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    Replacing hard drive with CF card

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Problems Installing or Upgrading pfSense Software
    30 Posts 11 Posters 19.2k Views
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    • H
      heiko
      last edited by

      The Disk-on-module is to place directly to the IDE-Port. Then you run the installation from the LiveCD. That´s it. A DOM with 4 GB costs for example 60 €/ 80 $.

      dom.jpg
      dom.jpg_thumb

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      • J
        j0emv
        last edited by

        You can also try a CF microdrive which has physical moving parts and a platter so they should last longer than your traditional CF card.  A 4gb microdrive runs about $50 probably and fits in the same CF type II slot.  Of course older CF readers have issues reading these drives from my experience but if its something recent, you should be fine.

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        • J
          joebarnhart
          last edited by

          You might mention that the Seagate 4G and 8G microdrives (the ones which cost $50 or less) DON'T WORK in CF-to-IDE adapters under FreeBSD 6.x.  Not sure how this slipped your mind since you are the one who discovered it and submitted the bug report to FreeBSD!  (Thank you for doing that, by the way.)

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          • G
            gnarfer
            last edited by

            How do you install? I Followed the fullinstall on wrap guide using wmware but all I get is

            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (1 retry left) LBA=0
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (0 retries left) LBA=0
            ad0: FAILURE - READ_DMA timed out LBA=0
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (1 retry left) LBA=1
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (0 retries left) LBA=1
            ad0: FAILURE - READ_DMA timed out LBA=1
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (1 retry left) LBA=0
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (0 retries left) LBA=0
            ad0: FAILURE - READ_DMA timed out LBA=0
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (1 retry left) LBA=0
            ad0: TIMEOUT - READ_DMA retrying (0 retries left) LBA=0
            ad0: FAILURE - READ_DMA timed out LBA=0
            Trying to mount root from ufs:/dev/da0s1a
            
            Manual root filesystem specification:
              <fstype>:<device>  Mount <device> using filesystem <fstype>
                                   eg. ufs:da0s1a
              ?                  List valid disk boot devices
              <empty line="">       Abort manual input
            
            mountroot></empty></fstype></device></device></fstype>
            

            I'm not realy sure what I did wrong. The hardware I use is a routerboard 200 from www.routerboard.com

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            • H
              hoba
              last edited by

              Did you try the default embedded image first? I have heard about people using that board so it should not have any issues. If you want to have a full hdd install on there (which is not recommended) try to just install the livecd to the cf without other modifications. The WRAP has to be treated a bit special as it's bios doesn't offer a fake vga/kbd device. A soekris for example can just run a default full install to cf-card. You might want to try this with the routerboard as well.

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              • G
                gnarfer
                last edited by

                Thanx for the tip. A Embeded img works. I'll try a clean install tonight. I have a industry class 4gb CF and it is my home fw so I'm not that worried about wearing it down.

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                • H
                  hoba
                  last edited by

                  Enable serial console option at system>advanced before moving it to the routerboard as you most likely will have to reassign nics after moving it over ;)

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                  • G
                    gnarfer
                    last edited by

                    Took me a good while but now I have tried to make a clean full install from 1.2-beta1.iso I used vmware to do this but when i put my cf back on the routerboard I still get the same error.

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                    • G
                      gnarfer
                      last edited by

                      I googled the error and found that it might have to do with dma settings so I looked at the wiki http://wiki.pfsense.com/wikka.php?wakka=BootOptions at boot options but even with CF card set to PIO4 i still get the question about "manual root file system specification" I have also tried to move the /boot/loader.conf file from the Embedded install (that actually boots) but I get the same result. Any ideas?

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                      • G
                        gnarfer
                        last edited by

                        It's working fine now  :) I had to rename partitions in /etc/fstab  to point to /dev/ad0 and enable the console in advanced settings.

                        As the stupid newbe I'm I installed the swap partition. Do I have to reinstall to make sure that I do not use it or could I just remove it from /etc/fstab? ???

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