Watchhguard x1000 Boot Error
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Yeah..I think you are right. I was getting a bunch of issues trying to write to the cards at times… had to use the diskpart utility in windows to fix the cards ..going to give it another shot if not this thing is going up on ebay ...do you have a preferred cf card and serial cable? I'm also thinking the serial port could be bad.
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had to use the diskpart utility in windows to fix the cards.
That's not a good sign. The file system used by pfSense is UFS which isn't readable in Windows. The cards should appear as corrupt or unformatted if you try to view them in Windows. The FreeDOS image is FAT32 so is readable. (might even be FAT16)
There is no need to do any formatting or partitioning as all that is contained in the card image.Presumably you used one of the serial cables with the Watchguard OS before you wiped the card?
Steve
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Had to use the Diskpart utility due to card losing capacity. I guess windows didn't like the card. it would drop from 8gig down to 1.8gigs and would not let me write to it. Diskpart would bring it back to 8gigs and allow me to write the img. Not sure why, anyway also tried a new CMOS battery which didn't help. :'(
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Seeing a 1.8GB partition would be righf if you had written it with a 4GB image previously.
Physdisk shouldn't have a problem wrting to it even if whatever formatting is on it is completely screwed.
It could be that it won't see your 8GB card correctly. CF cards that big didn't exist when that box was designed.Steve
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Steve,
Is there a way I can access the bios through PCI video card and keyboard. I googled and found a picture of a watchguard x500 with a video card and keyboard. Want to give this a try.
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Yep, pretty much just as shown in the picture. You need PCI graphics card, which are not common these days, and a PS2 keyboard header (and keyboard).
Steve
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Would this be the pins to connect to? If so, what are the specs for these pins for keyboard?
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Yes that's it. The pinout is given somewhere here on the forum, in the X700 thread I think. It's a standard pinout though if you already have a ps2 header cable. Of course they were found on PCs that came with an AT keyboard as standard but those are rare now. ;)
Steve
https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php?topic=20242.0
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Steve,
Very cool. Going to look for a cheap PCI card on eBay and try this. Thanks for the help.
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Okay… got some progress here. Bought a PCI card and did the keyboard setup and was able to get into the bios. I was able to fix the boot error but now I'm getting this issue while trying to install pfsense "ad1: TIMEOUT/FAILURE-READ DMA". Do you have any ideas of a fix.
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Ok, so the CF slot on the Watchguard box doesn't have the IDE DMA lines connected. That's common to many CF slots. If your card is new and fast enough it will support DMA and will be reporting to the OS and BIOS that it's DMA capable. pfSense tries to use DMA and you get errors as you're seeing.
For this reason DMA is disabled in the NanoBSD snapshots. However it isn't disabled on the Nano+VGA snapshots because those were originally built for a box that required DMA to boot. I assume you're booting the Nano+vga image because you're running the PCI card? You need to disable DMA by doing this:
https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/Boot_Troubleshooting#Disable_DMA_for_IDE_drivesSteve
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Okay got it…. disabled DMA... still stuck..trying to add line to boot loader. Keep on getting a /boot/loader.conf.local: not found. Where do I enter this text?
Stuck at this point.
After the installation, add the following line to /boot/loader.conf.local:
To disable DMA for hard drive(s):
hw.ata.ata_dma=0To disable DMA for optical drives:
hw.ata.atapi_dma=0 -
It's not a file that's included by default you have create it. You can do this at the console (or probably via the Command screen in Diagnostics):
echo 'hw.ata.ata_dma=0' >> /boot/loader.conf.localNo need to worry about optical drives.
Steve
Edit: Yes you can do that in Diagnostics: Command Prompt:
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Got it finally…pfsense is booting perfectly..thank you for the help Steve... Do you have a guide on lcdproc setup..downloaded the packages and nothing on LCD.... thanks again. :P
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It's a bit of a fiddle to setup because the lcdproc package doesn't play nicely with the sdeclcd driver that's required. There's a link in the wiki page but this is where you want to look:
https://forum.pfsense.org/index.php/topic,7920.msg344513.html#msg344513Steve
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Thanks Steve..It worked!!!
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Steve,
Do you have a how to guide for WGXepc setup? Sorry to keep bugging ;D.Thanks
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Also on the wiki page. :D
https://doc.pfsense.org/index.php/PfSense_on_Watchguard_Firebox#Controlling_hardware_with_WGXepc
You can use Shellcmd to run it at boot.Actually reading back through that section it could use an update. Still valid for your box though.
Steve
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Thanks for the help..got pfsense running but the internet is really slow. Web pages do not load or load very slowly to the point where its not usable. Strange thing YouTube loads well but other sites do not. Theres many threads here but do not know where to start. What would cause a slow internet connection?..one thing that has been bugging me is the amber light on the modem link light. It only turns amber when connected to the watchguard/pfsense. Modem is an Arris model# CM820A. My set up is ..modem to watchguard @192.168.0.1…watchguard to Cisco 3550 catalyst switch@192.168.0.24...Access Point dlink DGL 4500(DHCP disabled) @192.168.0.5...and a Linksys router as a repeater bridge flashed with ddwrt@192.168.0.2. The only rules I set were for Xbox live for the Xbox one, which actually set my Nat to open.
Thanks -
Unusual link light on the modem sounds like it could be connected at 10Mbps or maybe half duplex. Either would indicate a failure in the speed/duplex negotiation which could definitely cause slow and erratic throughput. Check the Status: Interfaces: page for errors or collisions and the link state. The Realtek NICs in the X-Core are known to be pretty poor unfortunately, I would normally suggest trying to set a fixed speed and duplex but that may not work for you. Worth trying though.
One thing to try is putting a switch in between your modem and the X1000 if you can.
Try to confirm the throttling is at the WAN interface by downloading something on the firebox itself. At the command line:
[2.1.5-RELEASE][root@pfsense.fire.box]/root(1): fetch -o /dev/null http://109.123.87.183/speedtest.256mb /dev/null 100% of 256 MB 8307 kBps 00m00sThe file is from the London test site at http://www.cloudtestfiles.net. You should choose a server local to yourself.
Steve
