Re: G5 powermacs

[Havard Eidnes <he%NetBSD.org@localhost>]

>> I left NFS in but removed everything you listed. System still hangs on
>> Loading ELF.
>> Kernel size was 3.6MB.
>
> Hmm, let me try on mine.
> You'll likely want to have a look at the POWERMAC_G5_11_2 config I just
> committed, assuming your G5 is a dual core / PCIe variant. I forgot to
> commit it Way Back When for some reason, it's got the necessary support
> for those machines. That one ( or a cut down subset at least )
> certainly netbooted on mine ( 2GHz dual core powermac11,2 - hence the
> config's name )

I've created a local setup which prepares a "root on cd9660"
setup, but I'm having problems booting the kernel images from the
cd-rom.  OpenFirmware console output is (briefly):

0 > boot cd:\netbsd_g5_11_2 load-size=399 adler32=3990001
unrecognized Client Program format

This is a kernel built from POWERMAC_G5_11_2, but without the
MEMORY_DISK* options to keep within the 4MB size constraint.

Checking the state of those files on the CD on my amd64 desktop:

# ls -l netbsd*
-rw-r--r--  1 polkitd  wheel  3840424 Jun  8 11:39 netbsd-g5
-rw-r--r--  1 polkitd  wheel  3922428 Jun  8 11:39 netbsd-g5-11-2
# file netbsd*
netbsd-g5:      ELF 32-bit MSB executable, PowerPC or cisco 4500, version 1 (SYSV), statically linked, for NetBSD 7.99.75, not stripped
netbsd-g5-11-2: ELF 32-bit MSB executable, PowerPC or cisco 4500, version 1 (SYSV), statically linked, for NetBSD 7.99.75, not stripped
# size netbsd*
   text    data     bss     dec     hex filename
3366235   48196  125796 3540227  360503 netbsd-g5
3431315   59276  133316 3623907  374be3 netbsd-g5-11-2
# 

So why is the kernel an "unrecognized Client Program format"?  Doesn't
OpenFirmware on the G5 Macs load 32-bit ELF after all?  OpenFirmware
displays all the file names in upper-case in the directory listing (no
RockRidge support), but the error message seems to indicate that it
has in fact accessed the file...

(Hmm, that kernel was without the sata driver in the POWERMAC_G5_11_2
config, so would not have gotten me where I wanted to go anyway...)

Regards,

- Håvard