Ohayden: /* Mem86+ */

2010-12-12T06:55:25Z

Mem86+

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= Dryad - Mom's Desktop =

== Specifications ==
{| border="1"
! Brand !! Model !! Description !! Link !! Price
|-
| AMD || Athlon II X2 / ADX250OCGMBOX || Athlon II X2 250, Regor, 64Bit, 0.85V - 1.4V, 65W, 3.0GHz, 2x1MB L2 Cache, Socket AM3 Dual-Core || [http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/processors/athlon-ii-x2/Pages/AMD-athlon-ii-x2-processor-model-numbers-feature-comparison.aspx Manufacture] [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103903 Purchased] || $58.99
|-
| ASRock || K10N78M-PRO || AMD AM3/AM2+/AM2, D-Sub+DVI, FSB:2600MHz HT (5200 MT/s) North Bridge:NVIDIA GeForce 8200, LAN: Realtek 8211CL, Audio:Realtek ALC662 || [http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?Model=K10N78M%20PRO Manufacture] [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157187 Purchased] || $51.99
|-
| G.SKILL || F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK || 2x2GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500), CL5, 5-5-5-15, 2.0v-2.1v || [http://www.gskill.com/products.php?index=57 Manufacture] [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231166 Purchased] || $89.99
|-
| Western Digital || Caviar Blue / WD10EALS || 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Firmware: ?? P/N:?? Date Code: ?? || [http://www.wdc.com/global/products/specs/?driveID=793 Manufacture] [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136534 Purchased] || $69.99
|-
| LOGISYS Computer || CS305BK || Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Enhanced SOHO Computer Case 480W Power Supply || [http://www.logisyscomputer.com/viewsku.asp?SKUID=CS305&DID=Main Manufacture] [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811148046 Purchased] || $32.99
|}

== BIOS Configuration ==
* Default BIOS options / Nothing changed

== Boot Up Errors ==

* I installed AMD64 Debian 5.0.7 / Lenny with a desktop environment
** 3 partitions:
*** sda1 boot primary ext3 @ 500105.25MB
*** sda2 primary @ 488680.34MB
*** sda3 logical swap @ 11417.69MB

=== Error 1 ===

* I was seeing the following error at boot up:
Your BIOS doesn't leave a aperture memory hole
Please enable the IOMMU option in the BIOS setup
This costs you 64 MB of RAM

* To fix the above message, I added "iommu=noagp,noaperture" to the kernel line. Based on [http://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/x86/x86_64/boot-options.txt some research] and a bunch of googling, it appears this issue is somewhat related to the fact that I don't have an AGP card. Either way, the two values for the iommu kernel parameter mean the following:
noagp = Don't initialize the AGP driver and use full aperture.
noaperture = Ask the IOMMU not to touch the aperture for AGP.

=== Error 2 ===
* I was also seeing the following error at boot up:
PCI: Not using MMCONFIG.

* To fix the above message, I added "pci=nommconf" to the kernel line. Based on [http://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt some research] I understand that the "pci=nommconf" parameter tells the kernel to ignore mmconfig when identifying PCI devices, thus it will use other methods to identify PCI devices such as the BIOS or direct querying. With that said, I checked the all the pci devices with "lspci -v" and they all appear to be detected properly with the "pci-nommconf" parameter.

=== Error 1 & 2 Solution ===

* Tweaks to fix the above boot errors is as follows:
vim /boot/grub/menu.lst
<pre>
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-2-amd64 root=UUID=481003fb-06a2-4036-a11a-7179dc79a13a ro quiet iommu=noagp,noaperture pci=nommconf
</pre>

== Initial Configuration ==

* I installed the following packages:
aptitude install ssh binutils killall gcc make build-essential linux-headers-`uname -r`

* Configured sshd to deny remote root login
vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config
* Find and change "PermitRootLogin yes" to "PermitRootLogin no", as such:
PermitRootLogin no

== Installed Latest Nvidia Drivers ==
* I went nvidia's website and downloaded the latest 64 bit driver for linux. [http://www.nvidia.com/content/DriverDownload-March2009/confirmation.php?url=/XFree86/Linux-x86_64/260.19.21/NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-260.19.21.run&lang=us&type=GeForce Here is the link I used for version 260.19.21.] I suggest searching for your exact card as I'm sure there's been updates.
* Make a folder in the share folder:
<pre>mkdir -p /share/nvidia</pre>
* Copy the folder to the share folder:
<pre>mv ~/Desktop/NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-260.19.21.run /share/nvidia</pre>
* Ran the script from a console as it didn't like doing it with X loaded:
<pre>
CTRL+ALT+F1
</pre>
* Log in as root
<pre>
cd /share/nvidia
/etc/init.d/gdm stop
sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-260.19.21.run
</pre>
* It prompt asking about installing 32-bit compatibility and I felt generous so I said yeah, go for it
* It also complained about my compiler being newer than what the kernel was compiled for, but I didn't care much
* Reboot for ease of finalizing the install:
<pre>reboot</pre>
* Once you login, you should now see the nvidia setup menu item under System->Preferences and you can tweak as desired
* I had to turn off vsync as it seemed to be affecting ET's brightness setting by making the screen go darker

== Backup for Windows (partimage) ==
* Installed rsync and partimage
<pre>
su
aptitude install rsync partimage
</pre>
* Copied Windows Backup Files
<pre>
mkdir -p /share/backup/windows
</pre>
* Restored backups from Muse
<pre>
cd /share/backup/windows
partimage
</pre>
* Chose sda2, tab, then typed "windows_xp_clean.000" for the "Image file to create/use".
* Tab and selected "Restore partition from an image file"
* F5 to continue, the rest is fairly self explanatory and not worth mentioning here

== Windows Dual Boot ==
* Fixed Windows parition
** Used cfdisk to mark sda2 as boot and type 07 = NTFS
* Add Windows to Grub
** Boot into previously installed Linux
** Open a terminal window, su, and use vim to edit /boot/grub/menu.lst to add the following lines of text:
<pre>
title Windows
rootnoverify (hd0,1)
makeactive
chainloader +1
</pre>
* Save and reboot again and you now have Linux and Windows all happy together
'''NOTE:''' To my surprise Windows was NOT happy at all and it just sat there after grub not wanting to boot! Unfortunately Windows stores the starting sector and as I moved to a bigger drive, I obviously didn't know about Windows being so picky. To fix this issue, either you have to match the previous drive layout up to the Windows partition (yeah, like that was going to happen) or go in and get a little dirty by manually changing the address Windows previously saved to the new location (this is what I opted to do).

== Fix Windows Starting Sector ==
* Install hexedit
<pre>aptitude install hexedit</pre>
* Fist, find the new sector containing the Window partition:
<pre>
fdisk -lu /dev/sda

Disk /dev/sda: 1000.2 GB, 1000204886016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 121601 cylinders, total 1953525168 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00063fd1

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 63 976768064 488384001 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 * 976768065 1931221844 477226890 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3 1931221845 1953520064 11149110 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 1931221908 1953520064 11149078+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
</pre>
* From this we see Windows it now at: 976768065 and using gcalctool we know that's 3A384C41 in hex
* Let's go fix it, shall we:
<pre>
hexedit /dev/sda2
00000000 EB 52 90 4E 54 46 53 20 20 20 20 00 02 08 00 00 .R.NTFS .....
00000010 00 00 00 00 00 F8 00 00 3F 00 FF 00 82 0E 3C 33 ........?.....<3
</pre>
* See the second line containing "82 0E 3C 33"? Well, that's the old location of 0x333C0E82 which is 859573890 as you can see from the fdisk -lu /dev/sda dump from the previous computer:
<pre>Disk /dev/sda: 640.1 GB, 640135028736 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 77825 cylinders, total 1250263728 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00087e51

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 63 840038849 420019393+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 840038850 859573889 9767520 5 Extended
/dev/sda3 * 859573890 1054908224 97667167+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda5 840038913 859573889 9767488+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
</pre>
* In hexedit, go to the "82 0E 3C 33" and write the new address 3A384C41 as "41 4C 38 3A"
* Press CRTL+X and answer Y to save and exit
* Reboot again and magic shall occur, well okay... maybe not, but Windows will now boot

== Final Touches ==
=== Fixed Partition ===
* I had to boot back into Linux and use gparted to shrink the partition down, then back into Windows for it to run chkdsk automatically at boot, then back to Linux used gparted again to resize back to what it was set to, and once again into Windows in order for chkdsk to realize the size of the partition grew.

=== Mem86+ ===
<pre>
aptitude install memtest86+
cat /usr/share/doc/memtest86+/examples/grub-menu.lst >> /boot/grub/menu.lst
</pre>
* Clean up the memtest86+ entry
<pre>
vim /boot/grub/menu.lst
</pre>
* I ran memtest86+ all night and it passed with flying colors

Dryad - Revision history

Ohayden: /* Mem86+ */