# Serial console problem after upgrade 6.3 to 7.3 on HP DL380 G5



## george_harley (Aug 30, 2010)

Hello Everyone,

On some of our servers I've upgraded to 7.3 but since then the serial console (via an Avocent TSU unit) does not work. I've browsed the forum, and found quite a lot of useful information but the issue is still there. I also followed the freeBSD handbook for serial console setup.

1) checked the messages log to see if the port is recognized:

```
hostname# cat /var/log/messages | grep sio0
Aug 30 11:43:31 hostname kernel: sio0: <Standard PC COM port> port 0x3f8-0x3ff irq 4 flags 0x10 on acpi0
Aug 30 11:43:31 hostname kernel: sio0: type 16550A, console
Aug 30 11:43:31 hostname kernel: sio0: [FILTER]
```
2) edit the /etc/ttys

```
hostname# cat /etc/ttys | grep d0
ttyd0	"/usr/libexec/getty std.9600"	xterm	on  secure
```
3) I configured the /boot/loader.conf

```
hostname# cat /boot/loader.conf 
console="comconsole"
```
4) I set the -h option in the /boot.config

```
hostname# cat /boot.config
-h (I also tried -Dh, and -P)
```

Furthermore the tsu unit is set for 9600 8n1 and on the server (HP DL380-G5) the bios is set to the same.

During boot the following happens when I have a display/keyboard attached to the server and a connection through the tsu unit to the serial console:

I get all the information on the serial console (the attached display shows everything untill freebsd kicks in) but when the login: prompt arrives (sometimes the prompt is not shown), the session doesn't accept a username, it just doesn't react to the keyboard) Strangely enough I do get application messages on the screen, but as soon as I touch a key on the keyboard these stop coming through too.

When I try to use the serial console, I do see that the ttyd0 has been started up by getty.

During the upgrade the kernel was obviously upgraded, but I got a message about the orriginal SMP kernel:


```
WARNING: This system is running a "smp" kernel, which is not a
kernel configuration distributed as part of FreeBSD 7.3-RELEASE.
As part of upgrading to FreeBSD 7.3-RELEASE, this kernel will be
replaced with a "generic" kernel.
```
fafaik this should not cause this behaviour, the smp kernel more or less deals with multi cpu and hyperthreading.

I hope someone can shed some light on this.
regards,
Herman


----------



## george_harley (Aug 30, 2010)

*addition*

Oh, I just spotted that the console type was still on xterm...thats now back to the default vt100. I've been testing with other types such as 3wire and xterm. Excuse me for that. All types have the same effect (as described above).


----------



## george_harley (Oct 27, 2010)

I have found a workaround to this. I changed std.9600 to al.9600.
In this case al stands for automatic login.
Not the perfect way to do this, but functional.


----------

