# booting FreeBSD 8.1 on sun fire 280R



## BarbeRousse (Sep 10, 2010)

Hello,

I have successfully installed FreeBSD 8.1 on one sun fire 280R hardware with net boot CD.
The system doesn't start. I get 
	
	



```
{0} ok
```
 prompt and try :
`boot`
`boot disk0`
`boot disk1`
`boot disk2`
And with `boot disk /boot/loader`

It tell me with that "file" is not an executable one.

This system has two FC hard drive Seagate 36Gb, only ad0 is used.
The console is on the video card (VGA screen) and the input is a keyboard on usb port.

During install process nothing appear about boot loader, nor configuration, nor installation.

Is there any special manipulation to make this system boot ?

Thank you.
Best regards,


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## krnlpk (Sep 14, 2010)

Do you have Solaris on it? You could try to boot FreeBSD using Solaris grub, with a command like 

```
insmod ufs2
set root=(hdx,x,s)
kfreebsd   /boot/kernel/kernel
kfreebsd_loadenv /boot/device.hints
set   kFreeBSD.vfs.root.mountfrom=ufs:/dev/adNsNs
set   kFreeBSD.vfs.root.mountfrom.options=rw
boot
```
from grub2 console and load kernel directly; I don't know if on SPARC you might need some other option to boot correctly.


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## BarbeRousse (Sep 15, 2010)

Hello krnlpk,

   Solaris is not installed on this server. I have erased all disk space when installing FreeBSD.

   Maybe I can try to boot with /boot/kernel/kernel on boot prompt or install grub with any liveCD.

Best regards,


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## BarbeRousse (Sep 18, 2010)

Hello,

I have burn SystemRescueCD for sparc architecture and mount the first partition /dev/sda1 with `mount -t ufs /dev/sda1 /mnt/custom/ -o ufstype=ufs2`. 

I found a file named /boot/loader.

But on the OpenBoot prompt it reply with 
	
	



```
The file just loaded does not appear to be executable.
```
 with any boot command even if I put a nonexistent file like `boot disk /toto` or the "good one" like `boot disk /boot/loader`.

I have tried with disk,disk0,disk1 and with disk:a and from "a" to "f" on "disk", "disk0" and "disk1"

I use OpenBoot 4.5

Hard drive is FiberChannel Seagate ST336704FSUN36G

I don't understand why with the install cd boot with `boot cdrom` works but we can't boot on any hard drive !

As any one could boot FreeBSD on SUN hardware ?

Thank you.

Best regards,


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## mmoll (Sep 19, 2010)

BarbeRousse said:
			
		

> As any one could boot FreeBSD on SUN hardware ?



I wonder why no bootblock got installed on your HDD with the FreeBSD installation but you can add it when booting a FreeBSD live CD (livefs.iso) and then use something like

```
# kldload geom_sunlabel
# sunlabel -B da0
```
and then try

```
boot disk
```
in OBP (ok prompt).


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## BarbeRousse (Sep 20, 2010)

Hello mmoll,

Thank you for your advice.

I have burn and booted livefs and executed :

```
# sunlabel -B qd0
# echo $?
0
```
Command as been successfully executed.

At openboot prompt when entering :

```
boot disk
```
I have got this error :

```
The file just loaded does not appear to be executable
```

With systemrescuecd we had retrieved a dump of the first 10 sector/blocks with this command :

```
dd bs=510 count=10 if=/dev/da0 of=/tmp/da0_blocks
```
We could see sun like partition table on the first block (512 bites) and the beginning of the freebsd sparc64 boot block at the second block.

This previous error message was found in openboot source code, so it seams that it found boot block code but can't execute it.

Best regards,


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## mmoll (Sep 21, 2010)

Hi,



			
				BarbeRousse said:
			
		

> At openboot prompt when entering :
> 
> ```
> boot disk
> ...



Could you post the output of

```
# sunlabel da0
```

Here is mine for example:

```
# sunlabel da0
# /dev/da0:
text: FreeBSD17G cyl 2200 alt 2 hd 255 sec 63
bytes/sector: 512
sectors/cylinder: 16065
sectors/unit: 35343000

8 partitions:
#
# Size is in sectors.
# Offset is in cylinders.
#    size       offset
#    ---------- ----------
  a:    1050776          0
  b:    2045008         66
  c:   35343000          0
  d:    3119344        194
  e:    1050776        390
  f:   28017360        456
```

da0a is my root partition, which has an offset of 0 - that is important, AFAICR. Otherwise I'm bit out of ideas, did you already update the firmware to the latest revision?


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## BarbeRousse (Sep 22, 2010)

Hello,

   Here sunlabel output :

```
Fixit# sunlabel da0
#/dev/da0:
text: FreeBSD34G cyl 24620 alt 2 hd 27 sec 107
bytes/sector: 512
sectors/cylinder: 2889
sectors/unit: 71127180
8 partitions:
#
# Size is in sectors.
# Offset is in cylinders.
#    size       offset
     ---------- ----------
  a:    1048707          0
  b:    8314542        363
  c:   71127180          0
  d:    6254685       3241
  e:    1048707       5406
  f:   54460539       5769
Fixit#
```

Openboot version is 4.5.

Best regards,


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## BarbeRousse (Sep 22, 2010)

Hello,

The latest openboot version for Sun FIRE 280R seems to be 4.16.4
But sunsolve site require special account to download firmware.

```
Firmware/BIOS/Drivers etc.      HardwareUpdates      Requires an Oracle Premium Systems Contract or a legacy Sun Warranty Contract Number or a Sun System Support Plan.
```
I don't have it.
Does some one have sufficient access to download it ?
Patch ID is 118323-01

Thank you.
Best regards,


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## BarbeRousse (Sep 27, 2010)

Hello,

Now, openboot version is the latest one.
To upgrade it I had reinstalled sun solaris 10 (on a backup disk) to run flash update utility.

But FreeBSD isn't booting at all, even after re installation and set-defaults / reset-all.

I don't know wath to try/do now.

Any idea ?
Thank you.

Best regards,


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## mmoll (Sep 28, 2010)

BarbeRousse said:
			
		

> Any idea ?



No further ideas... 
It's running just fine on my 280R. Maybe ask on freebsd-sparc64@


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