9.1 installation issue on VIA P900

F

frederic

Hello,

Today I tried to install 9.1-RELEASE i386 on my VIA P900 (Eden X2 CPU). The only way I found to pass the boot stage is to start in safe mode (with or without ACPI, no difference). After that, so far, everything seems fine.

I tried without success to "emulate" the safe mode by adding the following lines into /boot/loader.conf:

Code: 
kern.smp.disabled="1"
hint.kbdmux.0.disabled="1"
hw.ata.ata_dma="0"
hw.ata.atapi_dma="0"
hw.ata.wc="0"
hw.eisa_slots="0"
SMP seems not to be the issue as with or without
Code: 
kern.smp.disabled="1"
the result is the same.

The boot blocks right after:
Code: 
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: p4tcc0: <CPU Frequency Thermal Control> on cpu0
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: Device configuration finished.
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: procfs registered
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: Timecounters tick every 1.000 msec
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: vlan: initialized, using hash tables with chaining
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: lo0: bpf attached
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: hptrr: no controller detected.

In safe mode it continues with:
Code: 
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: hdacc0: <VIA (0x9f80) HDA CODEC> at cad 1 on hdac0
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: hdacc0: Root Node at nid=0: 1 subnodes 1-1
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: hdaa0: <VIA (0x9f80) Audio Function Group> at nid 1 on hdacc0
Sep  5 14:23:49 FreebsdBox kernel: hdaa0: Audio Function Group at nid=1: 2 subnodes 2-3

Any idea?

Thanks
Frédéric
 
I have been able to install FreeBSD on a Via C-7 desktop and laptop. The only problem was the HDA codec on both and it was not a show stopper - I was not willing to put the time into the sound when it worked fine in Linux. These are single core, 32 bit CPU's.

In OpenBSD, SATA support is crippled and it will only support one SATA drive. If I used two SATA drives (hard drive + DVD burner) the boot process would hang. There was no AHCI bios selection. OpenBSD worked fine on the desktop as long as I used a SATA hard drive and and IDE DVD burner. The laptop would not boot openbsd OpenBSD but would boot FreeBSD and again the sound did not work out of the box.

I know it does not help to say that I am not planning to buy any more Via motherboards but I would recommend
  1. Play with the bios settings.
  2. Remove anything that is not absolutely necessary.
  3. Post your dmesg.
  4. Search to see if anyone has run Linux on the board and if anything special was needed. (I did a quick search on Freebsd FreeBSD and came up empty). My search on Eden X2 CPU indicated they were 64 bit CPU's so may be worth trying the amd64 port.

Edit: I found this link regarding boot problems in linux Linux.
 
Thanks @shepper,

The P900 works fine with Ubuntu 12.04, except the VT6130 (Ethernet) is not supported. That is why I'm investigating FreeBSD as an alternative. FreeBSD boots correctly with the 8.4 version! (I did not go through the install process but I boot itself is ok without the safe mode.) I play with all the bios options without success :( BTW, there are no AHCI parameters.

I cannot post the dmesg as nothing is logged when the boot hangs :( I assume that the dmesg in safe mode is not really useful.

I also tried the amd64 version, same problem without the safe mode and, in safe mode, it stops later on for a problem of timer.

:(
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Hello,

Thanks for the hint but the board is different, the chipsets are different and the logs are not the same. Unfortunately I don't think, the two problems are related.
 
Have you checked if there's a BIOS update available for your board? My Jetway Mini-ITX board that uses the VIA C7 CPU with the CN700 chipset needed a few BIOS updates to get everything properly working with FreeBSD.
 
My BIOS version is 1.02 built 04/03/2012. On the ViaEmbedded web site: version 1.00 since 31/01/2012.

LOL
 
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