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Re: I can't make my NSLU2 boot with Debian squeeze (nor any other release for that matter) :(



Hi Nicola

On Thu, Aug 18, 2011 at 09:08, Nicola Bernardini <nicb@sme-ccppd.org> wrote:

> First, I tried to  install  Debian  proper  following  Martin  Michlmayr
> instruction here[0]. It wouldn't go past the "all four  leds  on"  stage
> (top led yellow). So I followed a hint and opened the case  and  removed
> the RTC battery. And  voilà,  the  di-nslu2.bin  (taken  from  here[1])
> suddendly booted and started the installer. So I logged in  and  started
> the installation process. Unfortunately, it won't complete. I tried many
> times but I couldn't go past the "Install the base  system"  stage.  The
> (direct, wired) ssh connection would drop and when reconnecting, I would
> have to start the "Install the base system" stage again and  so  I  went
> nowhere with that method. One  good  thing  was  that  the  machine  was
> immediately (so to speak) available on  the  network  at  the  canonical
> address 192.168.1.77.

The squeeze installer uses too much memory, so what is likely
happening is that the kernel out of memory handler is killing the
installation process. This is a known problem [1], and nobody has come
up with a fix yet. The way around this problem is to use the lenny
installer to install lenny, and then upgrade to squeeze. This method
works well - I have done it many times. BTW, I suspect that the
squeeze installer problem is not going to get fixed. We did try all
the simple things to fix it, but it seems that the problem requires
more effort than anybody is willing to dedicate.

> So I switched to another page from Martin's, the one  that  suggests  to
> install a Debian 6.0 tarball on  an  external  disk,  then  upslug  this
> squeeze image[2] and boot from there. This time, the leds do  the  usual
> boot routine, then only the network led remains lit and the machine goes
> into meditation mode and is hardly accessible from outside (yes, I  also
> checked with nast -m to make sure that it did not get  an  IP  address).
> The attached disk doesn't show any activity, so it looks like  the  boot
> doesn't even get to fsck it or whatever. I waited also for entire nights
> for the device to boot, but to no avail. I set up the  bootlogd  default
> to yes, but of course since it doesn't get  to  the  disk  nothing  gets
> written on it. Nor read, for that matter. I tried with and  without  the
> RTC battery, no show.

I've never tried the tarball installation method, so I'm not sure what
could be going on here. It should work. I believe others have used it
very successfully. Martin may have some ideas for you to try.

Gordon

[1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-arm/2011/01/msg00010.html

-- 
Gordon Farquharson
GnuPG Key ID: 32D6D676


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