Laptops and PC-Cards (WAS: Toshiba P20-S303)

[Florian Hoenig]

Hey!
The thing is, that it doesn't boot with any of the kernels available in the
boot menu of the 5.x installation isos. Not even with safe mode, which
doesn't seem to turn off pccard stuff because it locks at the same thing.
Any other suggestions on this problem?

Regards,

-flo

-----Original Message-----
From: Daniel [mailto:freebsd at argentproductions.com] 
Sent: Mittwoch, 01. Oktober 2003 11:11
To: Florian Hoenig; freebsd-mobile at freebsd.org
Subject: Laptops and PC-Cards (WAS: Toshiba P20-S303)


Sorry for the top-post but I've been seeing a few people say they've had
install issues and 
whatnot with PC-Card controllers and incompatibilities and all... and a lot
of mis-information 
and old web pages out there too... so I thought I'd insert a little generic
information I came 
across while doing my own installs. 

What I've found (I have a ThinkPad) is that FreeBSD 5.1 *should*, given the
right kernel 
parameters and all, work very well for most people.  To get around the
kernel boot hang 
during the install, simply choose the "safe mode" boot option, which
disables all PC-Card 
things for the install portion.   For my model and possibly many others
(those using the Intel 
or IBM chipsets) you then need to build a custom kernel containing the pcic
device and 
excluding the cbb device.  Obviously, those of you with chips supported by
cbb should 
probably use that instead.  ;-)  There are a number of websites (and emails
on this list) with 
info on some kernel parameters to tune if needed, as well.

But for the most part, the issues I've been seeing -- "5.x won't work on my
laptop" / "4.x and 
5.x hang during boot probing" / "my typical and usually supported cards
aren't detected 
properly" -- 5.1 offers a simple install solution and the most configurable
kernel options of all 
the releases -- and with oldcard support as well, it goes back to anything
(IIRC) that 4.x 
supported too.  

Please correct my gross over-simplification of things, but this boot feature
certainly helped 
me install 5.1 (and I'd way rather have 5 than 4 on a laptop) and it looks
like it might help a 
few others to not be afraid of the transition.  :)

However, if you still want to stick with 4.x on your laptop, you'll have to
go other routes (e.g. 
boot option setting or using a custom bootdisk or something.  I can't help
you there, as I've 
got 5 on mine. 

Peace to all,

 -- D
 <><


> Hey! I'd like to report this problem too, which apperantly some other 
> models seem to have to, when trying to boot any of the kernels that 
> are included on the install CDs (tried everything from 4.5 and above).
> 
> pci2: <network, ethernet> at device 2.0 (no drive attached)
> cbb0: <ToPIC100 PCI-CardBus Bridge> at device 4.0 on pci2
> pcib2: device cbb0 requested decoded memory range 0x2000000-0xc20fffff
> 
> It freezes here. In the other posting there was the hint to change the 
> pnp option in the bios. The p20-s303 doesnt have that option. I cant 
> hardly change anything lowlevel in the bios.
> Any other workaround? Maybe build a install disk with a kernel that
doesn't
> include pccard?
> 
> Thanks and kind regards,
> 
> Florian Hoenig
> 
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