Re: [iPAQ] Dual booting woes

Hello. =)

In the interrest of gathering searchable wisdom in the mailing-list
archives, here's my solution to a problem previously discussed on the
list...

When booting a cramfs-initrd, alot of people (not only related to
handhelds) have been getting errors similar to:

 Error -3 while decompressing!
 c015f928 (484778622) -> c0c0a000 (4096)

...And then pretty much nothing.

There are alot of suggestions out there on how to fix this, but none of
them made the initrd (from http://www.handhelds.org/feeds/dualboot/)
bootable on my iPAQ-3630.
But then I came across an ARM-linux post discussing gzip'd cramfs images
(http://www.spinics.net/lists/arm/msg04068.html) and since I was out of
good ideas, I decided to try it. So I gzip'd the 'initrd.cramfs' and
changed 'boot/initrd.cramfs' to 'boot/initrd.cramfs.gz' in boot/params.
And well, suddenly it worked!

I'm not 100% sure yet if it was only the gzipping or a combination of
that + my params tweaking that made it work, though. So I'll put my (not
so optimal?) current 'boot/params' contents here just in case.

----
set linuxargs "initrd root=/dev/rd/0 init=/linuxrc ramdisk_size=6144
ramdisk_blocksize=4096"
set kernel_filename boot/zImage
set initrd_filename boot/initrd.cramfs.gz
----
Have a good Sunday, people! =)
 - Tobias Ekbom (Kybernetos).
"George G. Davis" wrote:
> 
> Tony Falcone wrote:
> >
> > On Mon, 2002-11-25 at 10:28, George G. Davis wrote:
> > > Tony Falcone wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Hi,
> > > >
> > > > First, can someone tell me if they have been able to boot from a CF card
> > > > using the "boot vfat" command in bootldr 2.18.54?
> > >
> > > I haven't used 2.18.54. But I have successfully used other versions.
> > >
> >
> >                         [Lots of stuff deleted]
> >
> > > I think you're really close. : )
> > >
> > > 1. To fix the "Kernel panic", you need to append "ramdisk_blocksize=4096"
> > >    to your linuxargs string.
> > >
> > > 2. To get console messages via the serial port, you need to append
> > >    "console=ttySA0" to you linuxargs string.
> > >
> > > That should do it!
> >
> > No, it doesn't.
> >
> > It stops again at exactly the same point.  I just noticed that, before
> > the modprobe errors (repeated twice)
> >
> >         kmod: failed to exec /sbin/modprobe -s -k binfmt-0000, errno = 13
> >
> > I see the lines
> >
> >         VFS: mounted root (cramfs filesystem).
> >         Mounted devfs on /dev
> >         Freeing init memory: 68K
> >         Error -3 while decompressing!
> >         c015f928 (484778622) -> c0c0a000 (4096)
> >         Error -3 while decompressing!
> >         c0164250 (-453355996) -> c0013000 (4096)
> 
> The above looks to me like you still don't have "ramdisk_blocksize=4096"
> in your linuxargs?
> 
> I just grabbed the dual boot image from here:
> 
>         http://handhelds.org/download/pub/linux/feeds/dualboot/
> 
> I installed params, initrd.cramfs and zImage on CF card under /boot
> and booted it as d/l'd from URL above. It appears to fail with the
> same messages you note above.
> 
> I then changed the params file as shown here:
> 
>         set linuxargs "initrd ramdisk_size=5120 console=ttySA0 ramdisk_blocksize=4096"
>         set kernel_filename boot/zImage
>         set initrd_filename boot/initrd.cramfs
> 
> The only change in fact is the console and ramdisk_blocksize parameters
> added to linuxargs. I now have console messages via serial and it boots
> just fine for me. That's all I need to get the image from above URL to
> boot on my H38xx target. YMMV!  : )
> 
> --
> Regards,
> George
> 
> >
> > After these come the modprobe errors, and then the Kernel Panic...
> >
> > > Hm, did you at least get console messages via serial with the console=
> > > change?
> > >
> >
> > No.  If I append "console=ttySA0" to the linuxargs, then I don't see any
> > error messages; all I see is
> >
> >         Uncompressing Linux............................. done, booting .
> >
> > and then everything freezes.
> >
> > BTW, I received your follow-up message, and there should be no problem
> > with the kernel and modules; they are both 2.4.18-rmk3.
> >
> > Any other suggestions?
> >
> > Thanks again,
> >
> > Tony
> >
> > --
> > Tony Falcone
> > Principal Engineer
> > Alphatech, Inc.
> > 6 New England Executive Park
> > Burlington, MA  01803-5012
> > Office Phone: (781) 273-3388, x700      Fax: (781) 273-9345
> > Email: afalcone@alphatech.com
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