Re: Updated Debian Ports installation images 2025-03-31 / loongarch test report
On Tuesday, April 22, 2025 7:26:59 AM Coordinated Universal Time John Paul
Adrian Glaubitz wrote:
> Hello Yifei,
>
> On Tue, 2025-04-22 at 02:43 +0000, Yifei Zhan wrote:
> > I tested this image on my loongarch 3A5000 system with the following
> > model:
> >
> > LM-LS3A5000-7A1000-1w-A2101
> >
> > It doesn't seem to boot up, the screen turns black as soon as the usb
> > drive
> > containing the image is selected as the boot target, and the console
> > output
> > stuck at `[Bds]Booting UEFI <USB Drive name>`
> >
> > The firmware is UDK2018-LoongArch-A2101-beta10.fd which I believe is the
> > latest version available for my model.
> >
> > I tried different USB drives but nether USB3.0 nor 2.0 makes a different.
> >
> > Am I missing something? I also tried the previous image but with the same
> > outcome.
> >
> >From my current knowledge, there have been UEFI compatibility issues in
> >some
> firmware versions which caused boot issues. Have you tried updating your
> UEFI firmware to the latest available version?
Yes, I'm aware of that UEFI issue and my firmware is updated to beta10 which is
the latest one listed on [1]
It eventually got it working by manually running the EFI file from the UEFI
Shell, the process is roughly:
- boot into firmware, select Boot Manager -> UEFI Shell -> spam ESC to skip
startup.nsh
- find the FS entry ending with USB(XXX)/CDROM(XXX), for me that's fs2, then
manually load grub:
shell> fs2:
shell> cd efi
shell> cd boot
shell> bootloongarch64.efi
- select 'install', 'graphical install' won't work due to the missing
/install/gtk/initrd.gz
At one stage of the installation I was prompted about missing firmware for USB
controller, then the USB drive is disconnected, I have to unplug and replug it
then manually remount it as /cdrom. But other than that, the whole process is
smoother than anticipated!
I installed KDE Plasma and although sddm/lightdm won't work (due to missing
graphic card?), running startx from the console does the trick. I also have to
disable acceleration in about:config for firefox to display any webpage, but
other than that the system is usable as a desktop.
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