Instruction fault panic while installing 6.2 on VMware Server

[Eric Anderson]

On 02/24/07 05:44, ghozzy wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On 2/23/07, Greg Larkin <glarkin at sourcehosting.net> wrote:
>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> I'm creating a standard FreeBSD 6.2 ISO image that I can use to
>> perform unattended installations into VMware Server virtual machines.
>> I'm using VMServer 1.0.1, and I've hit a roadblock when sysinstall
>> attempts to create the root filesystem.
>>
>> The first thing to mention is that VMServer is running on a CentOS 4.4
>> host OS, and the CPU architecture is a Via C3 Nehemiah.  Technically,
>> the VMServer software is not supposed to work on the Via C3 line, but
>> the Nehemiah apparently supports the CMOV instruction that VMServer
>> requires.  I've been able to install Fedora Core 6 successfully and
>> run it with no problems, so I'm wondering if I just need to find the
>> right options to configure FreeBSD 6.2 to get it to work.
>>
>> Anyway, the VM boots fine, loads the FreeBSD ISO, and launches
>> sysinstall, but as soon as newfs is invoked to make the root
>> filesystem, I get this:
>>
>> Making a new root filesystem on /dev/ad0s1a
>> Panic: privileged instruction fault
>> (auto reboot)
>>
>> I've tried installing from the standard 6.2 release ISO as well as a
>> custom ISO with a recompiled kernel, but I get the same error either
>> way.  I also tried disabling ACPI during boot with no success.
>>
>> My custom kernel config is included below.  My first thought was that
>> if I explicitly set the CPU to I486, that might help avoid the
>> instruction fault, but that doesn't work.  I didn't see any other
>> options that looked like they would fix the fault, but I'm not very
>> experienced at kernel configuration either.
>>
>> Does anyone have an idea how to troubleshoot this problem? Thank you
>> for any help!
>>
>> Regards,
>> Greg Larkin
> 
> I have experienced similar problem in VMware Workstation under Windows XP
> on Via C3 Nehemiah processor since FreeBSD 5.x. In my case privileged
> instruction fault shot somewhere in rc boot process. Tracing down the cause of
> fault i found out that it was xstore instruction, which VMware did not emulate.
> It turned out to be the merit of new random generator appeared somewhere in
> 5.x, which detected the Via processor and tried to use its hardware random
> number generator. My workaround was to patch kernel to disable using this Via
> processor feature completely. The result was successful booting and running
> FreeBSD 5.x and 6.x under VMware on this machine.
> 
> Attached is the patch i use for 6.x kernel.


Can you both send me the dmesg of these machines?


Eric