Hi,

I've struggled for days now trying to get my Efika going.

I have finally just gotten to the "ok" prompt with a serial extension cable that I rewired to null modem cable.

The problem I have is I cannot type anything on the boot prompt. I've tried with the keyboard on the host PC that I'm attached to as well as a USB keyboard attached to Efika.

I've tried this on Linux with minicom and screen as well as Windows with HyperTerminal.

Anyone have any ideas?


Thanks!

Marty

Your serial settings should be set to 115200 8n1 no handshake - if you do set any handshaking (XON/XOFF or RTS/CTS) then you won't be able to type anything as expected (firmware settings don't bother to handshake, it's a really "dumb" terminal)

I would try picocom rather than minicom (it's easier to configure :) and do this;

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Matt Sealey

Hi Matt,

Thanks for the quick reply!

I've emerged pipcocom and fired it up with the settings you provided but still have the same problem :(

I wonder if my cable is wired incorrectly???

Would you happen to know the pinout that's needed for the null modem cable?

As you can probably tell I'm very new to this. I've never even used serial connections much less embedded system but I'm a quick learner so your help is much appreciated.

My cable is wired like this:

2 - 3
3 - 2
4 - 6+1
5 - 5
6+1 - 4
7 - 8
8 - 7

Is this the wrong setup?

Also, I have a USB keyboard. I've tried with it plugged into efika and without. I'm a bit confused really. Should I be expecting to type into my Host keyboard through picocom or from the USB directly?(neither work at this point :( )

Sorry for all of the questions and thanks again for your help! This forum is awesome!


Marty

Hi again,

One more bit of info:

I'm getting this error from picocom a lot when resetting the efika:

FATAL: read from term failed: Resource temporarily unavailable

and

FATAL: term closed

I'm guessing that's pointing in the direction of a bad cable???


Marty

Quite possibly. Is it a USB serial cable or just PC serial port?

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Matt Sealey

Hi Matt,

It's a PC serial port. Radio Shack has a USB serial adapter for $40(ouch!). Should I just go get it?

Btw, this Efika is going into a kiosk for Purina Pet Foods. It's going to be really cool if I can get it done! The board is responsible for lighting up different sections of the kiosk display and playing audios. These actions are triggered by button presses.

Thanks! (sorry to bother you so much but your guidance is appreciated greatly)


Marty

No, but they fail much easier than normal null modem cables - there is more to go wrong than a couple wires :D

BTW I would try NewEgg before I even thought about "The Shack".

Does it boot with keyboard and display attached, or is ALL of it dead?

If you can get it running with a display you should then look at replacing your null modem cable, as it's probably this that is breaking. I am assuming that you do not have any PCI card in there..

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Matt Sealey

Get a real nullmodem-cable instead.

I noticed the EFIKA have problems with many USB-
keyboards. Many simply don't work.

Thanks guys! I did get a real null modem cable and I'm able to boot the Efika now :)

Sorry it took so long to update this post. I've been really busy trying to get this baby working how I need it to.

I have another question but I'll open another post for it.

Thanks again!

Marty

actually, right after I posted the last message I was able to get logged into my Debian system on Efika!!! I was having issues with:

Id "T0" respawning too fast: disabled for 5 minutes

I knew it had to do with /dev/PSC0 device file and inittab but I had tried over and over with no luck.

I just opened up the inittab file again and realized that there was a typo on the baud rate.

This got me where I needed to be:

T0:23:respawn:/sbin/getty -L ttyPSC0 115200 vt100

WOOHOO!!! Now I just need to program my 'PIC-ECIO USB board' and I'll be all set!

Fyi, this Efika is going into a kiosk to control user interaction. When each button is pressed an audio file plays and certain LEDs will light up.

This forum has helped me a great deal and I thank you for that.


Marty

So with a 'standard' null modem cable connected from my pc to the efika i should be able to monitor booting and even start linux on it?

Yes. You can force it into serial mode by simply disconnecting the keyboard and graphics on boot; it will redirect all the firmware console to the serial port. The firmware uses 115200 rate, 8 bit data, no parity, 1 stop bit (popularly "8n1" mode) and NO handshake (RTS/CTS and XON/XOFF disabled)

Booting with console=ttyPSC0,115200,8n1 for Linux will get you a serial console. You will have to edit inittab as above, and add ttyPSC0 to securetty to get a login console.

You can force a serial console from firmware - although make sure you actually GET a console first, dodgy cables and weird terminal programs will bite you here - by following the details in this article which has been on the site for a good 4 and a half years now (yes, it worked on Pegasos all these years!) and has been linked from the front page all this time.

A note about the article: the "io" Forth word is the ONLY recommended way to do it. Changing input-device and output-device firmware variables is a VERY VERY bad idea. You can completely trash a system this way without very few ways of recovering it. If you mistype anything for the "io" word arguments (like getting the serial device name wrong), OF will just pop an error and go back to the defaults.

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Matt Sealey

I noticed the EFIKA have problems with many USB-
keyboards. Many simply don't work. levitra

Hi karee, which ones? Can you provide a model number or manufacturer? Are you referring to the original Efika (PowerPC) or the Efika MX (ARM)?

R&B :)

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http://bbrv.blogspot.com

I have noticed an occasional problem where my Logitek keyboard is not active or the mouse does not light, on the SmartTop. This is easily corrected by reseting the USB, by unplugging any one device and plugging it back in, forcing the USB driver to reenumerate the devices on the bus. If that fails I unplug the hub I have the devices on and plug it back in. I've only had to do the hub once (perhaps that was the hub locking up, I was editing a file when everything froze that time: both keyboard and mouse).

Is that your problem, or is the keyboard simply nonfunctional on the Efika but works fine on other computers?

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--

Science, n. Investigation of natural phenomena.
Engineering, n. Domestication of natural phenomena.
Technology, n. Domesticated natural phenomena.

--

\"It is essential for automatic computation that, instead of containing every single instruction necessary to carry out the program, the coded program include methods for generating instructions which are needed to carry out the program. ... One measure of the extent to which an automatic digital computer is used effectively is given by the ratio of the number of instructions formed in the machine to that of the instructions inserted into the machine initially.\" Mathematical Machines Volume I Digital Computers ©1961 Francis J. Murray

If so, then why is this ratio zero on most modern computer software?