Compaq desktop PC with ACPI and DMA issues

[Apatewna]

I have this nice Compaq Evo PC (P4@1.7 512MB 20G NvidiaTNT).
The problem has appeared before with the 1.0. Version 1.1 was not directly tested (upgraded through PBI).

I burned the 1.2 ISO and tested it on another machine and it installed correctly.
Next I put this CD into the DVD drive of the Compaq and booted.
I was greeted with the standard selection menu (1,2,3 etc) and pressed Enter. Shortly after the PC sprew up errors (didn't get to the graphic install phase).
Reboot.
Okay, I said, let's press option 2 (Boot with ACPI enabled), it worked!
The installation went on normally.
At the end It told me to take out the CD and the sytem rebooted.
Upon this boot I got the "BTX Loaded blablah" error.
Went to the BIOS and disabled the "IDE use DMA" option.
The system logged in successfully and surfed the net for about an hour.
I decided to shutdown and the system did not shutdown using ACPI. I got the "System halted, press any key to reboot".

So I have 2 questions here:

a) I selected "Boot with ACPI enabled". Can the installer detect the presence of the acpi.ko module and insert it in the boot sequence? On this specific computer with 1.0 version I had the same issues and loaded the module manually in the appropriate conf file.

b) How can the "IDE DMA mode" affect the normal boot but not the installation itself?

This is a 100% repeatable issue, happened on version 1.0 again and it is manually resolvable.

[TerryP]

a) I selected "Boot with ACPI enabled". Can the installer detect the presence of the acpi.ko module and insert it in the boot sequence? On this specific computer with 1.0 version I had the same issues and loaded the module manually in the appropriate conf file.

b) How can the "IDE DMA mode" affect the normal boot but not the installation itself?

If it worked in 1.0 it should work in 1.2 I believe.

You can select safe, normal, or acpi disabled boot during install for install kernel but I think when you reboot it's in normal mode. I've had to toy with my ACPI settings between install/reboot and between FreeBSD (6.1)/PC-BSD (1.1) before, how things go with DMA I wouldn't know yet.

[Apatewna]

If it worked in 1.0 it should work in 1.2 I believe.

You can select safe, normal, or acpi disabled boot during install for install kernel but I think when you reboot it's in normal mode. I've had to toy with my ACPI settings between install/reboot and between FreeBSD (6.1)/PC-BSD (1.1) before, how things go with DMA I wouldn't know yet.

The installer has the same behaviour in 1.0 and 1.2. This is feature. If ACPI is not detected at boot, the selection mask says:
[1] Default
[2] Boot with ACPI enabled

If ACPI is detected it says

[1] Default
[2] Boot with ACPI disabled

At this point I know the PC works correctly only with ACPI enabled. And I want to force the installer to use the ACPI on the next reboot as well. It seems that the only way to do it is manually later after the install.

[Apatewna]

I am following some freebsd lists for a while and today I found something interesting for our developers crew. It is a patch that resolves the problem booting with DMA enabled in BIOS. I paste below the actual emails:

On Friday 22 September 2006 10:39, Dominic Marks wrote:
> > CyberSans AirBort wrote:
>> > > hello guys, sorry if i send email to wrong address.
>> > >
>> > > i have tested 6.2-BETA and the same problem still appear when i want to
>> > > install it into compaq evo desktop; BTX HALTED.
>> > >
>> > > like previous version, it stucks when booting from cd on the first
>> > > installation. i have follow so many discussion around the internet, and
>> > > they
>> > > are blaming compaq BIOS, some of them give solution such as change hdd
mode
>> > > from extended DMA to max PIO, but it won't work. and for your information,
>> > > this machine had no problem when installed with windows or linux.
>> > >
>> > > please guys, i hope there will be a fixed on 6.2 so that it will load,
>> > > installed, and run on my compaq evo desktop
> >
> > Go into the BIOS, disable BIOS DMA transfers **. After that it
> > will boot
> > normally. I have about 20 EVOs, which this change they run fine. This
> > is true of all versions of FreeBSD I have ever tried.
> >
> > ** I can't remember the exact name of the option, but it is something
> > along those lines.

Hmm, are you willing to test a change that should fix that? If so, try
http://people.freebsd.org/~jhb/patches/btx_crx.patch You'll need to do
a 'make clean && make && make install' in /sys/boot after applying, and if
the make install suceeeds, do a 'bsdlabel -B ad0s1' (replace ad0s1 with the
actual slice you boot from). I think it should work (I think it was tested a
while ago, but boot2 used to not fit, now it does though). Be warned though
that if it doesn't work, you won't be able to boot from your disk. If that
happens and you have a 6.x disc 1 lying around, you can boot into rescue mode
and re-run 'bsdlabel' and move boot/loader.old to boot/loader on the root
partition to get your system back. Ideally you'd try this on a system with
data you don't care about (i.e., it's ok to just do a reinstall if it is
hosed).

-- John Baldwin

John Baldwin wrote:
>
> Hmm, are you willing to test a change that should fix that? If so, try http://people.freebsd.org/~jhb/patches/btx_crx.patch You'll need to do a 'make clean && make && make install' in /sys/boot after applying, and if the make install suceeeds, do a 'bsdlabel -B ad0s1' (replace ad0s1 with the actual slice you boot from). I think it should work (I think it was tested a while ago, but boot2 used to not fit, now it does though). Be warned though that if it doesn't work, you won't be able to boot from your disk. If that happens and you have a 6.x disc 1 lying around, you can boot into rescue mode and re-run 'bsdlabel' and move boot/loader.old to boot/loader on the root partition to get your system back. Ideally you'd try this on a system with data you don't care about (i.e., it's ok to just do a reinstall if it is hosed).
>

Hi John.

I tested the patch on my -CURRENT box, both with the BIOS DMA
enabled and disabled and I can confirm it works successfully.
Test system is was a Compaq EVO D510 CMT desktop.

Thanks John,
--
Dominic

Anybody able to doublecheck this on a machine that has the exact same problem with DMA?

[antik]

Anybody able to doublecheck this on a machine that has the exact same problem with DMA?

I don't have any Compaq here anymore, but I can test it on some computer of my friends.

[Apatewna]

You can test it on whatever computer has the DMA issue, not just Compaq.

But hey, I wouldn't like to spoil the fun of ruining a friend's computer :evil: