM300? 
is there a bootimage for the RM200C that i can give a try?

with best regards
thomas
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Re: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Thiemo Seufer]

Thomas Kunze wrote:
> Quoting Thiemo Seufer <ica2_ts@csv.ica.uni-stuttgart.de>:
> 
> > It is, AFAIK. But the woody kernel is for a SGI Indy/Indigo2, not for
> > RM300E. The linux-mips.org tree has only support for RM200C, adding
> > support for RM300E is probably not that complicated if it is similiar
> > enough.
> 
> OK. what are the next steps to get a bigendian bootimage for the RM300E? 
> are there any sources available to compile for the RM300? 
> is there a bootimage for the RM200C that i can give a try?

I would try current CVS HEAD, compile the RM200C configuration and
see where it dies. No need to bother about a complete boot image
at this stage. Welcome to the world of kernel porting. :-)

(You need a kernel converted to ECOFF for this, like it is done
for some other machines via elf2ecoff.)


Thiemo

RE: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Alexander Voropay]

>i've downloaded the arcdiag-0.2 and served it via tftp. but the RM300E
don't like that file.
>it only says "Bad magic number". what does this mean
(little/bigendian)? 

>the same error-message appears when the to load mipsel boot-images.

 Do you have an originas OS (SINIX ?) supplied with this server ?
Try a `file` GNU utility:
$ file <ANY_BINARIES_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>
or
$ file <KERNEL_IMAGE_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>

 Some modern loaders requires ELF binaries (not COFF) so you should
know a full binary file format to load (ELF/COFF/little/bigendian).


--
-=AV=-

RE: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Alexander Voropay]

>i've downloaded the arcdiag-0.2 and served it via tftp. but the RM300E
don't like that file.
>it only says "Bad magic number". what does this mean
(little/bigendian)? 

>the same error-message appears when the to load mipsel boot-images.

 Do you have an originas OS (SINIX ?) supplied with this server ?
Try a `file` GNU utility:
$ file <ANY_BINARIES_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>
or
$ file <KERNEL_IMAGE_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>

 Some modern loaders requires ELF binaries (not COFF) so you should
know a full binary file format to load (ELF/COFF/little/bigendian).


--
-=AV=-

RE: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Thomas Kunze]

>  Do you have an originas OS (SINIX ?) supplied with this server ?
> Try a `file` GNU utility:
> $ file <ANY_BINARIES_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>
> or
> $ file <KERNEL_IMAGE_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>
> 
>  Some modern loaders requires ELF binaries (not COFF) so you should
> know a full binary file format to load (ELF/COFF/little/bigendian).

yepp, sinix reliant 5.44 is installed and boots up. BUT, i have no login no password.
and the previous owner can't remember any login or password. also, i don't have any
orig. CD's for the RM300E. it seems that the machine is running in bigendian mode.

with best regards
thomas

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Re: Linux on SNI RM300E ?

[Jan-Benedict Glaw]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1331 bytes --]

On Tue, 2004-07-06 03:41:17 -0800, Thomas Kunze <thomas.kunze@xmail.net>
wrote in message <1089110477.40ea81cd8e976@www.x-mail.net>:
> >  Do you have an originas OS (SINIX ?) supplied with this server ?
> > Try a `file` GNU utility:
> > $ file <ANY_BINARIES_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>
> > or
> > $ file <KERNEL_IMAGE_FROM_THE_ORIGINAL_OS>
> > 
> >  Some modern loaders requires ELF binaries (not COFF) so you should
> > know a full binary file format to load (ELF/COFF/little/bigendian).
> 
> yepp, sinix reliant 5.44 is installed and boots up. BUT, i have no login no password.
> and the previous owner can't remember any login or password. also, i don't have any
> orig. CD's for the RM300E. it seems that the machine is running in bigendian mode.

I don't know what filesystem Sinix used, maybe you can rip off the
disks and attach them to any other Linux box. Possibly you can mount the
filesystem(s), but even if not, you can use a hex editor to zero out
root's password on the raw disk :-)

MfG, JBG

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