When attempting to boot with either kernel included on the 2004.3 livecd, the results are a kernel panic. I have tried several combinations of the flags noted at the F2 menu on both regular and no-fb kernels, with no change in the results. I could not get an idea of the problem in the gentoo-nofb kenrel due to the messages scrolling by too fast, the screen res showing so few rows, nand not being able to scroll up the terminal (shift+pgup) sue to the kernel lockup. I tried the gentoo (framebuffer) with splash=off and got enough info i think i have at least an idea where to start looking --> SMP.. here is what I could see on screen: Unable to handle NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 0000000c printing eip: c016eee3 *pde = 00000000 Oops: 0000 [#1] SMP Modules linked in: CPU: 0 EIP: 0060:[<c016eee3>] Not tainted VLI EFLAGS: 00010286 (2.6.9-gentoo-r1) eax: 00000000 ebx: c047ee14 ecx: c03b4c80 edx: 00000000 esi: 00000000 edi: c047ed2c ebp: c5e034c0 esp: c113fe5c ds: 007b es: 007b ss: 0068 Process swapper (pid: 1, threadinfo=c113e000 task=c113d5b0) Stack: c047ee14 c03b4df0 c029cfdb 00000000 c047ee3c c047ee14 c047f1b8 c029d1cc c047ee14 c047ee14 c047f1b8 c029c452 c047ee14 c047ee14 c047ec80 c029c481 c047ee14 c047ec80 c02b912e c047ee14 c5d84d70 00000001 00000001 c047ec80 Call Trace: [<c029cfdb>] [<c029d1cc>] [<c029c452>] [<c029c481>] [<c02b912e>] [<c02b93de>] [<c02c38da>] [<c0159837>] [<c0287399>] [<c0287482>] [<c029ceb8>] [<c029cf8d>] [<c029d333>] [<c029d772>] [<c0287514>] [<c03df06a>] [<c03de9ac>] [<c03c677f>] [<c0100530>] [<c0100485>] [<c0103771>] Code: ea 04 01 d0 49 47 6b d8 0b 83 f9 ff 75 e6 89 1c 24 ff 74 24 ff 74 24 1c 8d 44 24 04 50 e8 6c 19 fe ff 83 c4 18 5b 5f c3 56 53 8b 74 24 0c <8b> 46 0c 8d 48 6c f0 ff 48 6c 0f 88 9e 00 00 00 ff 74 24 10 56 <0>Kernel panic - not syncing: Attempted to kill init! Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Boot LiveCD and type any of the kernel names or allow the timeout to autoselect the default kernel to boot (none of the options listed via F2 seem to have an effect) Actual Results: Using the 'gentoo' kernel, the splash screen will appear and freezes at that point. Using the 'gentoo-nofb' kernel, the kernel messages will fly by real fast and end at a kernel panic message, with no ability to scroll up to see much of the messages. Using the 'gentoo' kernel with the 'splash=off' option achieves the same effect as booting the 'gentoo-nofb' kernel, except much more of the messages preceeding the kernel panic message is visible. In all cases, the system freezes and the installation cannot continue. Expected Results: Boot to a logged-in root shell prompt. System hardware: IBM ThinkPad 770 Pentium-MMX CPU with 96MB RAM Host Bridge: 430TX-82439TX MTXC ISA/IDE/USB/ACPI Bridge: Intel 82371AB/EB/MB PII4 Revision 1 CardBus Bridge (2): Texas Instruments PC1250 Revision 1 VGA Compatible Controller: Trident Microsystems Cyber 9397 Revision F3 Mouse (Pointing Stick): PS/2 on /dev/psaux USB Host Controller: USB UHCI Root Hub Hard Disk (/dev/hda): Hitachi IDE on Primary Channel _DK23AA-60B
Without perhaps a list of things that you have tried, it will be harder to determine the problem. Have you tried booting with acpi=off and apic=off? Those would probably solve your problem. Another thing to try is nosmp, and see if that solves it.
As a constructive suggestion I would have would be to document in the F2 menu the fact that a 'nosmp' option exists -- since the goal of the livecd is to get more users installed ;) However, I believe I had tried that option as a shot-in-the-dark idea to get around what I believed was the problem (SMP)... to no avail. I will, nonetheless, try the 'nosmp' option again and report back here. In other attempts, I have tried 'noapic', 'acpi=off', 'acpi=off noapic', 'ide=nodma' 'ide=nodma noapic acpi=off', 'ide=nodma noapic acpi=off nodetect nohotplug nousb noraid nofirewire nokeymap nodhcp' on both the 'gentoo' and 'gentoo-nofb' kernels. I have also run the 'memtest86' and found no problem with my memory. As an aside, I tried to get around the problem by booting a 2004.2 livecd with kernel 2.4 using the 'docache' option, but got 'squashfs' failure errors and had to resort to mounting the 2004.3 livecd on a usb-storage device, but this will not work for some folks. As I said, I will try the 'nosmp' option and report back here. Thanks.
Well, honestly, the nosmp option is a kernel default. We generally *only* list the Gentoo-specific options on the F2 page, mostly due to space constraints. After all, there's no way to scroll up on the F2 page, so if is scrolls off screen, then it is lost. I look forward to hearing from you about the nosmp. I recommend "nosmp noapic", actually.
Well, I tried 'nosmp noapic', 'nosmp noapic acpi=off', and plain old 'nosmp' on both the framebuffer and nonfb kernels with exactly the same kernel panic as before.
I have the same issue with my Thinkpad 600.
Please add pnpbios=off as an option to boot. gentoo-nofb pnpbios=off At least one guy on irc could confirm that helped on a thinkpad 600E. Thanks for your reports. Roger (who googled 3 hours on panics on thinkpads)
That is a confirmed kill :) Using the pnpbios=off option squashed that bug flat As an aside, I emailed Adrian Lee the fix also for his TP600 Universal 2004.3 livecd boot: gentoo-nofb pnpbios=off boots normally now with no other changes to the kernel arguments :)
ok, problem solved. wolf31o2 has fixed the future kernel config to disable that. Roger
