Re: USB-serial adapter suggestions needed

On Jan 12, 2024, at 12:03, bob prohaska <fbsd@www.zefox.net> wrote:

> On Fri, Jan 12, 2024 at 10:48:01AM -0800, Mark Millard wrote:
>> On Jan 12, 2024, at 09:25, bob prohaska <fbsd@www.zefox.net> wrote:
>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Please do not use a configuration based in part on armv7 FreeBSD
>>>> config.txt material any more for the testing activity: Just use
>>>> the FreeBSD normal aarch64 configuration with the force_mac_address
>>>> related material added at the end.
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> Just tried it now. The boot seems _extremely_ slow and invited 
>>> at least some intervention (manually typing run bootcmd_usb0
>>> at the u-boot prompt) but it did come up multi-user.
>> 
>> The above seems odd to me. What version of U-Boot is in use?
> 
> Older, U-Boot 2022.04 (Oct 02 2022 - 23:00:31 +0000)

Do all your aarch64 RPi*'s use that aarch64 U-Boot
vintage?

If not, it is another undocumented source of context
variability.

What vintage of EFI/BOOT/bootaa64.efi (in other words:
what vintage of the FreeBSD loader for aarch64 contexts)?
Are they all the same vintage?

If not, it is another undocumented source of context
variability.

For armv7 systems: EFI/BOOT/bootarm.efi ?

Going the other direction (earlier in the boot sequence):
what vintage(s) of RPi* firmware? Are they all the same?
If not, . . .

> It's possible the boot would have completed on its own had
> I kept my mitts off the keyboard. The loader boot delay
> countdown ticks seems slow by about 10X.

The FreeBSD loader starts after U-Boot is done. You wrote of
forcing U-Boot to speed things up. I'm confused.

There used to be notes around about the countdown rate being
slow and what contributed to that, if I remember right. But
I'm not sure I could find them any more and I do not remember
any detail.

> That might
> explain the 
> init_uart_clock=3000000
> in the old config.txt.

I doubt it.

> I should have said earlier that this particular Pi3 was
> configured to boot direct from USB, without a microSD
> card, but never would. I ended up using a bootcode.bin
> file alone on the DOS partition.

On a microsd card, I presume.

For the RPi3B, RPi2B v1.2, and RPi2B v1.1 I always use
a microsd card with a modern bootcode.bin and a timeout
file but otherwise boot from USB. That bootcode.bin
handles more of the modern config.txt notation than what
is built into the RPi3B, RPi2B v1.2, and RPi2B v1.1 does.
There is other additional functionality as well, as I
understand.

(The RPi3B, RPi2B v1.2, and RPi2B v1.1 internal bootcode
can not be updated, just avoided via the bootcode.bin on
a microsd card.)

> I should probably pull
> the microSD card to see if the new config.txt changes
> that behavior.

For RPi3B, RPi2B v1.2, and RPi2B v1.1 (not RPi4B):
I recommend using a microsd card with a modern bootcode.bin
and, possibly, the timeout file. Using the older, internal
bootcode is more likely to have problems vs. modern
documentation/operation.

===
Mark Millard
marklmi at yahoo.com