[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Martti Kuparinen]

I installed Solaris 10 U6 and it works without any problems...
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Martti Kuparinen]

> Too bad that the keyboard is unusable in kmdb...

The keyboard and mouse detected is in fact KVM switch. But I was accessing the 
system using the DRAC console via Internet Explorer.

> Is it possible to connect a PS/2 keyboard to that dell machine?

No, I don't have any old PS/2 keyboards (hmmm, maybe I can try with one of 
those USB-PS/2 converters we have in the lab).
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Jürgen Keil]

> > Now, I tried to install OpenSolaris 2008.11 but the installation program 
> > hangs
> 
> Attached a more verbose boot with the installation CD. I'll try again with 
> SXCE tomorrow...

It seems that some users have been able to work around usb keyboard
hangs on dells by disabling all or port of acpi - by booting with options
"-B acpi-user-options=0x8" or "-B acpi-user-options=0x2"

And others had success by disabling the uhci usb host controller driver
with "-B disable-uhci=true";  but that has the disadvantage that you
have no keyboard when it is booted (and the workaround for this is to 
install a pci usb card with the nec chip (ohci) and attach an usb keyboard
to the nec usb controller; I think attaching an usb 2.0 hub and connecting
the usb keyboard to the hub might work, too)
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Jürgen Keil]

Hmm, in that second kmdb picture is seems to have
made a bit more progress; there's both the usb
keyboard (device hid2) and an usb mouse device (hid3)
online before it stops booting...

And the usb keyboard seems to work for the unix
kernel; it echos keystrokes, and it was possible
to enter kmdb...

Too bad that the keyboard is unusable in kmdb...

Is it possible to connect a PS/2 keyboard to that 
dell machine?  Or setting up the console on a 
serial port (COM1 / ttya)?
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Martti Kuparinen]

> Is there a bios setup option to enable / disable "usb keyboard legacy 
> emulation"?

No.

> is it possible to break into kmdb by pressing "F1 + a"

Yes. But it doesn't accept any commands, nothing appears on the prompt after 
pressing F1+a
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Jürgen Keil]

> > Now, I tried to install OpenSolaris 2008.11 but the installation program 
> > hangs
> 
> Attached a more verbose boot with the installation CD.
> ...
> /pci at 0,0/pci1028,1b1 at 1d,7/hub at 1/device at 1/keyboard at 0 (hid 2) 
> online
> [ hangs ]

So it hangs after detecting an usb (console) keyboard.

This could be some problem with the bios'
"usb keyboard legacy emulation" - the bios
should stop the emulation of  a ps/2 legacy
keyboard as soon as an operating system usb 
drivers control the usb keyboard.

Is there a bios setup option to enable / disable
"usb keyboard legacy emulation"?


Btw. when booted with options " -kv" and it hangs
after "keyboard at 0 (hid 2) online", is it possible to
break into kmdb by pressing "F1 + a" (press F1 key,
followed by "a" while still holding down F1)?

If this enters kmdb, what stack backtrace is
reported by the kmdb ::stack command?
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Martti Kuparinen]

> Now, I tried to install OpenSolaris 2008.11 but the installation program hangs

Attached a more verbose boot with the installation CD. I'll try again with SXCE 
tomorrow...
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Jürgen Keil]

> I have one Dell PowerEdge 2900 with ... 8 x 1 TB
> SATA HDDs connected to PERC 5/i, each physical SATA
> disk presented as a RAID0 logical disk. The purpose
> is to use these 8 HDDs for a RAIDZ2 volume.

According to the bug database the PERC 5/i seems to
be unsupported:

   Bug ID6556091
   Synopsis LSI Logic MegaRAID SAS and Dell PERC 5 Controllers lack support 
in OpenSolaris
   http://bugs.opensolaris.org/view_bug.do?bug_id=6556091

   Bug ID6473786
   Synopsis lsimega should support Dell PERC 5/i
   http://bugs.opensolaris.org/view_bug.do?bug_id=6473786


It seems that there is a Solaris mfi driver available (see the
workaround section for bug 6473786); no idea if that one
would work...
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Jürgen Keil]

> I disabled the PERC 5/i RAID controller in the BIOS
> and now SXCE boots correctly...
> 
> Not a solution as I really need access to those 8 HDDs :-)

The 8 HDDs where visible during installation, when 
booted from the installation media?

Where exactly does it hang when you boot from
the installed system with options " -kv" (which enables
verbose kernel messages and the kernel debugger) ?

What are the last few lines printed on the console
before it hangs?
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Martti Kuparinen]

I disabled the PERC 5/i RAID controller in the BIOS and now SXCE boots 
correctly...

Not a solution as I really need access to those 8 HDDs :-)
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[osol-help] Installation problems on Dell PowerEdge 2900

[Martti Kuparinen]

I have one Dell PowerEdge 2900 with one 32 GB SSD connected directly to the 
motherboard and 8 x 1 TB SATA HDDs connected to PERC 5/i, each physical SATA 
disk presented as a RAID0 logical disk. The purpose is to use these 8 HDDs for 
a RAIDZ2 volume.

Now, I tried to install OpenSolaris 2008.11 but the installation program hangs 
after "Probing for device nodes ...". It just stays there forever (or at least 
two hours :).

Next I downloaded SXCE 106 and the installation appears to be okay (or at least 
I didn't see any error), I was able to install the system on the SSD but the 
first boot hangs after "Use is subject to license terms".

Any ideas? What can I try?

NetBSD on this hardware was rock solid...
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