Full install on Alix 2c3
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Hi everybody!
I'm a french user of alix board and i'm trying to du a full install on it. I follow the instruction in comment on this site : http://blog.pfsense.org/?p=175 and it's work untill this step :
halt your pc or virtual pc place your card to the alix board use, connect a console cable and power up. Your board is booting and ready for configuration.
I well mount the partition /dev/da0s1a to the mnt and edit the fstab file to modify da to ad. I can't boot correctly.
I see th Grub boot loader screen and after I have this message :
Trying to mount root from ufs:/dev/ad0s1a
Manual root filesystem specification:
<fstype>:<device> Mount <device>using filesystem <fstype>eg. ufs:da0s1a
? List valid disk boot devices
<empty line=""> Abort manual inputmountroot>
And i'm blocked at this step. I don't know what to do…
Could you help me? Have you a solution?
Thanks by advance.</empty></fstype></device></device></fstype>
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What does it show on the line right above "Trying to mount root from…"?
It sounds like the disk is a different number on the ALIX. If it shows ad2 for example, at that mountroot prompt, type:
ufs:ad2s1a
hit enter, then it should boot and work fine.
once you're up and running you'll need to use Diagnostics -> Edit File, open /etc/fstab and change ad0 to ad2 or however it shows on your ALIX. Save that file and reboot to test, and you should be set.
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Make sure your combined partition(s) sizes are smaller than 20GB. At this point Alix boards will not recognize sizes larger than 20GB.
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Since ALIX boards are now a known constant, would it be helpful just to release a full version that can be dd'ed to a microdrive with all the appropriate parameters preconfigured? A full version of pfSense on an ALIX board really is the holy grail of firewalls these days.
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I totally aggre with you Valnar! a full alix version of pfsense could be great!
My microdrive is a seagate 2.5GB. I don't think there is microdrive larger than 20GB… ???
I can't try what you say now cmb but I will try it tomorow and I'll inform you...
Thanks for your help!
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To add to cmb's comment, when you get to that prompt, if you don't know what else to enter, press ? to see the available boot devices.
Hopefully you can get this working. It seems that the biggest problem is finding a Microdrive that works in the right mode for FreeBSD on the ALIX. CompactFlash devices can work both as CompactFlash cards and ATA devices - I can't remember which one of these modes (or is it both?) is required to run FreeBSD on the ALIX.
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I pressed ? but there is no boot device on appearing on the screen. It's maybe a probleme with the type of my microdrive, I have a 2.5 Gb seagate one. Is there a modification to do in bios (LBA mode, CHS mode)?
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Ah, didn't realize you were talking about microdrives. I tried my 4GB microdrive and never could get it to work.
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I have a 2.5GB Seagate micro drive that works fine in a USB card reader (in the Compact Flash Slot) but the same drive doesn't work at all on FreeBSD 6.2, 6.3 or 7.0 (its not even recognised) and Linux 2.6.10+something reports lots of timeout errors on this drive. I suspect these drives don't interrupt but I haven't been able to prove that to my satisfaction.
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Can someone please give me a step by step to do what was mentioned here?
once you're up and running you'll need to use Diagnostics -> Edit File, open /etc/fstab and change ad0 to ad2 or however it shows on your ALIX. Save that file and reboot to test, and you should be set.
I have an ALIX setup and running just fine but I cant for the life of me figure out how to change my fstab. Currently it wants to boots from ufs:da0s1a and I have to type in ufs:ad0s1a when I reboot this is from installing to an adapter card. When I go to Diagnostics -> Edit File, no matter what I type in nothing happens and the screen stays blank.
Thanks ahead of time.
