Did I miss anything?

[joekewl]

Thought I would post this here, but I wouldn't really consider myself a newbie, hacked the tivo several time now.

This was actually my first time putting 6.2 on my DirecTivo (Hughes dvr40), the 4.0.1b system worked great forever... Stupid HD failure...

Anyways, I put 6.2 on a new 300GB drive via an InstantCake 6.2 CD (I will probably be using the 62small.mfs image next time though). After a couple days of reading (while the unit remained unplugged), I moved to the hacking.

I placed a (vmlinux-series2-7.2.2-oth.k1-01-2.px) killhdinitrd'd kernel via dd onto hda3 & hda6, also have placed busybox on the system, added the rc.sysinit.author file with the environment variables, it also starts telnet, ftp, and runs fakecall.tcl.

I was able to (at least for now) hook up a usb nic, and telnet in to run the SuperPatch67 (diff patched up to v1.11).

Also, updated the bootpage as follows:
root=/dev/hda7 dsscon=true console=2,115200 upgradesoftware=false

This system will end up being setup with no network, or phone connections, so MRV and a couple other things are not needed.


Now I have a couple questions:
1. Did I miss anything? (besides using the IC 6.2 CD)

2. With this being a larger HD, and mfstools needing the -r 4 option for partitions larger than 274GB, did IC 6.2 CD do this for me?
Or, I am guessing that, since the largest partition (I see via pdisk) is only 259GB, this isn't a big deal.

3. After the system completes booting, I can not input and commands via the serial connection (I can watch it boot via the serial connection though). What did I miss so I have the ability to enter command via the serial console?

4. I also have slices for 6.2a, what will this get me if I copy them over, and force the upgrade? Will it fix the DST guide issue? Or is there something else I can do to fix this? Is the 6.2->6.2a even upgrade worth it?

Thanks for the help!

[tivo4mevo]

1. Given the unit will run without a network connection, I can't think of many other hacks.
2. I have no experience with IC, but I side with you, the -r 4 option is not required with partitions smaller than 274GB.
3. Does your rc.sysinit.author start serial bash? i.e.
exec /bin/bash --login </dev/ttyDSS >/dev/ttyDSS&
4. 6.2a includes 2007 DST; BTUx9 posted a method to "upgrade" without slices here (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=343660)

[Narf54321]

Keep in mind the basic idea for the -r 4 option is to make the chunk sizes larger, which results in fewer "inodes". In your case I'd say at least an -r 3 would be sufficient.

Since, IIRC, Instant Cake creates a typical swap size of 127MB, you need to make sure there is enough swap for all the inodes in the MFS filesystem to complete a green-screen. Too many small chunks can potentially sieze up a GSOD.

[joekewl]

3. Does your rc.sysinit.author start serial bash?


No it didn't, I added the command, and it's working now, Thank You!
Funny how I didn't need that command in there for the 4.x version.


4. 6.2a includes 2007 DST; BTUx9 posted a method to "upgrade" without slices...

That should work great, I will give that a shot, thanks for the link!



Since, IIRC, Instant Cake creates a typical swap size of 127MB, you need to make sure there is enough swap for all the inodes in the MFS filesystem to complete a green-screen.

Yes, the swap is 127MB, below is a printout of the pdisk readout. I am somewhat familiar with partition block sizes, and exactly what the -r X option is for, just didn't know about the inode #'s being the requirement (or reasoning) for trying to decrease the inode count via the -r X option.
What would the calculation (or formula) be for figuring out how many inodes are supported by your current swap size?
And what would the calculation (or formula) be for how large of a swap partition is needed needed for ones MFS filesystem?


#: type name length base ( size )
1: Apple_partition_map Apple 63 @ 1
2: Image Bootstrap 1 4096 @ 77261888 ( 2.0M)
3: Image Kernel 1 4096 @ 77265984 ( 2.0M)
4: Ext2 Root 1 262144 @ 77270080 (128.0M)
5: Image Bootstrap 2 4096 @ 77532224 ( 2.0M)
6: Image Kernel 2 4096 @ 77536320 ( 2.0M)
7: Ext2 Root 2 262144 @ 77540416 (128.0M)
8: Swap Linux swap 260096 @ 77802560 (127.0M)
9: Ext2 /var 262144 @ 78062656 (128.0M)
10: MFS MFS application region 1048576 @ 78324800 (512.0M)
11: MFS MFS media region 33100800 @ 44161088 ( 15.8G)
12: MFS Second MFS application region 1048576 @ 79373376 (512.0M)
13: MFS Second MFS media region 44161024 @ 64 ( 21.1G)
14: MFS New MFS Application 1024 @ 80421952
15: MFS New MFS Media 544702464 @ 80422976 (259.7G)
16: Apple_Free Extra 17008 @ 625125440 ( 8.3M)


Would like to also say thanks guys for the informative & quick reply's! :)