Hyperion Entertainment Message Boards

Posted: **Tue Apr 25, 2023 10:22 pm**

At first, thanks to Hypex and others for Jessie installation .iso https://sourceforge.net/projects/amigao ... installer/

As I upgraded my XE to 7445 / 1400 MHz CPU, i tried install linux here. Yes, it slow on every single-core machine, but on my 1333 MHz Pegasos 2 I has linux also and it works according his power.

I have some questions about installer:
- in early Installer menu there is "D" - DMA option. Setting this option has effect on DMA only during installation process, or also in newly installed system ? And it looks like D option is only for a1ide ( I see kernel boot parameter libata.dma=1 ) and not SATA, is this right?
Because I have boot partition on a1ide CF card ( no DMA fix ) and /root partition on SATA controller with DMA.

- when I set boot partition to 1 GB ( booting CF card is large, and suprplus of space is good ), I receive during formatting this:
ERROR! A1 Boot volume filesystem must have size 128 inodes!
If I changed size to 98 MB, it works OK. As I don't understand ext2, please what is maximum partition size with inode size 128 ?

- what exactly mean: "Boot partition must be a partition after your Workbench boot partition" ?
Because my linux boot is second partition is on a1ide ( cfcard, with slbv2 ) where is first partion FFS named Boot:, only with /Kickstart direcrory and boot flag.
From this partition are loaded AmigaOS kickstart modules only and then it boots AmigaOS from System: partition on SATA disk.

- I cannot boot linux after installation.
It is clear, because on a1ide linux boot partition are only files a1boot.conf and bootorder.conf. No boot.img or kernel.
If I look in a1boot.conf there is locatin of image on SATA disk.
I can edit this file, but there is warning: "DO NOT MODIFY! USE BOOTLOADER SCRIPT TO GENERATE FILE. PUT CUSTOM ENTRIES IN /boot/a1boot/custom/a1boot.conf*"
But - where is bootloader script and what is format of custom entries? Is this yaboot ?

Posted: **Wed Apr 26, 2023 9:59 pm**

I cannot boot linux. Slb2 bounds AmigaOS and linux boot partitions, in menu is shown three items: AmigaOS, linux, linux-recovery.
I even modified a1boot.conf manually ( add my line ), but all linux menus in ( autogenerated and my manual ) ends with:

Booting configuration XYZ
## Booting image at 00500000 ...
Bad Magic Number
Failed loading kernel (or kickstart) image file(s)

What is "Bad Magic Number" ?

Posted: **Thu Apr 27, 2023 6:50 pm**

I finally sucseed run lixux Jessie on AmigaOne XE. Huraaaaa... ( I have to say, that Pegasos 2 users had much easier work, both with Amiga/MorphOS an linux ).

After installation is necessary to run again /amigaone/postinstall.sh - to avoid "Bad Magic Number" magic.

Still remains these questions:

- what exactly do libata.dma? It turns on/off both for SATA anf internal ATA? I need SATA DMA and ATA no-DMA...
- is possible to add temporary kernel boot parameter?
if I set it in U-Boot linux menu, it does nothing... I want to test libata.force and some others. Doing the changes via Rescue CD + postinstall.sh is very time consuming.
- And what is this Bad magic number, how the slbV2 works?

Posted: **Thu Apr 27, 2023 11:40 pm**

And I had done the same as you. Unfortunately, I changed SATA HDs thinking I had a problem since it often wouldn't start and gave me problems
with AmigaOS and also with Linux , I reinstalled just AmigaOS on a new 1Tb SATA HD and it kept giving me problems .
Desperate I thought it was the AmigaOne then I changed the sata cable that came with the Sil3112 to a new SATA3 one with metal hooks and everything worked out.
I would like to reinstall Linux again but I forgot to leave space after the OS4 boot partition. i might try again by sacrificing the Swap partition which is just after that
Of the Workbench.
The Bad magic number , if I remember correctly is when you set up a device and/or boot partition that is then not found.
A curiosity , I read your article about replacing the cpu module of the XE , I would also love to upgrade mine to a G4 with higher Ghz speed.
I got lost in technical explanations , PowerMac cpu modules are any good the ones on Megarray , if I buy one and try to insert it into A1 I risk burning the motherboard.
Based on what did you make the changes to the CPU board?I'm really afraid of burning out the A1 , however I could use a lot more speed I use it a lot with Blender.

Posted: **Fri Apr 28, 2023 8:44 am**

Ghillo wrote: Thu Apr 27, 2023 11:40 pm And I had done the same as you. Unfortunately, I changed SATA HDs thinking I had a problem since it often wouldn't start and gave me problems
with AmigaOS and also with Linux , I reinstalled just AmigaOS on a new 1Tb SATA HD and it kept giving me problems .
Desperate I thought it was the AmigaOne then I changed the sata cable that came with the Sil3112 to a new SATA3 one with metal hooks and everything worked out.
I would like to reinstall Linux again but I forgot to leave space after the OS4 boot partition. i might try again by sacrificing the Swap partition which is just after that
Of the Workbench.
The Bad magic number , if I remember correctly is when you set up a device and/or boot partition that is then not found.

Finally I solved DMA problem this way:
My AmigaOne XE disk config:
internal ATA ( without DMA-fix ): CF card - 1. partition: SFS, with /kickstart directory for booting AmigaOS; 2. partition - EXT2, linux /boot/a1boot
+ CD/DVD
PCI SATA Sii3114: SSD with AmigaOS System: + Work:, AmigaOS SWAP, EXT4 linux /, linux SWAP

kernel parameter libata.dma=1 causes that harddisks ( i.e. SSd) use DMA, and CD + CFcards not used DMA. What is exactly I need.
There if also possibility for detailed DMA/PIO settings, to use kernel parameter libata.force=1:pio4,2:pio4,3:udma6 .... but in my case I am not using it.

I also found easy way how to test different booting configurations and kernel parameters:
I modified /boot/a1boot/boot/a1boot.conf ... i.e. bootconfig file on ext2 booting partition.
I leave original rows untouched, as is generated with postinstall.sh script, and I add another row(s) with my testing configuration. This way my configuration appears on booting menu, like last line(s).

And thanks for Magic number explanation - it is a little magic

A curiosity , I read your article about replacing the cpu module of the XE , I would also love to upgrade mine to a G4 with higher Ghz speed.
I got lost in technical explanations , PowerMac cpu modules are any good the ones on Megarray , if I buy one and try to insert it into A1 I risk burning the motherboard.
Based on what did you make the changes to the CPU board?I'm really afraid of burning out the A1 , however I could use a lot more speed I use it a lot with Blender.

NEVER use POWERMAC CPU MODULE in AMIGAONE !!!!
they have the same connectors, but different pinout. You risk damage of both motherboard and CPU module.

Use Powermac module only as source of fast CPUs. If you have G4 AmigaOne module, you look for Powermac module with 7455 or 7457 CPU. If you have G3 Amigaone module, there is no way.
For sure you need friend or company who is experienced in CPU with ball array soldering and reballing. I have such company nearby, I never do any soldering on motherboard, even not the easy one. I am middle-aged lady and it is too much for me.

Also you must study manual of your Powermac new CPU ( you need to find exact type ), and look for Core voltage. This Core voltage you need to setup on AmigaOne motherboard. And also setup new frequency here. VCore+frequency settings are in AmigaOne XE manual. And if you have Micro, there is different VCore settings. Improper setting of voltage is also big risk of damage.

Last thing you have to is look at CPU cooler. If you have old AmigaOne flat one ( often is blue plastic here ), you must change it. If you have later model - with copper bars ( tall one) it is OK if you set new CPU for his nominal frequency. If you want to overclock it over nominal frequency, you need better cooler.

Posted: **Wed May 03, 2023 10:55 pm**

Thanks for the answers

, I tried to contact ACube since I live in Italy
but unfortunately they told me that they no longer support AmigaOne XEs due to lack of components.

Posted: **Tue May 16, 2023 10:51 am**

Debian Jessie on XE has disabled hardware acceleration of graphics cards. Do somebody know the reason?
As I know ( from here: https://docs.voidlinux-ppc.org/configur ... phics.html )
R100 + R200 graphics chip have no shaders, thus linux drivers cannot support kernel modesetting, only fbdev. So as drivers are very probably the same, this issue is on AmigaOne XE cards too.
And if we are using in our AmigaOne XE cards like 9250 or 9000 PRO with R200 chip, acceleration is disabled.

But anybody try R300 card? Like 9800 Pro? I know, it has no hw accel in AmigaOS, but will hw accel works with linux?
It should...

Posted: **Wed Jun 21, 2023 6:19 pm**

I succseed to replace CPU in my Micro A1-C to 750GX / 1200 MHz. And if there is great speed increase, I want to test here linux also.

I am used Hypex's Debian Jessie installer https://sourceforge.net/projects/amigao ... installer/.
Thanx to @Hypex for this!

In past I installed linux with this installer to AmigaOne XE with no problems. Installation on Micro A1-C has issues:
1) in early menu with boot options selections, if i touched any key (D/DMA, U/USB/... or arrow up/down to select boot option it looks normally and change the option, but after that if I press Enter / Return, nothing happens

I stay on boot options selection and cannot continue. No item works ( Jessie, Jessie expert mode, Rescue)
On XE it works.

2) if in boot options menu I not touch anything, it select after 10sec Jessie install automatically:

Code: Select all

Loading kernel...
Booting image at 00500000
Image name:...
Created:...
Image type...
Data size 12.8 MB
Load adress 04000000
Entry point: 040000fc
Contents:
Image0: 7.6 MB
Image1: 5.1 MB
Verifiyng checksum ... OK
OK
Loading ramdisk to0da3c000, end 0df609c4 ... OK

And after that message boot process not continued. ( on XE it works )

My Micro and XE are both connected via KVM switch, use the same monitor and keyboard.
Only difference is UBoot:

XE has last UBoot from Hyperion - 1.1.1.
Micro I bought with beta - 1.2.0

Has anybody similar problem? Or it is on my Micro only? And can be the cause UBoot different version?
Thanks for any idea.

Posted: **Sat Jul 01, 2023 6:35 pm**

sailorMH wrote: Tue Apr 25, 2023 10:22 pm

Good to see it's still useful after all these years. I still check the sourceforge site now and then and am surprised it still has downloads to this day.

I have some questions about installer:
- in early Installer menu there is "D" - DMA option. Setting this option has effect on DMA only during installation process, or also in newly installed system ?

It will also have an effect on the installed system. These options are added to the boot line, either using the key options, or importing bootargs from UBoot. It filters out the options and adds it to the A1 boot config for the kernel boot options. Namely, it looks for usb, libata or floppy.

And it looks like D option is only for a1ide ( I see kernel boot parameter libata.dma=1 ) and not SATA, is this right?
Because I have boot partition on a1ide CF card ( no DMA fix ) and /root partition on SATA controller with DMA.

I had to look this up. So it looks like all libata settings will affect IDE and SATA since both are controller by libata. This means it will disable DMA for SATA then. I can see this isn't good for speed. But would be needed for internal IDE. I likely chose this as it was simpler to add as more specific IDE options would complicate it.

In this case you will need to remove it and replace it with ide core but it's confusing as it looks like they renamed from ide_core to ide-core. It needs interface and device number like so:
ide-core.nodma=[interface_number.device_number]

So first device on first controller interface would be:

Code: Select all

ide-core.nodma=0.0

Internal IDE should be interface 0 and 1 for bus 0 and 1. But it needs setting for all devices. For only one that's fine if you know where it is.

Options here:
http://redsymbol.net/linux-kernel-boot-parameters/3.16/

- when I set boot partition to 1 GB ( booting CF card is large, and suprplus of space is good ), I receive during formatting this:
ERROR! A1 Boot volume filesystem must have size 128 inodes!
If I changed size to 98 MB, it works OK. As I don't understand ext2, please what is maximum partition size with inode size 128 ?

I not sure how it limits the partition size as there is also block sizes independent. Essentially, inodes are said to be index nodes for filesystem, analogous to to a file block header in FFS. The larger inode size allows for longer time stamps and other data. But 1GB should be fine. Likely the smaller size would use smaller inodes.

That said, how did you format the volume? Was it from the installer? The installer should have used 128 size inodes when formatting any device as Ext2. I'm not sure if disk utility in Debian will use same config used in installer. You can do it like this:

Code: Select all

mke2fs -t ext2 -I 128 </dev/point>

Tool tune2fs can also do it but not sure about modifying in place.

- what exactly mean: "Boot partition must be a partition after your Workbench boot partition" ?
Because my linux boot is second partition is on a1ide ( cfcard, with slbv2 ) where is first partion FFS named Boot:, only with /Kickstart direcrory and boot flag.
From this partition are loaded AmigaOS kickstart modules only and then it boots AmigaOS from System: partition on SATA disk.

It means I wasn't so clear by the looks of it. This is a quirk of SLBv2 as it scans for Linux menu. Or one of many between it and UBoot. So this means it needs a bootable OS4 partition such as FFS or SFS. With the Linux a1boot volume being a partition after. By the looks of your setup this should satisfy the requirements. Only thing is if it needs a Kicklayout, which is normal to have, and you do. I hope you didn't see that as an error?

- I cannot boot linux after installation.
It is clear, because on a1ide linux boot partition are only files a1boot.conf and bootorder.conf. No boot.img or kernel.

Oh oh. Something has gone wrong. The boot image is created in the installer step for "Creating UBoot image..." Did you see this? The menu is created after. Also this relies on the kernel package being loaded first thing when installer boots but it should error out if it wasn't found.

If I look in a1boot.conf there is locatin of image on SATA disk.

That's clearly wrong. All boot files should be installed to your a1ide. Don't know why it would install to your root volume as boot is at /boot/a1boot and root at /. Or both mounted off /target in the installer so different and it checks both are different.

I can edit this file, but there is warning: "DO NOT MODIFY! USE BOOTLOADER SCRIPT TO GENERATE FILE. PUT CUSTOM ENTRIES IN /boot/a1boot/custom/a1boot.conf*"
But - where is bootloader script and what is format of custom entries? Is this yaboot ?

Will need to have a word with Geri about this. Ha. It doesn't say and the docs are missing. No it's not yaboot. It's a tool from Geri's package to manage the boot entries. The installer uses it to create the boot menu and install boot image. So the command you want is:

update-amigaos4-slb

Options:
-k [version] Specify kernel version
-u Create or update a boot entry
-d Remove a boot entry
-h This message

You need to use -u or -d. You can configure kernel options by changing /etc/default/amigaos4-slb file. Set menu order in /boot/bootorder.conf. Or put custom a1boot configs in /custom/a1boot.conf*. Last two points from a1boot partition mounted at /boot/a1boot.

Oh the format. Exactly the same as a normal a1boot.conf file. Should be one entry per file but can have multiple entries if desired as it's just attached to main config.

Posted: **Sun Jul 02, 2023 1:34 pm**

sailorMH wrote: Thu Apr 27, 2023 6:50 pm I finally sucseed run lixux Jessie on AmigaOne XE. Huraaaaa... ( I have to say, that Pegasos 2 users had much easier work, both with Amiga/MorphOS an linux ).

That's a plus. Yes the Pegaos 2 had some official support for Linux from CD releases. But, when it works as expected, the installer makes it easy to install. A lot easier than on the X1000 which required "some tinkering". Also you can install from CD, USB or the internet from one boot image which his hard to beat.

Continuing...

What is "Bad Magic Number" ?

This is from UBoot. It means the uImage loaded in, which is a UBoot kernel image, doesn't have a correct ID. It's corrupt. It can also happen if an image wasn't loaded into memory. And boot was attempted from memory. This can be caused by either a corrupt image file or failing to load at all.

After installation is necessary to run again /amigaone/postinstall.sh - to avoid "Bad Magic Number" magic.

Likely this caused the image to be rebuilt and somehow install to the right place.

Even though you cannot boot it at this point a little help here. If you can get a CD booting in Rescue mode then you can try this. There is a command called mkbootuimage to rebuild images. But it does need kernel version. So it may be easier just to use rescue mode and mount the root volume. I don't recall if it picks up the boot volume. But if you label it as "a1boot" or it's the only Ext2/3 with an a1boot.conf then the bootcheck.sh script will find it and mount it while postinstall.sh can then fix stuff up. As you can see it does a lot of stuff between those two. Intelligent scripts before AI.

- is possible to add temporary kernel boot parameter?

You can if you edit the a1boot.conf manually like you have. Though heed the warning.

I was checking and the /etc/default/amigaos4-slb file on system root should be what you need. If you edit that it has options for enabling and disabling hardware. The installer options will in there which you can disable. There is a line to disable IDE which will help. Then call to update:

Code: Select all

update-amigaos4-slb -u

You could also put a test config in /boot/a1boot/custom/a1boot.conf.test as well as an example.

if I set it in U-Boot linux menu, it does nothing... I want to test libata.force and some others. Doing the changes via Rescue CD + postinstall.sh is very time consuming.

That's because the boot options variable is over wrote in memory before booting.

- And what is this Bad magic number, how the slbV2 works?

It's actually UBoot doing it from SLB. So to explain the process. What SLBv2 is doing is using UBoot core functions to do the heavy work. So when it loads SLB scans for OS4 partitions and then for an Ext2 partition. This is why there are quirks like Linux boot volume needing to be after a Workbench volume. If it finds an a1boot config it will load it in and attach the menu entries to the existing menu. When you boot it, it then commands UBoot to load the image, resets the boot options, then boot the kernel. So the magic error is from UBoot itself. You could get the same error if you told UBoot to "bootm" and nothing was in memory to boot.

A bit more on the inodes being 128. This is a UBoot quirk. UBoot core functions handle the reading of Ext2 files. As well as in built GZ decompression. Because UBoot is rather old it can only understand Ext2/3 volumes with 128 size nodes. This not too bad as you can use an Ex4 volume on a SATA drive as you have. Similar to how you are also limited to needing to boot OS4 from IDE and then divert to SATA.

Also, forgot to mention, if you check you system for /var/log/installer there should be an install log with any errors including any from my boot scripts. Which would be good to diagnose what went wrong during the install.

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