Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1998 11:26:39 +0930 From: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com> To: Andrew Shugg <andrew@guinness.it.net.au>, freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Installing FreeBSD on an AMD 386 Message-ID: <19981006112639.E27781@freebie.lemis.com> In-Reply-To: <19981005012243.U15425@guinness.it.net.au>; from Andrew Shugg on Mon, Oct 05, 1998 at 01:22:43AM %2B0800 References: <19981005012243.U15425@guinness.it.net.au>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Monday, 5 October 1998 at 1:22:43 +0800, Andrew Shugg wrote: > Hello, > > As per the directions on the FreeBSD website, I am sending a message to a > mailing list which I'm not on, and I have no idea what goes on here ... :) > > I have been trying hard to install FreeBSD on a machine I picked up a few > days ago. Until now I have only been running Linux as my 'alternative' > operating system at home and am really keen to run FreeBSD on this 'new' > machine. > > I have tried both the 2.2.7 and the 3.0-19980804-SNAP install disks > (boot.flp, written to clean error-free floppies with dd in linux). On this > new system, which is an AMD 386DX clone, both disks will boot, and come to > the kernel config screen. I remove nearly all the devices from the list > (this is a very minimal system) and then proceed. The system continues, > correctly finding the ethernet card, the serial and parallel ports, and the > hard disk. The blue screen then comes up with "Probing for devices" and > then it just sits there. I found that alt-F2 shows the debug screen, which > showed that the aforementioned devices were found. Going back to alt-F1, > the blue screen is still just sitting there - the longest I've left it is > fifty minutes, with no progress. I know the machine hasn't actually > crashed, because I can still press ^C and abort. > > I tried the 3.0-19980804-SNAP disk on a genuine Intel 386, and it went past > that blue screen with no problems, and went straight on to the next part of > the installation procedure. > > I have tried a different network card in the problem machine, and tried > removing the network card altogether; no difference. The only unusual > thing about this system is that it is an AMD CPU, not Intel. > > Is there some known problem with AMD chips and FreeBSD? Is there some way > to get this dang thing to install? It doesn't really need to probe for > hardware, because apart from the network card it's a bare system. > > I've installed linux on it in the meantime, which went on fine. I'd like > to be able to get FreeBSD onto it though (somehow). Well, I'm puzzled by this one. Years ago I recall installing FreeBSD on this chipset, and I had no trouble. Still, you have pretty conclusive evidence that this is a CPU (including motherboard) problem. I can only guess that you have a defective CPU. A few years back many manufacturers considered that "if it runs Microsoft, it can't be broke". Considering the number of chip features that Microsoft doesn't use, this is just plain Wrong. About the best I can recommend is that you get yourself a second hand motherboard somewhere and use that instead. It's probably not worth the trouble getting this one to work. Greg -- See complete headers for address, home page and phone numbers finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?19981006112639.E27781>