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    Watchguard Firebox M400/M500

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Hardware
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    • I
      iJay-XTM5
      last edited by

      Good deal, looks like you're finally on your way!

      If you need to access the VGA, all you need are some $3 arduino jumper cables from ebay. Here's what my crappy setup looks like - not very elegant, but works! I was able to boot freedos and tinker a bit….

      IMG_3290.JPG
      IMG_3290.JPG_thumb
      IMG_3282.JPG
      IMG_3282.JPG_thumb

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      • T
        Testing
        last edited by

        Yeah, I think my bios is setup for different devices on the sata ports. In the manual I saw that you need to select which kind of device is connected to which sata port. So it seems Sata4 is for HDD in a Firebox m500.

        The complete videocard with the right vga port+cable was 8dollars including shipping. I will send a picture when I have it up and running ;)

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        • I
          iJay-XTM5
          last edited by

          Hopefully the BIOS is setup to switch automatically to an external VGA when one is detected. The problem with the locked BIOS is you can't change any setting.
          I was naive and actually called WatchGuard support expecting to get an unlocked version of the BIOS or the password to unlock it! :)

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          • stephenw10S
            stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
            last edited by

            I'd be surprised if it cannot boot a legacy install though it might be locked out of doing so in the BIOS. You'd have to inspect the BIOS image to know for sure.

            What options did you chose in the install process?

            My own VGA hookup was even more basic. I connected only the green signal line and used some random header cables from an old PC.  ;)

            Steve

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            • N
              N1ck
              last edited by

              Well, it seems only uefi will boot, nothing else.

              And for my vga cable, forgot a few holidays here, so that will arrive tuesday. I am not using the vga card, only the vga cable that comes with it. It's a low profile card and those had the blue vga port above the rest(full profile), but in low profile you needed an extra steel plate next to the card and there you would mount the blue vga port. That's why on those cards the vga port is connected via a ribbon with 12pin(1NC) connector. Ordering header/arduino cables was an option, but it was cheaper to buy an entire graphics card which has the correct vga port with ribbon ;)

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              • stephenw10S
                stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                last edited by

                That's interesting. Yet legacy images boot fine from CF?

                I don't see anything in the default BIOS settings that I can see in the image that might do that. However some stuff is not visible there.

                Can we see a comparative output from the console command 'geom part list'?

                For example from a Minnowboard Turbot which only boots UEFI:

                [2.4.4-DEVELOPMENT][admin@4220.stevew.lan]/root: geom part list
                Geom name: ada0
                modified: false
                state: OK
                fwheads: 16
                fwsectors: 63
                last: 62533255
                first: 40
                entries: 152
                scheme: GPT
                Providers:
                1\. Name: ada0p1
                   Mediasize: 209715200 (200M)
                   Sectorsize: 512
                   Stripesize: 0
                   Stripeoffset: 20480
                   Mode: r0w0e0
                   efimedia: HD(1,GPT,3da27220-1e32-11e8-8da9-0008a20bc486,0x28,0x64000)
                   rawuuid: 3da27220-1e32-11e8-8da9-0008a20bc486
                   rawtype: c12a7328-f81f-11d2-ba4b-00a0c93ec93b
                   label: (null)
                   length: 209715200
                   offset: 20480
                   type: efi
                   index: 1
                   end: 409639
                   start: 40
                2\. Name: ada0p2
                   Mediasize: 29855055872 (28G)
                   Sectorsize: 512
                   Stripesize: 0
                   Stripeoffset: 209735680
                   Mode: r1w1e2
                   efimedia: HD(2,GPT,3da318d6-1e32-11e8-8da9-0008a20bc486,0x64028,0x379c000)
                   rawuuid: 3da318d6-1e32-11e8-8da9-0008a20bc486
                   rawtype: 516e7cb6-6ecf-11d6-8ff8-00022d09712b
                   label: (null)
                   length: 29855055872
                   offset: 209735680
                   type: freebsd-ufs
                   index: 2
                   end: 58720295
                   start: 409640
                3\. Name: ada0p3
                   Mediasize: 1601175552 (1.5G)
                   Sectorsize: 512
                   Stripesize: 0
                   Stripeoffset: 20480
                   Mode: r1w1e1
                   efimedia: HD(3,GPT,3da43efe-1e32-11e8-8da9-0008a20bc486,0x3800028,0x2fb800)
                   rawuuid: 3da43efe-1e32-11e8-8da9-0008a20bc486
                   rawtype: 516e7cb5-6ecf-11d6-8ff8-00022d09712b
                   label: (null)
                   length: 1601175552
                   offset: 30064791552
                   type: freebsd-swap
                   index: 3
                   end: 61847591
                   start: 58720296
                Consumers:
                1\. Name: ada0
                   Mediasize: 32017047552 (30G)
                   Sectorsize: 512
                   Mode: r2w2e5
                
                

                Any 2.4.X should be able to create that. You do have to choose efi rather than freebsd-boot though.

                Steve

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                • N
                  N1ck
                  last edited by

                  I will install a CF image(nanobsd) and will try the command. Or is there a faster way to use the command? Now I have install image on my CF and unfortunately only have 1 CF.
                  I don't think the images are legacy images, my image has got an efi-partition and is a GPT not MDR.

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                  • stephenw10S
                    stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                    last edited by

                    The installer image has both efi and freebsd-boot partitions so it should boot either.

                    In the MBT which only boots efi the installer only adds en efi image. I'm pretty sure I didn't do anything special there. I suspect it adds the partion type depending on how the installer booted. Trying to confirm that.

                    So if you installed to a HD in an efi laptop it will probably work.

                    Steve

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                    • N
                      N1ck
                      last edited by

                      Ok, geom part list command executed on pfsense 2.1(grabbed a 1gb card from my dad). Seems MBR, but it could be that sata needs efi(as each sata port needs to be configured and can only accept what was configured by firebox). I don't have the vga cable yet, so I can't run anything to grab the bios image.

                      # geom part list
                      Geom name: ad4
                      modified: false
                      state: OK
                      fwheads: 16
                      fwsectors: 63
                      last: 1969631
                      first: 63
                      entries: 4
                      scheme: MBR
                      Providers:
                      1\. Name: ad4s1
                         Mediasize: 472195584 (450M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 32256
                         Mode: r1w0e2
                         attrib: active
                         rawtype: 165
                         length: 472195584
                         offset: 32256
                         type: freebsd
                         index: 1
                         end: 922319
                         start: 63
                      2\. Name: ad4s2
                         Mediasize: 472195584 (450M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 472260096
                         Mode: r0w0e0
                         rawtype: 165
                         length: 472195584
                         offset: 472260096
                         type: freebsd
                         index: 2
                         end: 1844639
                         start: 922383
                      3\. Name: ad4s3
                         Mediasize: 52641792 (50M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 944455680
                         Mode: r1w0e2
                         rawtype: 165
                         length: 52641792
                         offset: 944455680
                         type: freebsd
                         index: 3
                         end: 1947455
                         start: 1844640
                      Consumers:
                      1\. Name: ad4
                         Mediasize: 1008451584 (961M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Mode: r2w0e4
                      
                      Geom name: ad4s1
                      modified: false
                      state: OK
                      fwheads: 16
                      fwsectors: 63
                      last: 922256
                      first: 0
                      entries: 8
                      scheme: BSD
                      Providers:
                      1\. Name: ad4s1a
                         Mediasize: 472187392 (450M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 40448
                         Mode: r1w0e2
                         rawtype: 0
                         length: 472187392
                         offset: 8192
                         type: !0
                         index: 1
                         end: 922256
                         start: 16
                      Consumers:
                      1\. Name: ad4s1
                         Mediasize: 472195584 (450M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 32256
                         Mode: r1w0e2
                      
                      Geom name: ad4s2
                      modified: false
                      state: OK
                      fwheads: 16
                      fwsectors: 63
                      last: 922256
                      first: 0
                      entries: 8
                      scheme: BSD
                      Providers:
                      1\. Name: ad4s2a
                         Mediasize: 472187392 (450M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 472268288
                         Mode: r0w0e0
                         rawtype: 0
                         length: 472187392
                         offset: 8192
                         type: !0
                         index: 1
                         end: 922256
                         start: 16
                      Consumers:
                      1\. Name: ad4s2
                         Mediasize: 472195584 (450M)
                         Sectorsize: 512
                         Stripesize: 0
                         Stripeoffset: 472260096
                         Mode: r0w0e0
                      
                      

                      ADDED: I don't have any other device that uses uefi boot. laptops and computers all don't use uefi.

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                      • N
                        N1ck
                        last edited by

                        Tested MBR image in CF->works.
                        Image installed to ssd->doesn't work.

                        So it seems my router requires UEFI on sata. The router has a locked bios, so can't change anything there.
                        The pfsense 2.4.3 image has uefi, but when it installs it formats the ssd GPT and doesn't add an efi-partition with data to the ssd. So I think I just need an option to let pfsense install an efi-partition and data on the ssd.

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                        • stephenw10S
                          stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                          last edited by

                          You can just add an efi partition using the manual install method. I've never tried that and don't have any easy way to test it but it should work.

                          You can probably remove the freebsd-boot slice too. Though it should work with both in place.

                          Steve

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                          • N
                            N1ck
                            last edited by

                            With manual installation I can add an efi-partition. But pfsense doesn't install anything in it, so it's just an empty partition. Maybe I need to use another command to install something in the efi-partition?

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                            • stephenw10S
                              stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                              last edited by

                              Ok try installing using the 'Auto (ZFS)' option. Then you can set the Partition Scheme to GPT(UEFI) or GPT (BIOS+UEFI). Both of which should boot.

                              [2.4.3-RELEASE][admin@pfSense.localdomain]/root: gpart show
                              =>     40  8388528  ada0  GPT  (4.0G)
                                     40   409600     1  efi  (200M)
                                 409640     1024     2  freebsd-boot  (512K)
                                 410664      984        - free -  (492K)
                                 411648  7974912     3  freebsd-zfs  (3.8G)
                                8386560     2008        - free -  (1.0M)
                              
                              

                              Steve

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                              • N
                                N1ck
                                last edited by

                                That worked! I selected GPT(UEFI) and it installed and booted without a problem.

                                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                • stephenw10S
                                  stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                  last edited by

                                  Nice!  :D

                                  That's weird. Learned something there though.

                                  Steve

                                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • N
                                    N1ck
                                    last edited by

                                    Yeah it seems my Firebox M500 will only boot an hdd or ssd on sata port 3. 2 and 4 will not work(won't even now I installed it on port 3).

                                    And the Firebox M500 will boot MBR on CF, but requires UEFI on sata.

                                    Strange, but with my tests it looks like this is 100% true.

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                                    • stephenw10S
                                      stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                      last edited by

                                      I imagined that would be identical to the m400 other than RAM and CPU but maybe not.

                                      You can dump the BIOS image from the pfSense command line using flashrom but it cannot re-write it.

                                      pkg install flashrom
                                      
                                      rehash
                                      
                                      flashrom -p internal -r /root/backup.rom
                                      

                                      Reading that should be no risk but any operation involving the carries some danger. I've done that several times here though.

                                      Steve

                                      chpalmerC 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • S
                                        Scorch95
                                        last edited by

                                        Those with ssd installations are you installing a bracket to hold the drive or just letting it sit inside the case?

                                        I 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • stephenw10S
                                          stephenw10 Netgate Administrator
                                          last edited by

                                          I'm not currently but I previously found adhesive velcro pads to be an acceptable solution for SSDs at least.

                                          Steve

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                                          • S
                                            Scorch95
                                            last edited by

                                            I have an m400 on the way but is the 4GB DDR3 RDimm or UDimm?

                                            I 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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