[Soekris] Net 4501 BIOS v1.31b Problems?

[Heather Lockridge]

Hi,

Is there something wrong with combios V1.31b on the 4501?  This is 

What are the risks in downgrading the BIOS version to an earlier version, like b4501_128.bin?  

I know the downloads page says it is not recommeded to downgrade a BIOS to an older version than the one a board is supplied with, but I am wondering if this problem I am seeing is due to a flaw in the V1.31b BIOS.

As I mentioned to the list earlier and received many helpful responses I am trying to build Linux (a stripped-down version of Centos 4.4) onto a new 4501 which I received earlier this week.

I have loaded this version of linux on many net 4801s using the approach of booting from a tftp sever with an append line parameter in the tftpboot default file of root=/dev/nfs nfsroot=192.168.1.121:/soekris-root and it works great on net4801s with combios v1.31.

With the 4501, I use the same parameters, just a new kernel built for the correct CPU (AMD Elan).  What happens every time, no matter what kernel version I try is that the kernel boots from nfs, but does not find the root partition served by the nfs server.  I checked and a 4801 still finds it so I know there is no problem with my nfs server.

What I see is the following at the beginning of the kernel boot on the net4501 console:

Built 1 zonelists.  Total pages: 16256
Kernel command line: console=ttyS0,9600n81 root=/dev/nfs nfsroot=192.168.1.121:/soekris-root ip=dhcp panic=10 ramdisk_size=4096 rw BOOT_IMAGE=vmlinuz.net4501

Then at the end of the boot process, I see the following:

IP-Config: Complete:
      device=eth0, addr=192.168.1.228, mask=255.255.255.0, gw=192.168.1.2,
     host=192.168.1.228, domain=localdomain, nis-domain=(none),
     bootserver=192.168.1.121, rootserver=192.168.1.121, rootpath=
Looking up port of RPC 100003/2 on 192.168.1.121
Looking up port of RPC 100005/1 on 192.168.1.121
VFS: Mounted root (nfs filesystem).
Freeing unused kernel memory: 140k freed

Then nothing further happens!  I have checked with tcpdump on the nfs server watching the IP of the net4501 and I see no further traffic.

Note the "empty" rootpath=  !!

Could the "empty" rootpath= be due to a flaw in the BIOS?  Will I ruin my 4501 by downgrading to a prior version of the BIOS?

Any thoughts would be appreciated!

Thanks so much,

Regards,

Heather


       
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