A certain powerpc 2.6.28 kernel (which is by default compressed with gzip -9) fails to load with u-boot v2008.10. It results in a machine check stop. I'm testing on a MPC8313-RDB.
Btw. the linux-2.6.28/arch/powerpc/boot/wrapper script takes care of compressing with "gzip -9". On my host linux pc I'm using gzip 1.3.5 (2002-09-30).
If I manually compress that same kernel with "gzip -8" and generate a uImage, it *does* work.
As far as I know my start/load memory addresses are ok.
If anybody has any clues, please let me know.
more details follow. Here's the full output of when the problem occurs:
U-Boot 2008.10 (Jan 19 2009 - 12:21:43) MPC83XX
Reset Status: Software Hard, External/Internal Soft, External/Internal Hard
CPU: e300c3, MPC8313E, Rev: 1.0 at 333.333 MHz, CSB: 166.667 MHz Board: Freescale MPC8313ERDB I2C: ready DRAM: 128 MB Top of RAM usable for U-Boot at: 08000000 Reserving 307k for U-Boot at: 07fb3000 Reserving 520k for malloc() at: 07f31000 Reserving 68 Bytes for Board Info at: 07f30fbc Reserving 104 Bytes for Global Data at: 07f30f54 Stack Pointer at: 07f30f38 New Stack Pointer is: 07f30f38 Now running in RAM - U-Boot at: 07fb3000 FLASH: 8 MB NAND: 32 MiB In: serial Out: serial Err: serial U-Boot relocated to 07fb3000 Net: TSEC0, TSEC1 [PRIME] => run tird Speed: 100, full duplex Using TSEC1 device TFTP from server 10.10.4.142; our IP address is 10.10.77.77 Filename 'uImage'. Load address: 0x2000000 Loading: ################################################################# ##################################################### done Bytes transferred = 1717604 (1a3564 hex) Speed: 100, full duplex Using TSEC1 device TFTP from server 10.10.4.142; our IP address is 10.10.77.77 Filename 'initramfs.igz.uboot'. Load address: 0x1000000 Loading: ################################################################# ################################################################# ########## done Bytes transferred = 2051722 (1f4e8a hex) Speed: 100, full duplex Using TSEC1 device TFTP from server 10.10.4.142; our IP address is 10.10.77.77 Filename 'mpc8313erdb.dtb'. Load address: 0x400000 Loading: # done Bytes transferred = 11130 (2b7a hex) ## Current stack ends at 0x07f30c00 * kernel: cmdline image address = 0x02000000 ## Booting kernel from Legacy Image at 02000000 ... Image Name: Linux-2.6.28wa2 Created: 2009-01-19 11:36:09 UTC Image Type: PowerPC Linux Kernel Image (gzip compressed) Data Size: 1717540 Bytes = 1.6 MB Load Address: 00000000 Entry Point: 00000000 Verifying Checksum ... OK kernel data at 0x02000040, len = 0x001a3524 (1717540) * ramdisk: cmdline image address = 0x01000000 ## Loading init Ramdisk from Legacy Image at 01000000 ... Image Name: uboot initramfs Created: 2009-01-12 14:56:02 UTC Image Type: PowerPC Linux RAMDisk Image (gzip compressed) Data Size: 2051658 Bytes = 2 MB Load Address: 00000000 Entry Point: 00000000 Verifying Checksum ... OK ramdisk start = 0x01000040, ramdisk end = 0x011f4e8a * fdt: cmdline image address = 0x00400000 ## Checking for 'FDT'/'FDT Image' at 00400000 * fdt: raw FDT blob ## Flattened Device Tree blob at 00400000 Booting using the fdt blob at 0x400000 of_flat_tree at 0x00400000 size 0x00002b7a Uncompressing Kernel Image ...
U-Boot 2008.10 (Jan 19 2009 - 12:21:43) MPC83XX
Reset Status: Check Stop, External/Internal Soft, External/Internal Hard
I already applied this patch: http://www.mail-archive.com/u-boot@lists.denx.de/msg06709.html it makes no difference.
I also applied this patch: http://www.mail-archive.com/u-boot@lists.denx.de/msg04544.html it makes no difference either.
Using "bzip2 --best" gives: Uncompressing Kernel Image ... BUNZIP2: uncompress or overwrite error -3 - must RESET board to recover
Using "bzip2 --fast" works, but it takes a long time for u-boot to uncompress the kernel.
What's also strange is that some other 2.6.28 kernels (compressed with gzip -9) do work.
I probably have some kind of memory error, I don't see it though.
Unfortunately the problem doesn't occur when I start debugging it with a jtag debugger (lauterbach).
if anybody has any clues, please let me know.