yay, more SGI O2 netboot issues

[aroma7herapy]

I have an SGI O2 R5k 180, 256MB mem, normal CRT monitor, running (stable) IRIX 6.5.something.

I want to install Gentoo on the machine.

After RTFM'ing the guides and this forum, I installed a BOOTP, NFS and TFTP server on my Windows XP machine.

Booting the ip32-r5k-20040806.img file over the network (bootp(): root=/dev/ram0) gives the same problems with me as the previous poster had with his TFT screen. i.e. garbled screen and a computer that does not respond to anything. Only I've noticed that the mousepointer is shown correctly...And I've found that my TFTP-server tells me that the file transfer timed out when at 85% of the img-file.

Next up was the other solution; booting with ip32-2.6.6-fb.kernel and initrd-20040802.tar.bz2 (bootp(): root=/dev/nfs ip=dhcp initrd=/dev/nfs). this gives me at least the standard kernel loading screen with the devices being checked and so forth. But after the kernel has accessed my NFS server and read /sbin/init (the NFS server log-file tells me that) the kernel tells me that no initial console could be started and starts to Panic.

Now my question about this is of course; How can I boot my machine in Gentoo so I can install the OS?

A second question could be; How come there is no troubleshoot-thingie in the standard gentoo-install-docs for Mips? I mean, reading the forums tells me that there are a lot of problems, but the install-docs imply that everything should go just peachy...

Anyway, I'd really like some input from you guys regarding the aforementioned issues...

gr,
P. Westerweel

[poulpe]

The TFTP implementation on SGI boxes is quite strange. Currently it works fine with linux server with tftpd-hppa and 2 modifications of kernel parameters described in the handbook. It is most likely that it might be impossible to do the same thing from Windows.

For the NFS method, you must set the root-path option of your dhcpd server and your NFS server to point to a directory which has a 'initrd' directory. Inside the initrd dir you must uncompress and explode an initrd tarball (available on Kumba site). It might also be impossible to do that from windows cause the initrd image contain special device files...

[liquiz]

Just an odd side note.

Im not an expert on TFTP but my understanding is that most current clients support an extra set of extensions that allow you to download larger files. No its not huge files but larger than the default without the extensions.

If you install a TFTP server the new ones sometimes come with those extensions turned off since it breaks some clients. Check to see if your server has those extensions or not and if they are on.

I believe the solartftp is a nice one for windows that supports the extentions.

Peace,
Liquiz

[freshy98]

aroma7herapy, I have my O2 running with Gentoo.
I am using my own build kernel with FB support.
With that kernel I am using the initrd from ~Kumba over NFS which works fine.

You can meet me on #gentoo-mips.
_________________
Mac Pro single quad 2.8GHz, 6GB RAM, 8800GT. MacBook. Plus way too many SUN/Cobatl/SGI and a lonely Alpha.

[aroma7herapy]

Ok,

Thanks for all the info...
I think I will try to install again in a few weeks, and of course i will post the results in this thread..

grts,