Could you please try the kernel from [0]? It incorporates the patch [1] (which is committed to debian-kernel svn), based on David Miller's patch [2] for this problem, and boots fine in qemu. [0] http://www.wooyd.org/debian/kernels/linux-image-2.6.18-1-sparc32_2.6.18-4_sparc.deb
This works on real SS5 too, thanks! -- Meelis Roos (mroos@linux.ee)