no /proc/acpi, trying to dump dsdt to a file

[glen martin <lists@locutory.org>]

Greetings,

I've done some searches, poked around in the kernel source and doc, 
can't seem to find anything relevant.

kernel is 2.6.15, with gentoo patches and the patch to load a dsdt from 
initrd.

I'm trying to dump my dsdt, but there is no /proc/acpi, let alone 
/proc/acpi/dsdt.

Is there something special needed to make /proc/acpi show up? Or other 
way to get at the existing dsdt in this situation?

The dsdt table in my BIOS is broken, in case that's relevant and 
nonobvious. :)  I'm hoping the broken existing table isn't what is 
blocking the /proc/acpi ...

The other interesting (to me, anyway) snippet is that CONFIG_ACPI_SYSTEM 
doesn't show up when 'make menuconfig', but is set to 'Y' in the .config 
file.  /drivers/acpi/system.o is built.

I've tried booting with various kernel parameters, disabling variously 
acpi, apic and lapic. no difference in behavior. right now they're all 
turned on (no special parms on kernel line).

Here's a snippet from my .config

#
# ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) Support
#
CONFIG_ACPI=y
# CONFIG_ACPI_AC is not set
# CONFIG_ACPI_BATTERY is not set
CONFIG_ACPI_BUTTON=y
CONFIG_ACPI_VIDEO=y
# CONFIG_ACPI_HOTKEY is not set
CONFIG_ACPI_FAN=y
CONFIG_ACPI_PROCESSOR=y
CONFIG_ACPI_THERMAL=y
# CONFIG_ACPI_ASUS is not set
# CONFIG_ACPI_IBM is not set
# CONFIG_ACPI_TOSHIBA is not set
CONFIG_ACPI_CUSTOM_DSDT_INITRD=y
CONFIG_ACPI_BLACKLIST_YEAR=0
CONFIG_ACPI_DEBUG=y
CONFIG_ACPI_EC=y
CONFIG_ACPI_POWER=y
CONFIG_ACPI_SYSTEM=y
CONFIG_X86_PM_TIMER=y
# CONFIG_ACPI_CONTAINER is not set

Here's the dmesg output when loading the existing BIOS DSDT, in case 
that is relevant.

ACPI: Looking for DSDT in initramfs... error, file /DSDT.aml not found.
 tbxface-0109 [02] load_tables           : ACPI Tables successfully acquired
nssearch-0311: *** Error: ns_search_and_enter: Bad character in ACPI 
Name: 43035350
 dswload-0292: *** Error: Looking up [0x43035350] (NON-ASCII)
 in namespace, AE_BAD_CHARACTER
  psloop-0287 [09] ps_parse_loop         : During name lookup/catalog, 
AE_BAD_CHARACTER
 tbxface-0115: *** Error: acpi_load_tables: Could not load namespace: 
AE_BAD_CHARACTER
 tbxface-0123: *** Error: acpi_load_tables: Could not load tables: 
AE_BAD_CHARACTER
ACPI: Unable to load the System Description Tables


Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance,

glen