[9fans] Plan9 and VirtualBox 4.0

[sam ducksworth]

FYI .. I successfully created a plan9 virtual machine using VirtualBox 4.0 for Macintosh. The install only took a few minutes. It boots up fast and feels pretty snappy. 

--samd

[Steve Simon]

Is this a PPC mac or an Intel one?

Qemu and plan9 on my G4 Powerbook is
slow enough to be of little real use.

-Steve

[Robbin Johnson]

How did you configure the video? ... I get a scrambled image and no rio desktop.

Robbin.

[Fernan Bolando]

Weird i tried similar settings a few days ago and it didnt work. Can you post the vdi and hdd  settings too?

On Fri, Dec 31, 2010 at 3:52 AM, Sam Ducksworth <sduck...@gmail.com> wrote:

Here is how I setup my VM.

Base Memory: 392MB

Video Memory: 32MB

IDE Primary Master (CD/DVD): (latest plan9 iso was mounted here )

IDE Primary Slave: Plan9.vdi(Normal, 2.00GB)

Host Driver: CoreAudio

Controller: ICH AC97

Adapter 1:

Intel PRO/1000 MT Desktop (NAT)

--samd

I had to up the video memory for the VM to 32MB.

[Sam Ducksworth]

iMac with 2.66Ghz Intel Core i5

[blst...@bellsouth.net]

> Weird i tried similar settings a few days ago and it didnt work. Can you
> post the vdi and hdd settings too?

I had some success yesterday, but more so with Erik's 9atom
ISO than the one from the labs. It handled the VirtualBox
disk emulation much better. Anyway, I ended up with a
very similar configuration, but with the ISO on the secondary
master and the fossil FS on the primary master (though I think
it also worked the other way). I tried all three of the disk
controller settings PIIX3, PIIX4, and ICH6, but none worked
with the Labs' image. It looks like I used the ICH6 setting
with 9atom. I ended up using the PIIX3 chipset, but mostly
because that's what it was left on when I switched to 9atom.
I expect it would work with PIIX4 as well--not sure about the
ICH9.

Toward the end of the day, though, I also got a VirtualBox
instance to boot off of a real Plan9 file server as a diskless
terminal...using IL to Ken's FS even :) This was with the
Intel PRO/1000 MT Server in a bridged config. This also
required the VirtualBox extensions to allow PXE booting
from the Intel cards.

As always, your mileage may vary...

BLS

[Fernan Bolando]

On Sat, Jan 1, 2011 at 12:58 AM, <blst...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>> Weird i tried similar settings a few days ago and it didnt work. Can you
>> post the vdi and hdd  settings too?
>
> I had some success yesterday, but more so with Erik's 9atom
> ISO than the one from the labs.  It handled the VirtualBox
> disk emulation much better.  Anyway, I ended up with a
> very similar configuration, but with the ISO on the secondary
> master and the fossil FS on the primary master (though I think
> it also worked the other way).  I tried all three of the disk
> controller settings PIIX3, PIIX4, and ICH6, but none worked
> with the Labs' image.  It looks like I used the  ICH6 setting
> with 9atom.  I ended up using the PIIX3 chipset, but mostly
> because that's what it was left on when I switched to 9atom.
> I expect it would work with PIIX4 as well--not sure about the
> ICH9.
>
> Toward the end of the day, though, I also got a VirtualBox
> instance to boot off of a real Plan9 file server as a diskless
> terminal...using IL to Ken's FS even :)  This was with the
> Intel PRO/1000 MT Server in a bridged config.  This also
> required the VirtualBox extensions to allow PXE booting
> from the Intel cards.
>
> As always, your mileage may vary...

I spent a few hours and investigated virtualbox 4.0 here is a summary

latest official plan9 iso installed perfectly no network support.
latest 9atom iso installed perfectly however after reboot it fails
with the following errors

MBR...PBS1...Bad Format or I/O error
Press a key to reboot...

reinstalling 9atom over the plan9.iso installation fixed everything,
it's bootable and with netwrok support.

thanks all

[erik quanstrom]

> MBR...PBS1...Bad Format or I/O error
> Press a key to reboot...
>
> reinstalling 9atom over the plan9.iso installation fixed everything,
> it's bootable and with netwrok support.

that's quite wierd. can you reproduce this error?

if so, can you try running fdisk and prep by hand
and seeing if the output makes sense? also, one
can compare the first sector of the disk with the
mbr and the first sector of the plan 9 partition
with pbs. they should be the same, modulo the
bits that disk/mbr fiddle.

- erik

[Fernan Bolando]

On Sat, Jan 1, 2011 at 11:05 PM, erik quanstrom <quan...@quanstro.net> wrote:
>> MBR...PBS1...Bad Format or I/O error
>> Press a key to reboot...
>>
>> reinstalling 9atom over the plan9.iso installation fixed everything,
>> it's bootable and with netwrok support.
>
> that's quite wierd.  can you reproduce this error?

I tried to do a fresh reinstall a few times, so in my case it's at
least repeatable on
a macbook.

>
> if so, can you try running fdisk and prep by hand
> and seeing if the output makes sense?  also, one
> can compare the first sector of the disk with the
> mbr and the first sector of the plan 9 partition
> with pbs.  they should be the same, modulo the
> bits that disk/mbr fiddle.
>

you may need to give a least of commands to try as I am not sure
how to do this in plan9.

[erik quanstrom]

> I tried to do a fresh reinstall a few times, so in my case it's at
> least repeatable on
> a macbook.

your macbook. milage seems to vary. frustrating to not
know on what.

> > if so, can you try running fdisk and prep by hand
> > and seeing if the output makes sense?  also, one
> > can compare the first sector of the disk with the
> > mbr and the first sector of the plan 9 partition
> > with pbs.  they should be the same, modulo the
> > bits that disk/mbr fiddle.
> >
>
> you may need to give a least of commands to try as I am not sure
> how to do this in plan9.

start with
disk/fdisk -p /dev/sd??/data
disk/prep -p /dev/sd??/plan9
dd -count 1 /dev/sd??/plan9 -count 1 | md5sum
dd -if plan9 -count 1 | strings
> should see something like
3: Plan9.00
43: CYLINDRICALFAT16
438: Bad format or I/O error
463: Press a key to reboot...
488: 9LOAD
500: PBS2...

you may need to open a new window to do this.

- erik