Re: NetBSD/aarch64 on 8 GB Raspberry Pi 4B?

[Paul Mather <bsd-lists%gromit.dlib.vt.edu@localhost>]

On Jun 9, 2020, at 1:14 PM, Jared McNeill <jmcneill%invisible.ca@localhost> wrote:

> Hi Paul --
> 
> I don't have a board to try, but you should be able to boot NetBSD on the 8GB model with the latest Pi4 UEFI firmware:
> 
> https://rpi4-uefi.dev/v1-14-release-for-pi-4/
> 
> To use it, start with 'arm64.img' from NetBSD -current. Delete everything from the MSDOS partition except for the "EFI" directory, then place the contents of the RPi4 UEFI build on the root of the SD card.
> 
> First time you boot, interrupt the UEFI firmware by pressing escape and under the 'Advanced Configuration' find the "Limit RAM to 3 GB" option and disable it.
> 
> Let us know how it goes!


Thanks for the easy-to-follow instructions!  I was able successfully to boot my Raspberry Pi 4 8GB model using the above firmware and a recent -CURRENT snapshot:

=====
[     1.000000] pool redzone disabled for 'kmem-04096'
[     1.000000] Copyright (c) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005,
[     1.000000]     2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017,
[     1.000000]     2018, 2019, 2020 The NetBSD Foundation, Inc.  All rights reserved.
[     1.000000] Copyright (c) 1982, 1986, 1989, 1991, 1993
[     1.000000]     The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.

[     1.000000] NetBSD 9.99.65 (GENERIC64) #0: Mon Jun  8 22:52:09 UTC 2020
[     1.000000]         mkrepro%mkrepro.NetBSD.org@localhost:/usr/src/sys/arch/evbarm/compile/GENERIC64
[     1.000000] total memory = 8026 MB
[     1.000000] avail memory = 7768 MB
[     1.000000] pool redzone disabled for 'buf4k'
[     1.000000] pool redzone disabled for 'buf64k'
[     1.000000] entropy: no seed from bootloader
[     1.000000] timecounter: Timecounters tick every 10.000 msec
[     1.000000] running cgd selftest aes-xts-256 aes-xts-512 aes-cbc-128 aes-cbc-256 3des-cbc-192 blowfish-cbc-448 done
[     1.000000] armfdt0 (root)
[     1.000000] simplebus0 at armfdt0: Sony UK Raspberry Pi 4 Model B
[     1.000000] simplebus1 at simplebus0
[     1.000000] acpifdt0 at simplebus0
[     1.000000] acpifdt0: using EFI runtime services for RTC
[     1.000000] ACPI: RSDP 0x0000000033AA0000 000024 (v02 RPIFDN)
[     1.000000] ACPI: XSDT 0x0000000033A90000 000064 (v01 RPIFDN RPI4     00000200      01000013)
[[...etc...]]
=====

This is great!

Just a quick question: what is the easiest way to direct the EFI bootloader to boot NetBSD from an external USB drive?  On my NetBSD 9-STABLE Raspberry Pi 3 I use a "root=" line in cmdline.txt on the SD card boot partition to load NetBSD from the external USB drive.  Will that same method work here?

The UEFI BIOS allows settings to be saved by pressing F10.  Where are these settings saved?

Cheers,

Paul.