ReefEdge Secure Port 25 with SnapGear Geode SC1100 @233MHz
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I'm new to pfSense, but have searched and can't find anything on this part. I picked up several ReefEdge Secure Port 25 devices recently and would like to repurpose them using pfSense. They use SnapGear Geode SC1100 boards with 2 ethernet, 1 CF slot, 1 serial port, and 1 mini-PCI slot with an 802.11b radio installed. They were part of a secure wireless switch system from now defunct ReefEdge. From what I've read and observed, they are VERY similar in design to the WRAP boards, but boot to a SanpGear firmware.
I have successfully flashed the latest version of pfSense to a 128MB CF card and booted. It shows a series of boot messages culminating in loading /boot/defaults/loader.conf and then reboots itself (see putty log below). It continues this cycle until interrupted. When I do interrupt it I can ls files and the directory structure looks appropriate. I have even modified the /boot/defaults/loader.conf to turn on verbose logging, but that doesn't seem to make any difference in what messages appear.
Does anyone have any experience with this part or advice on how to proceed. In pasting the log file I did notice that the device only has 64MB of memory. Could the lack of 128MB be causing this?
Thanks,
TNJed=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~= PuTTY log 2008.04.25 18:01:33 =~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=~=
OK autoboot
Hit [Enter] to boot immediately, or any other key for command prompt.Booting [/boot/kernel/kernel] in 4 seconds…
Booting [/boot/kernel/kernel] in 3 seconds…
Booting [/boot/kernel/kernel] in 2 seconds…
Booting [/boot/kernel/kernel] in 1 second…
Booting [/boot/kernel/kernel]…
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FreeBSD 6.2-RELEASE-p11 #0: Sun Feb 24 17:36:53 EST 2008
sullrich@builder6.pfsense.com:/usr/obj.pfSense/usr/src/sys/pfSense_wrap.6
Timecounter "i8254" frequency 1193182 Hz quality 0SNAPGEAR FAST BOOT Version 1.3.1 -- 19-Aug-2004
(C) Copyright 2001-2004, SnapGear Inc (www.snapgear.com)
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BIOS drive A: is disk0BIOS drive C: is disk1
BIOS 640kB/64512kB available memory
FreeBSD/i386 bootstrap loader, Revision 1.1(sullrich@builder6.pfsense.com, Sun Feb 24 17:26:05 EST 2008)
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Loading /boot/defaults/loader.conf
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Hit [Enter] to boot immediately, or any other key for command prompt.
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Have you read the documentation on troubleshooting the boot process?
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@Cry:
Have you read the documentation on troubleshooting the boot process?
I've looked thru the How To and wiki pages and haven't run across anything on troubleshooting the boot process. Actually I've been struggling with the organization of the documentation that is available. Any suggestions of particular places to look would be greatly appreciated. I'm glad to read the docs, I'm just not having much luck finding them.
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@Cry:
Have you read the documentation on troubleshooting the boot process?
I've looked thru the How To and wiki pages and haven't run across anything on troubleshooting the boot process. Actually I've been struggling with the organization of the documentation that is available. Any suggestions of particular places to look would be greatly appreciated. I'm glad to read the docs, I'm just not having much luck finding them.
OK, via Google I did find a page called "Boot Troubleshooting" on the PFSenseDevWiki page (http://devwiki.pfsense.org/wikka.php?wakka=BootTroubleShooting) . The only suggestion I get that sensibly applies to my embedded pfSense install is the suggestion to repartition with Linux. Being a newbie I'd appreciate any suggestions of partition type (ext2?) and process for loading image to a CF card with an existing Linux partition.
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Can you access the bios and check if there are settings for lba, chs or whatever and try thise? I also noticed that the bios reports a "drive a". Can you try to make your "drive c" the first device (disk0)? I think this was needed for older soekris boards as well to make them boot.
pfSense can run on 64 mb but you should not push it too hard (like adding multiple ipsec tunnels or using the captive portal). It's not supported though as the minimum system requirements are 128 mb ram.
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Can you access the bios and check if there are settings for lba, chs or whatever and try thise? I also noticed that the bios reports a "drive a". Can you try to make your "drive c" the first device (disk0)? I think this was needed for older soekris boards as well to make them boot.
I haven't been able to find any info on how to access the BIOS on this board. I've tried hitting 's' during early boot phase as I've read that is what the WRAP boards use, but that doesn't do it. It's hard to imagine that this board was proprietary to ReefEdge, but I haven't been able to find anything about it even when searching for the various part numbers screened on the board. I've found a few vague references to SnapGear Geode boards, but nothing specific enough to be useful. I can post a picture of the board if that would be useful.
pfSense can run on 64 mb but you should not push it too hard (like adding multiple ipsec tunnels or using the captive portal). It's not supported though as the minimum system requirements are 128 mb ram.
Thanks for specifically responding to this concern. I'm willing to put some effort into this because I have a number of these units, but I don't want to waste my time if there is no real chance of success.
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Forgot to mention that I can get to a command prompt (OK) by interrupting the boot sequence on this board. I can enter ? and get a list of 27 commands. They are geared toward detecting and modify the basic state of the system. For instance I can list directories and read file contents. List, load, and unload modules; set/unset variables; and list devices. I'm sure this is provided by the BSD OS. The interesting part is when I list devices (lsdev -v), it responds with:
cd devices:
disk devices:
disk0: BIOS drive A:And then it locks up. So it appears that it is having problems reading the CF; although it must be partially successful as it does load this far and I can browse the directories/files. Maybe a BSD driver issue with the CF hardware on this board?
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I rather think it tries to access the not existing drive a and gets stuck there. I really think the solution to this would be to disable it in the bios if possible. Just try different keys to get into the bios until you find the right one.
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OK, if I hit any key as soon as I apply power, I get a boot prompt as follows:
FreeBSD/i386 boot
Default: 0:ad(0,a)/boot/loader
boot:The final line is a prompt where I can enter ? and get ls equivalent. If I change the 'a' to 'c' in the default string it complains about not being able to work out which disk we are booting from and then quesses, fails, and defaults to disk0. If I enter the appropriate syntax for the boot string is this going to help or do I still need to disable in BIOS?
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OK, if I hit any key as soon as I apply power, I get a boot prompt as follows:
FreeBSD/i386 boot
Default: 0:ad(0,a)/boot/loader
boot:The final line is a prompt where I can enter ? and get ls equivalent. If I change the 'a' to 'c' in the default string it complains about not being able to work out which disk we are booting from and then guesses, fails, and defaults to disk0. If I enter the appropriate syntax for the boot string is this going to help or do I still need to disable in BIOS?
After further research I realize this is the BSD bootloader and I have since been trying some of the switches and various options, but it appears that I still need to find a way to access BIOS prior to this. I'll post follow-up if/when I find a way to access BIOS.
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My guess is the old ReefEdge EC25's (EC, not SP) they were SnapGear 2540's/2541's which I was unable to get into the bios, after some time I just flashed it with the SnapGear firmware. The source code for the firmware is available on the website but it runs a modified minimalist linux 2.4 kernel. The hardware configuration of the devices was always interesting due to the built-in IPSec hardware accellerator, power consumption, and size but I couldn't get the 25's to worth with pfsense. On a side note, the larger EC125 works very well for pfsense….quad nics + vpn accelerator card + celeron 1.2ghz ;)
