Alternately boots lenny, then stock OS

I've successfully installed lenny on a usb stick on my pogoplug and it's happily chugging away even as I write this.

I'm finding though that if I reboot the device by power-cycling it (as I've been doing quite a lot over the past couple of days while I get things set up) then it will boot back into the stock pogoplug OS. If I power-cycle again then lenny is back.

It's not a huge deal (rebooting from lenny with shutdown -r always brings lenny back up), but I'd prefer it if the device could come back up on its own after a power failure or something similar.

Am I missing something? Why is it doing this?

Hi Jason32 -- I've come across the same problem with my pink Pogoplug. Just like you, I've found that it alternates between booting into the stock OS and booting into Debian. I've detailed the various things I've tried here:

• telling it to boot to a labelled filesystem
• getting UBoot to initialize USB twice
• adding a boot delay to let things settle down

...none of which have worked.

I enabled netconsole, and found that I get this error message every other boot:

    (Re)start USB...
    USB:   Register 10011 NbrPorts 1
    USB EHCI 1.00
    scanning bus for devices... 4 USB Device(s) found
    scanning bus for storage devices... error in inquiry

right before it boots into the stock OS. If you search for the "error in inquiry" line, you'll find lots of bug reports about it. So far, nothing has worked for me. Has anyone else got any idea?

I'm curious if this is a timing problem.

Have you tried it w a different flash drive?

=====================================================

• davy's Github Repo's rescue-dg

Yep, a couple different drives. It's possible I've got two bad drives, of course, but there seem to be a lot of people with the same problem -- search for "error in inquiry" and you'll see. This Debian bug seems pretty similar, for example; it appears to have been fixed with a later version of uBoot than comes with Jeff's installer, so I'm wondering if upgrading might do the trick. Jeff has posted instructions/notes here (though with lots of warnings about bricking your device), so I may give it a try at some point.

Have you considered the "Newer uBoot" that also addresses the 3.2 (& higher) kernels? They are based on 2011.12. See f uBoot section... http://forum.doozan.com/read.php?3,6965

=====================================================

• davy's Github Repo's rescue-dg

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/23/2012 06:11PM by davygravy.

Saint Aardvark the Carpeted Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ... it appears to have been
> fixed with a later version of uBoot than comes
> with Jeff's installer
So I assume from this statement that you don't have Jeff's latest uboot installed. If so, and you are not running a 3.2 kernel, then do install Jeff's uboot.

> so I'm wondering if
> upgrading might do the trick. Jeff has posted
> instructions/notes
> [url=http://jeff.doozan.com/debian/uboot/build_ubo
> ot.htm]here[/url] (though with lots of warnings
> about bricking your device), so I may give it a
> try at some point.

Those instructions are for building a new uboot. I suggest that you installed Jeff's latest uboot following these instructions:
[url=http://jeff.doozan.com/debian/uboot/][/url]
I've installed uboot using these instructions on five different devices without problems.

Could this be a problem with env vars?

Maybe you could printenv and post your values.

=====================================================

• davy's Github Repo's rescue-dg

Thanks for the replies, everyone!

davygravy: Thanks for the pointer to the newer version of uBoot. I'm not using a 3.1 kernel -- good ol' 2.6.32 instead -- so I hadn't thought of that. I'll have a look and probably give it a try. As for environment vars, here we go:

ethact=egiga0
bootdelay=3
baudrate=115200
mainlineLinux=yes
console=ttyS0,115200
led_init=green blinking
led_exit=green off
led_error=orange blinking
mtdparts=mtdparts=orion_nand:1M(u-boot),4M(uImage),32M(rootfs),-(data)
mtdids=nand0=orion_nand
partition=nand0,2
stdin=serial
stdout=serial
stderr=serial
rescue_installed=0
rescue_set_bootargs=setenv bootargs console=$console ubi.mtd=2 root=ubi0:rootfs ro rootfstype=ubifs $mtdparts $rescue_custom_params
rescue_bootcmd=if test $rescue_installed -eq 1; then run rescue_set_bootargs; nand read.e 0x800000 0x100000 0x400000; bootm 0x800000; else run pogo_bootcmd; fi
pogo_bootcmd=if fsload uboot-original-mtd0.kwb; then go 0x800200; fi
force_rescue=0
force_rescue_bootcmd=if test $force_rescue -eq 1 || ext2load usb 0:1 0x1700000 /rescueme 1 || fatload usb 0:1 0x1700000 /rescueme.txt 1; then run rescue_bootcmd; fi
ubifs_mtd=3
ubifs_set_bootargs=setenv bootargs console=$console ubi.mtd=$ubifs_mtd root=ubi0:rootfs rootfstype=ubifs $mtdparts $ubifs_custom_params
ubifs_bootcmd=run ubifs_set_bootargs; if ubi part data && ubifsmount rootfs && ubifsload 0x800000 /boot/uImage && ubifsload 0x1100000 /boot/uInitrd; then bootm 0x800000 0x1100000; fi
usb_scan=usb_scan_done=0;for scan in $usb_scan_list; do run usb_scan_$scan; if test $usb_scan_done -eq 0 && ext2load usb $usb 0x800000 /boot/uImage 1; then usb_scan_done=1; echo "Found bootable drive on usb $usb"; setenv usb_device $usb; setenv usb_root /dev/$dev; fi; done
usb_scan_list=1 2 3 4
usb_scan_1=usb=0:1 dev=sda1
usb_scan_2=usb=1:1 dev=sdb1
usb_scan_3=usb=2:1 dev=sdc1
usb_scan_4=usb=3:1 dev=sdd1
usb_init=run usb_scan
usb_device=0:1
usb_root=/dev/sda1
usb_rootfstype=ext2
usb_rootdelay=10
usb_set_bootargs=setenv bootargs console=$console root=$usb_root rootdelay=$usb_rootdelay rootfstype=$usb_rootfstype $mtdparts $usb_custom_params
usb_bootcmd=run usb_init; run usb_set_bootargs; run usb_boot
usb_boot=mw 0x800000 0 1; ext2load usb $usb_device 0x800000 /boot/uImage; if ext2load usb $usb_device 0x1100000 /boot/uInitrd; then bootm 0x800000 0x1100000; else bootm 0x800000; fi
ethaddr=00:25:31:00:74:7C
arcNumber=2097
serverip=192.168.23.201
ipaddr=192.168.23.1
if_netconsole=ping $serverip
start_netconsole=setenv ncip $serverip; setenv bootdelay 10; setenv stdin nc; setenv stdout nc; setenv stderr nc; version;
preboot=run if_netconsole start_netconsole
bootcmd=usb start; usb stop; usb start; run force_rescue_bootcmd; run ubifs_bootcmd; run usb_bootcmd; usb stop; run rescue_bootcmd; run pogo_bootcmd; reset

laprjns: I have gone through the update process on Jeff's uBoot page, and it said I had the latest version already. It offered to reset the vars, so I did that; other than losing my netconsole settings and having to put them back in, it didn't make a difference. The build-your-own-uBoot instructions seemed relevant because I've seen other bug reports, similar to mine, that were resolved with a newer version of uBoot (like this one; there are others).