Re: Rebooting a Fire V240 with a different kernel

["Frank Wille" <frank%phoenix.owl.de@localhost>]

On 2026-10-23, Martin Husemann <martin%duskware.de@localhost> wrote:

> I think the forth boot block has /ofwboot had coded:
>
> boot-args ascii D strchr 0= swap drop if
> " /ofwboot" do-boot
> then exit

Ok. My Forth is weak, but I assume that it inserts /ofwboot into the
boot-args, when using "boot" from OBP, and the given kernel name is
then appended?

It is still confusing, because I saw boot-commands with /ofwboot
and netbsd-kernels in the documentation. How can both work?


> > How can I tell OpenBoot to use an updated /ofwboot? Or what is my best
> > upgrade path?
>
> I would expect the old ofwboot to work too,

Would be nice.
The sparc64 FAQ writes it is important that ofwboot matches the kernel.


> the error looks more like
> a root partition size issue - how big is your / and what inodes do
> the working and the non working kernel have?

Hmm. Good point. The root partition is 48GB:
sun# disklabel raid0
# /dev/rraid0c:
[...]
4 partitions:
#        size    offset     fstype [fsize bsize cpg/sgs]
 a: 101405696         0     4.2BSD      0     0     0  # (Cyl.      0 -  99028)
 b:   8388608 101405696       swap                     # (Cyl.  99029 - 107220)
 c: 143374592         0     unused      0     0        # (Cyl.      0 - 140014*)
 d:  33554432 109794304     4.2BSD      0     0     0  # (Cyl. 107221 - 139988)

And the inode numbers for /netbsd11 are quite high:
sun# ls -i /net*
  11777 /netbsd     1248831 /netbsd11

I read in the installation notes that the root partition should be 4GB
to prevent such problems - on Ultra1 and Ultra2 systems. My V240 has
UltraSPARC-IIIi CPUs ... so it is Ultra3?

And isn't that a problem which could/should be fixed by ofwboot, as
long as ofwboot resides in the first 4GB of the partition? Which is
the case here:
sun# ls -i /ofwboot
3 /ofwboot

-- 
Frank Wille