Install appears to stop at CD-ROM SCSI-0 device

wallabybob

I tried to boot from a memory stick but the BIOS on the machine doesn't find the USB;

Curious! What sort of USB stick and what was on it - what build of pfSense and what did you do to get it on the USB stick?

How new is the intended target system? FreeBSD sometimes has trouble with "too new" hardware. FreeBSD 8.1 used in pfSense 2.0.3 was released in July 2010.

Another option is to install on another computer and then move the hard drive to your intended target system. On first boot on the target system you will probably get a "Mount root error" but that is pretty easy to rectify - search the forums or ask here.

Ridgeway

Curious! What sort of USB stick and what was on it

Jetflash 4GB

what build of pfSense

LiveCD 2.0.3 AMD 64

what did you do to get it on the USB stick?

I followed these instructions at http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,28264.0.html as recommended on the instructin guide

How new is the intended target system

Jetway J7F2WE1G5D

Intel G31 Express Chipset + ICH7 Chipset
Intel Core2 Processors
Support FSB 1333MHz
Integrated GMA3100 GPU
Supports Dual Channel DDR2 800/667MHz
Integrated Serial ATA2 3Gb/s
Integrated ALC662 HD Audio CODEC with 6.0 CH
Integrated Gigabit LAN
Micro ATX Form Factor ( 245mm X 180mm)

Intel Solid State Drive 520 Series, 2.5 60GB

The supplied assured me that all components will work with Linux but he wasn't sure about BSD

Another option is to install on another computer and then move the hard drive to your intended target system

I'll give that a try

Thanks for your feedback

stephenw10

You should be using the memstick image on a USB stick.

Steve

Ridgeway

Hi Steve,
Sorry for not being clearer but I used the "pfSense-LiveCD-2.0.3-RELEASE-amd64-20130412-1027.iso" for the DVD install and the "pfSense-memstick-2.0.3-RELEASE-amd64-20130412-1027.img" for the memory Stick install

Regards,

Ridgeway

wallabybob, I tried your suggestion and successfully loaded pfSense to the target hard drive using anther machine. You were correct, when I reconnected the hard drive back, I did get the "Mount Root error" and the boot up stopped. I searched the forum as you suggested for a solution to the "Mount Root error" but didn't find any posts that addressed that concern. I'm not sure how to work around this problem. Any ideas?

stephenw10

When you get to the mountroot> prompt type ? as it suggests and it should show you where your drive is connected.
Then you tell it where to look for root:

mountroot> ufs:/dev/ad0s1a

Of course your drive may not be ad0s1a.

Once you have booted you edit the fstab so it points at the correct mount points.

Here's a similar post: http://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,41201.msg212866.html#msg212866

Steve

wallabybob

When you installed on another computer, the hard drive would have had a name like /dev/ad0. When the drive is moved to another computer it will get a name dependent of which socket on the motherboard it was connected to but it will probably have a different name, perhaps /dev/ad2. The startup code reads /etc/fstab from the boot drive and attempts to mount the root file system as specified in /etc/fstab. On my system:
$ more /etc/fstab

Device Mountpoint FStype Options Dump Pass#

/dev/ad0s1a / ufs rw 1 1
/dev/ad0s1b none swap sw 0 0
$

so if I move this hard drive to another system on which the hard drive becomes /dev/ad2 I will need to edit /etc/fstab to change both occurrences of ad0 to ad2.

Ridgeway

Thank you for your help, wallabybob and Steve.

Using your suggestions, I've been able to determine the problem. As I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, after the "Welcome to pfSense" screen the text out display runs horizontally along the bottom of the screen. I thought that this was normal until I tried Wallabybob's suggestion and connected the hard drive to another computer which displayed the pfSense screen text one line at a time in the usual way with the text rolling down the screen. It appears to me that the video card on the Jetway mother board does not work properly with BSD and does not use line feeds to create a new line. Not only does the horizontal one-line display get blended in with the previous line of text but critical parts of the display are missed which makes it impossible to read.

It looks like I'll have to get some different hardware to install pfSense which is unfortunate because this small form factor enclosure and Jetway MB is perfect for a firewall. I was doing a proof of concept for an idea that I have, but I'll have to shelf that idea until future releases of BSD. If you can provide any additional suggestions, I'll be happy to try them on this hardware because this hardware combination, I feel, works well for pfSense and would be beneficial for other users.

Thanks again.
Regards

stephenw10

Try a 2.1 snapshot. It has much newer drivers anyway, since it's built on FreeBSD 8.3, but I believe it had a number of specific fixes for the newer Intel graphics chips.
http://snapshots.pfsense.org/

Steve

Ridgeway

Excellent suggestions, Steve and that moved me much further along: after running the 2.1 snapshot, the text scrolls down the page as it should and the system didn't hang at SCSI-0. We got all the way to "Do you want to Proceed [y:n] which after I entered "y" displayed "Writing configuration…". Unfortunately this is where the system hung.

I searched the forum and found a post where someone else experienced this "Writing configuration..." problem and they solved it by auto selecting the interfaces instead of entering them manually; however, for me that produced the same problem with a freeze at "Writing configuration...".

It appears like it's not recognizing the NIC. Has anyone had this problem?

Regards,