Diskless media director boots halfway

[MasterC]

Hello,

I'm trying to get a media director booting (my main system is a hybrid, but I would also like remote media director systems) from the network.  DHCP is working, TFTP is working and it begins to boot.  About 15 seconds into it it stops.  The system isn't hanging, I can scroll up and read boot messages, but it just doesn't go any further.  The last message puts eth0 down:

Code: [Select]

[ 43.145093] NET: Registered protocol family 17
IP-Config: eth0 hardware address 00:03:1d:02:0a:aa mtu 1500 DHCP RARP
[ 43.151327] eth0: link down
That is the very last 3 lines.  I am fairly comfortable with Linux but don't really know how to proceed with this.  The system is a Commell LV-667T which has a Via CN400 (unichrome) chipset and a VT1625 TV Out Encoder on it.  It is connected via S-Video to my Sony Wega CRT TV (somewhat old school).  I've gone over the directions on setting up a diskless MD several times. 

I've thought maybe I have to build openchrome and install it on the MD image.  I may try that by doing a chroot from the Core (which is also running a Via based system from Jetway) and doing the build, but I'm not entirely sure that is the problem as I don't think the system is continuing to boot beyond that point.

I may be overlooking the obvious, but I can't seem to figure out what that obvious is.  Any hints are very welcome.

-Chad

[MasterC]

Did the chroot, built openchrome and DRM, the install went just fine (same arch on both the diskless MD and the Core so no worries there) but there is no change.  I'd really like to get this going, I'm losing WAF quickly and I am also without my phone service (SIPPhone.com) in my current situation.  I don't want to integrate the Core system if I can't get any MD's to work, and if I don't integrate the Core I lose all other network connectivity (it will be replacing a smoothwall system).  So... hopefully I can get somewhere soon with this or else I'll have to scrap the project in my real world application and tinker on the pseudo network (not as fun or realistic).

-Chad

[MasterC]

Back again

So now I'm leaning towards a problem with the kernel since it appears to load the initrd image (the department of redundancy department ) but halts shortly after what appears to be loading the NIC module (via_rhine).  Because I can chroot into the image from the Core (sudo chroot /usr/pluto/diskless/70 /bin/bash) I also assume the "build" is working.  Seems logical that the problem may be a hard coded default that doesn't apply to my hardware (seems unlikely, but it's Beta so who knows) or (more likely) a missing requirement for my system.

My next move will be again chrooting into the image, apt-get a new/different kernel and try again.  If it starts (or even if it fails in a different place) it will be a huge indicator of a problem with either the kernel or the initrd.

Any suggestions in the meantime are welcome...

-Chad

[1audio]

The CN700 / Via based MB is the problem. There may be a workaround coming but many people have had problems getting the VIA stuff to cooperate with Linux past basic computing. I got most of the way with a CX700 and then both the video and audio drivers weren't working. Looking deeper there was a tedious process to build both with no indication on the via boards that it would actually work.  I decided to wait since I know the developers are looking at the Via platform and they will make something with a higher chance of working.

[MasterC]

Awesome, thank you for the reply.  I pretty much have decided to move on and just check back on the project intermittently.  I'm a heavy MythTV user/system integrator, and I just can't see the usefulness of LinuxMCE with all it's bugs and problems in the immediate future.  Right now there doesn't seem to be a good way to provide feedback, bug reports and other things necessary for a community driven project to grow quickly.  Which is fine, if it's still too early it probably doesn't need a lot of unnecessary feedback at this point, though I think more developers may get involved if it were easier to actually get on board with developing...

Thanks again.

-Chad

[1audio]

Within weeks a new, much more bug-free, system will be available with a lot of refinements. There are so very many things in this system to troubleshoot and they are all evolving independently. But once the bugs are reduced to a usable level the integration and functionality is very impressive.

I just built an audio server/control system out of this (no video) that really works well. The Video is the real PITA. And most of those problems can be assigned directly to poorly supported Linux drivers and the "walled garden" around video content.

Mythtv is the biggest challenge inside LMCE. Have you got the EPIA-EX board working OK with Myth live TV? I have seen it work for recorded stuff but live TV uses a myth driver and that seems to be a roadblock. Myth in general was not really designed to be encased in something like LMCE so there are a number of tweaks necessary to paste them together. I know my live Myth is very much hit or miss. However using its backend to capture content and play through xine in LMCE works fine. And hopefully soon on th EPIA-EX. (Which needs a special driver/xine to work).

The project is very much interested in developers and they will provide detailed direction and help for someone willing to take on anything difficult. I got a developer working on a mobile phone orbiter and they provided everything short of the finished product.

[totallymaxed]

The CN700 / Via based MB is the problem. There may be a workaround coming but many people have had problems getting the VIA stuff to cooperate with Linux past basic computing. I got most of the way with a CX700 and then both the video and audio drivers weren't working. Looking deeper there was a tedious process to build both with no indication on the via boards that it would actually work.  I decided to wait since I know the developers are looking at the Via platform and they will make something with a higher chance of working.

Once you build/install Openchrome then then CN700/CX700/CLE266 boards work fine in our experience with LMCE.

Andrew

[bulek]

The CN700 / Via based MB is the problem. There may be a workaround coming but many people have had problems getting the VIA stuff to cooperate with Linux past basic computing. I got most of the way with a CX700 and then both the video and audio drivers weren't working. Looking deeper there was a tedious process to build both with no indication on the via boards that it would actually work.  I decided to wait since I know the developers are looking at the Via platform and they will make something with a higher chance of working.

Once you build/install Openchrome then then CN700/CX700/CLE266 boards work fine in our experience with LMCE.

Andrew

Hi Andrew :

Could you please give some more of your experiences with Openchrome and Vias and more information, how to get this going
(building Openchrome) ?

Thanks in advance,

regards,
Bulek.

[chrisbirkinshaw]

Hello,

I'm trying to get a media director booting (my main system is a hybrid, but I would also like remote media director systems) from the network.  DHCP is working, TFTP is working and it begins to boot.  About 15 seconds into it it stops.  The system isn't hanging, I can scroll up and read boot messages, but it just doesn't go any further.  The last message puts eth0 down:

Code: [Select]

[ 43.145093] NET: Registered protocol family 17
IP-Config: eth0 hardware address 00:03:1d:02:0a:aa mtu 1500 DHCP RARP
[ 43.151327] eth0: link down


The problem here I'm guessing is that you have 2 network cards. The first boots and gets the boot image, but when that boots it puts the network interfaces in the wrong order so eth0 now appears to have no network connection.

You can verify this by checking 00:03:1d:02:0a:aa against the address on the media directors web page.

The only solution I can think of is to remove the driver for the second network card from the initrd or remove this card if you don't need it.

[rafik24]

edit the /etc/iftab replace eth0 by eth1 and vice vers ca.

[chrisbirkinshaw]

iftab is not read by the initrd, so this doesn't help

[rafik24]

well it works for me since the iftab is in the initrd.img file,
since i had modules to add in order to get my wifi nic to work i had to rebuild initrd.img