D2500CC/D2500CCE and serial port install
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I believe the bootloader always uses 9600 baud. So if you are looking at 115200 you won't see it. The console switches to 115200 when the kernel is loaded.
I don't know if you have a bug or just odd hardware. :-\ No one has come up with a good reason why this happens in the firebox yet.Steve
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Well, if the boot loader always uses 9600 baud, I should see the boot loader menu, if kernel and getty uses 9600 baud as well.
I just changed the baud rate to 9600 - and still could not see the boot menu. Everything else went as known: I could select entries on the subsequent welcome menu , could see all boot messages and finally reached hang of getty when init takes over. Can I conclude any new aspects from it? Shouldn't I see the boot menu with this configuration :o?
Of course, I am not sure, if it is a pfSense 2.0.1 bug or hardware related. But at least three mainboard/hardware types suffer from a not fully working serial console: Firebox, Intel D2500CC and Jetway NF99FL-525.
As soon as I have some time left, I will switch back to my alix box and test a recent 2.1 nanobsd image with my Jetway board. Depending on the results, I am going to decide whether to open a bug ticket or not. I suppose the change of a pfsense programmer working on it will be the higher the more recent the affected pfsense version is. Besides that I hope to get some new ideas of further forum members reading this thread.
Peter
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This could be my mistake as I've never used the +vga image. There is no boot menu for example in the standard nano image. I don't know what you should see.
It's certainly interesting to know that other hardware is suffering a similar problem (though it could be unrelated).
I'm really out of ideas but I'll be following this thread if anyone else has thoughts.Steve
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Thank you very much so far :).
Peter
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I've just read Serial Terminal: Enabling = Console "hangs" and gave a reference to this thread. I'm not sure how closely related the two serial problems are.
Peter
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It'll drive me mad if I don't ask: why not temporarily glue on a cd drive and a console and install from cdrom rather than fool around with serial ports? It sounds a dreadful lot of work for very little return.
(Apologies if I'm the only one to whom the answer isn't obvious.)
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Installation was not a problem. All authors describing their problems with the serial console have managed a succussful install, e.g. I did boot from CD and USB to manage a full install, flashed nanobsd, nanobsd_vga to obtain an embedded install. Instead, activating the serial console after a successful install was not fully possible. And the straight nanobsd images (e.g. without VGA) did not boot at all on my machine. This affects obviously at least some motherboards. Please find further details in the current thread and all referenced ones if desired.
A working serial console is valuable in particular, if you run your system without monitor and keyboard (even if you could), to
- interact when booting, e.g. to select boot slice
- see boot messages and possible errors
- access your system, if accidently locked out from SSH or webGUI due to rule error
Furthermore, at least me would like to exclude any misconfiguration before reporting this behavior as a bug.
Hope this helps to clarify :).
Peter