Hi! I've been having some trouble setting up a serial console under NetBSD
1.5.2 (by this I mean boot messages being sent over the serial line not
just enabling a serial terminal which is trivial to do via /etc/ttys). I
tried to change the console speed from the default of 9600 to 19200 with
no success. I was able to get the serial console working at 9600 connected
to a Wyse text terminal, however, I noticed whenever the terminal was
switched off, NetBSD wouldn't boot but rather dump me into the boot
shell/editor. I've only had experience setting this up successfully in
FreeBSD. Is there some kernel or other option that has to be set so that
NetBSD will fully boot even if there isn't a live serial connection and
the biosboot_com0 boot blocks are being used? Also, what is the correct
procedure to change the line speed from 9600 to 19200 or some other speed?
Finally, is the serial console setup in the same way under OpenBSD as
NetBSD?

Here's the procedure I followed:

- cd /usr/src/sys/arch/i386/stand/biosboot_com0

- edited Makefile by adding "CPPFLAGS+=-DCONSPEED=19200"

- make

- /usr/mdec/installboot -f ./biosboot_com0.sym /dev/rsd0a (not sure if
this was the exact command but the new boot blocks were definitely
installed.)

I also recompiled the kernel with this extra option:

options  "CONSDEVNAME=\"com\"",CONADDR=0x3f8,CONSPEED=19200

Regards,

Timothy Kallinis
Systems Administrator | Netfirms, Inc. (www.netfirms.com)