NetBSD 3.1 on B&W G3 freezes during booting at "Root device:"

I have had exactly the same problem as Molnar Gyula.

I have been trying to install NetBSD 3.1 from a CD onto a
Blue & White G3 (OFW
3).  At first all went exactly according to INSTALL.html;
the installation
kernel booted correctly, found my pdisk partitions,
installed everything to
wd0a, put the working kernel "netbsd" in the root
of /dev/wd0a, and so on.

I then reboot from the OF prompt with 

   boot hd:4,ofwboot.xcf hd:5,/netbsd

and ofwboot.xcf finds the working kernel "netbsd"
and starts to boot it.  It
gets through almost all of the dmesg messages until 

   Boot device: <unknown>
   Root device:

and there it freezes.  The keyboard doesn't work at all, and
I have to press the
power button on the front of the G3 case to start again.

I don't think it's an Open Firmware problem because netbsd
does start to boot -
it's obviously in the expected place and accessible.  My
best guess is that it's
a kernel problem, and that something is going wrong with the
way the kernel
autodetects the root device.  

There is a reference to something similar in the
NetBSD/macppc FAQ, under
"General Problems & Questions", article
"Why does the kernel always prompt me
for the root device?".  Here it says that sometimes
" ... the kernel can't seem
to find the root device."  Perhaps we have a version of
the same problem, except
that the kernel freezes completely instead of just giving up
and asking the user?

The FAQ article recommends rebuilding the kernel with the
config file entry
altered from 

   netbsd root on ? type ?

to 

   netbsd root on wd0a type ffs

which will simply bypass the autodetection.

I can't recompile the kernel on the G3 because BSD won't
install ... but I also
have NetBSD 3.1 for i386 installed on a 586 computer, and I
could use this. 
Should I download the macppc source onto the 586, edit the
config file,
recompile, and use this as my working kernel on the G3?  Has
anybody tried this,
and is freezing at "Root device:" a common
problem?

I've only been experimenting with NetBSD for a month, and
this is my first post
here, but already I've found this site really useful. 
Thanks!

Nick Sheppard

I you want I can send you my kernel compiled for a B&W
G3 - I found
that for reliability of IDE transfers I also need "wd* 
   at atabus?
drive ? flags 0x0f00" since I have the rev. 1 IDE chip
which is buggy
and can corrupt data on the higher speed DMA modes.  I am
using
"config          netbsd  root on wd0a type ?",
bypassing
autodetection.

Joe.

Please send it to me too. I can upload it to an FTP server,
then  
other people can access it, who had the same problem  as me,
and Nick  
Sheppard.
On May 19, 2007, at 3:45 PM, Joachim Thiemann wrote:

> I you want I can send you my kernel compiled for a
B&W G3 - I found
> that for reliability of IDE transfers I also need
"wd*     at atabus?
> drive ? flags 0x0f00" since I have the rev. 1 IDE
chip which is buggy
> and can corrupt data on the higher speed DMA modes.  I
am using
> "config          netbsd  root on wd0a type
?", bypassing
> autodetection.
>
> Joe.

I've put the kernel and the config file on my web server,
https://fornost.dyndns.or
g/ (note the https since I don't want to open
port 80 on my firewall)

Guess which machine the kernel is hosted on  so be
gentle please.

Joe.

Please help me, i don't know, that what i did wrong:
I installed netbsd: pdisk, newfs, mount, created directories
in /,  
and put the fstab to /etc.
Then I "upgraded".
Mounted the filesystem agin, deleted the file 'netbsd' in /,
and  
moved your kernel there (netbsd.VINYAMAR), then renamed to
'netbsd'.  
Then i moved the config file 'VINYAMAR.txt' to /root, and
renamed it  
to MYCONFIG (without any extension).
After restart it frozed agin at the root device line :(

On May 19, 2007, at 6:13 PM, Joachim Thiemann wrote:

> I've put the kernel and the config file on my web
server,
> https://fornost.dyndns.or
g/ (note the https since I don't want to open
> port 80 on my firewall)
>
> Guess which machine the kernel is hosted on  so be
gentle please.
>
> Joe.

On 19/05/07, Molnár Gyula <baaananagmail.com> wrote:
> Please help me, i don't know, that what i did wrong:
> I installed netbsd: pdisk, newfs, mount, created
directories in /,
> and put the fstab to /etc.
> Then I "upgraded".
> Mounted the filesystem agin, deleted the file 'netbsd'
in /, and
> moved your kernel there (netbsd.VINYAMAR), then renamed
to 'netbsd'.

Ok, that should be good.  Are you SURE it is booting that
kernel
though?  Do you see the

NetBSD 3.1_STABLE (VINYAMAR) #2: Wed Apr 18 09:46:42 EDT
2007
sourcevinyamar:/disk2/bsd/Source/builddir/obj.macppc/sys/ar
ch/macppc/compile/VINYAMAR

lines on the console?  Is your root harddrive actually on
the first
IDE bus? (I think it's the one closer to the back...) Is the
master?

> Then i moved the config file 'VINYAMAR.txt' to /root,
and renamed it
> to MYCONFIG (without any extension).
> After restart it frozed agin at the root device line
:(

You don't actually need the config file unless you want to
rebuild the
kernel from source.

Good luck,
Joe

I used the chmod'ed the kernel to 777, and it's booted for
me too!
Thanks, Nick!
Thanks, Joe! 
On May 19, 2007, at 11:21 PM, Nick Sheppard wrote:

> Joachim Thiemann <joachim.thiemann <at>
gmail.com> writes:
>
>>
>> I've put the kernel and the config file on my web
server,
>> https://fornost.dyndns.or
g/ (note the https since I don't want to  
>> open
>> port 80 on my firewall)
>>
>> Guess which machine the kernel is hosted on  so be
gentle please.
>>
>> Joe.
>
> I've downloaded your kernel and it boots!  Thank you!
>
> To get it into the G3, I copied it (netbsd.VINYAMAR) to
a CD,  
> booted the G3
> using the installation kernel, copied netbsd.VINYAMAR
to /  
> alongside the
> previous (freezing) netbsd, used chmod to change its
permissions to  
> the same as
> the previous netbsd (I don't know if this is actually
necessary),  
> restarted, and
> then booted the new kernel from OF with
>
>    boot hd:4,ofwboot.xcf hd:5,/netbsd.VINYAMAR
>
> in other words exactly what I was doing before but with
a different  
> kernel
> filename. It works!
>
> The new kernel does behave a little differently from
the  
> installation kernel - I
> had to do
>
>    stty erase '^H'
>
> to get the delete key to work properly (as suggested in
 
> INSTALL.html) but it has
> cured the freezing problem.  Now I'm going to read your
config file  
> very
> carefully ...
>
> Thanks again,
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>

I instelled netbsd on my B&W, thanks to Joachim
Thiemann.
I set up the internet connection, succesfully pinged
www.google.com,  
and i can get files from FTP servers too.
but when i try to "Install New Binary Packages" in
sushi, it reply that
"promt failed -wrong dir?", and "sushi:
ftp_start failed", and quit.