Messages

61

Operating Systems and Porting / Re: [NEWS] AlmaLinux 8.6 is out

« on: July 08, 2022, 10:03:18 am »

After a month of testing the FreeBSD 13.x /14.0 [BE|LE] on the Talos II, I find it painful that the system is not yet suitable for everyday use. I've installed AlmaLinux 9, it's definitely more convenient, but not perfect.

62

Talos II / Re: Installing the system on a Samsung 980 Pro SSD 1TB

« on: June 25, 2022, 01:22:07 pm »

Pocock thanks a lot for suggesting it should work. Cause of problems identified.

I conducted three experiments:

a) new ssd without thermal pad and heatsink -> works fine with AlmaLinux and FreeBSD;
b) new ssd with thermal pad and heatsink -> does not work;
c) old ssd without thermal pad and heatsink -> works fine with AlmaLinux and FreeBSD.

The problem is the thermal pad. I have one with a thickness of 2 mm. It is possible that something is short-circuiting or pressing down.

63

Talos II / Re: Installing the system on a Samsung 980 Pro SSD 1TB

« on: June 25, 2022, 08:18:22 am »

My disks are:



I tested the first disk from 2022.01, I will now check the second from 2022.03.

64

Talos II / Installing the system on a Samsung 980 Pro SSD 1TB

« on: June 24, 2022, 04:33:11 pm »

Heya everyone,

At the outset, I would like to mention that I waited almost four and a half years for my own Talos II station. This whole story deserves a separate article
and I even started to prepare for it. But I figured I needed a working base first to be able to write anything on my new toy without going back to x86 too
much.

For my first attempt, I decided to install FreeBSD 13.1 on two Samsung 980 Pro SSDs. I put the disks into the Highpoint SSD7502 controller. As expected,
I saw two separate drives as a possible installation location. Unfortunately I couldn't use ZFS to do RAID although it was stated on the FreeBSD website
that ZFS runs on the powerpc64 platform. I marked the first disk as the target and decided to partition it. Partitioning worked, I chose UFS as the root
filesystem and FAT as the system for the kernel partition. I started the installation. This operation did not produce the expected results, a process crashed
while trying to unpack base.tar.xz.

So I thought that the problem may be the raid controller, because FreeBSD does not have a dedicated driver for it. So I replaced the controller with a simple
ICY BOX M.2 NVME to PCIe 4.0 adapter: IB-PCI208-HS. Unfortunately, this operation did not help. I still couldn't install the system. So I decided to try the
powerpc64le version. Surprisingly, this version installed and I was even able to boot the system. However, my joy lasted only a short time, when I tried to install
packages, the system crashed.

IMG_1376.jpeg

Second try:

IMG_1379.jpeg

I found information on the network that there were performance problems with the first Samsung 980 Pro disks for PCIe 4.0. I decided to replace
the firmware. I moved the adapter to Dell OptiPlex 7040 and updated the firmware:

IMG_1380.jpeg

IMG_1381.jpeg

IMG_1382.jpeg

IMG_1383.jpeg

After this operation, I decided to reduce the system installation time and focus on disk tests. I have successfully installed FreeBSD on a USB key.
With the key, the system worked flawlessly. Unfortunately, attempts to access the SSD drive always end up in the disappearance of the device.
Fortunately, the system did not lock up anymore.

IMG_1389.jpeg

IMG_1390.jpeg

I was disappointed. I tell myself I'll try Linux. It's probably much better here. I have installed the distribution that I use professionally on x86, AlmaLinux 9:

IMG_1387.jpeg

Installation seemed to go smoothly, but there were momentary system freezes. I looked at the logs and my worst expectations came true:

IMG_1395.jpeg

After five such errors, the system stops operating the device and further normal operation becomes impossible. Usually, full freezing of work occurs
within a quarter of an hour.

Of course, I have no more ideas what to do with it. Any help is appreciated...

PS. Sorry for the lack of direct images, but I'm having trouble providing the correct DropBox preview links.

65

Operating Systems and Porting / Re: [NEWS] AlmaLinux 8.6 is out

« on: May 18, 2022, 03:36:01 pm »

This may focus on FreeBSD, it is less fragmented ;-)

Personally, I have been testing FreeBSD on x86_64 for several weeks. It is good system.

66

General OpenPOWER Discussion / Re: The Vikings store (european reseller of RaptorCS products) is open again

« on: March 03, 2022, 06:18:37 am »

From the perspective of a Polish customer, the price of the equipment increased by 6.5% in a month
At the beginning of February, I was determined to buy, but now I'm seriously considering it.

67

Operating Systems and Porting / Re: Haiku

« on: February 08, 2022, 01:51:07 pm »

I understand that in that case I have to prepare Haiku build tools for ppc64, 32 bit architecture probably doesn't make much sense anymore.

68

Operating Systems and Porting / Re: Haiku

« on: February 07, 2022, 03:28:22 am »

Hi,
I am interested in Haiku on PowerPC / Power 9. Recently I even bought a Power Mac G5 D 1.8 GHz for pennies.
I have tried to compile what I can into a PPC architecture but with no success. System-build tools do not compile.
I tried on Haiku / 64 and Linux. There are construction errors in one of the macros. As far as possible, I will try to
overcome this problem this week.

I have a question if I understand the markings correctly:

ppc -> 32 bits big-endian,
ppcle -> 32 bits litle-endian
ppc64 -> 64 bits big-endian,
ppc64le -> 64 bits litle-endian?