SOLVED New to FreeNAS Installation

[RobbieG1977]

I have researched a lot about FreeNas and this is the best option I am looking for. So with that in mind I would like to turn my Dell Studio 540 into a Nas. Nowhere I have found says Ican't do it. So, why is the install so hard? :)

There are 3 issues that I currently have:

1. "run_interrupt_driven_hooks still waiting after 60 seconds for xpt_config"

And it sits there and does nothing afterwards...

2. In the attached photo you will sit it continue to say disconnected.

I even swapped different mice in different ports.

3. Manual root file system error:

Please help! Thank you!

 

[Redcoat]

Let's start with some basics:

What CPU and how much memory does your Dell Studio 540 have installed?

What version of FreeNAS are you trying to load on it?

What is your boot device (type of device and size) and how did you prepare it?

What data storage (hard disk drives?) do you have installed in your Dell Studio 540?

 

[RobbieG1977]

What CPU and how much memory does your Dell Studio 540 have installed? Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 2.33GHz, 8GB DDR2

What version of FreeNAS are you trying to load on it? FreeNAS-11.1-U5

What is your boot device (type of device and size) and how did you prepare it? 500GB Seagate

What data storage (hard disk drives?) do you have installed in your Dell Studio 540? Currently I have a variety of 8 hard drives (1TB-3TB)

 

[Redcoat]

OK, thanks.

Why are you using a 500GB Seagate (HDD, I presume, yes? Connected to a mobo SATA port?) as the OS drive and not a USB stick as is the typical recommendation?

How did you load the FreeNAS OS onto the 500GB Seagate?

And is that 500GB Seagate set to be the boot drive in the BIOS?

 

[RobbieG1977]

I am using an 8GB USB drive to install FreeNas onto the 500GB Seagate Hard Drive.

 

[Redcoat]

And did the install complete?

If so, then you removed the USB drive and attempted to boot from the Seagate HDD but it hung?

If this is what happened then we'll want to go back through the steps of preparing the USB boot drive from the downloaded iso, then what happened when you booted your machine from that and made the OS load onto the HDD.

In your first post you asked why this install is so hard - well it shouldn't be, but there are many threads where people had trouble making a good install drive and/or had problems when following the install instructions from the manual. Then ensuring that the OS drive has been selected in the BIOS has also given some people issues. This is the reason for the questions - to check each step for issues. BTW, you never did say why you chose an HDD as OS drive instead of using a USB drive as is typical for most installs (at least initially) - not suggesting that this is a culprit in your issues - but is it a "known good" drive?

 

[RobbieG1977]

I used Rufus to create the bootable USB drive from the iso that I downloaded from this site. In my first post I posted 2 images. The first being the mouse issue, which I still have. Then at that time of troubleshooting I removed the mouse and that is when I got the run error.

 

[Elliot Dierksen]

What is the drive controller? I suspect the xpt_config is more related to that than the mouse. If it is an integrated RAID controller, that could be an issue. It might be possible to flash it a different firmware that will make it perform better, but that has to be done very carefully.

 

[Redcoat]

Did you follow the manual information at 2.4?:

2.4. Installation Troubleshooting
If the system does not boot into FreeNAS®, there are several things that can be checked to resolve the situation.

Check the system BIOS and see if there is an option to change the USB emulation from CD/DVD/floppy to hard drive. If it still will not boot, check to see if the card/drive is UDMA compliant.

If the system BIOS does not support EFI with BIOS emulation, see if it has an option to boot using legacy BIOS mode.

When the system starts to boot but hangs with this repeated error message:

run_interrupt_driven_hooks: still waiting after 60 seconds for xpt_config

Go into the system BIOS and look for an onboard device configuration for a 1394 Controller. If present, disable that device and try booting again.

If the system starts to boot but hangs at a mountroot> prompt, follow the instructions in Workaround/Semi-Fix for Mountroot Issues with 9.3.

If the burned image fails to boot and the image was burned using a Windows system, wipe the USB stick before trying a second burn using a utility such as Active@ KillDisk. Otherwise, the second burn attempt will fail as Windows does not understand the partition which was written from the image file. Be very careful to specify the correct USB stick when using a wipe utility!

 

[Redcoat]

Oh, and when using Rufus, did you follow the guide info at 2.2.2?:

"When using Rufus, check Create a bootable disk using and select DD Image from the drop-down menu"

 

[RobbieG1977]

What is the drive controller? I suspect the xpt_config is more related to that than the mouse. If it is an integrated RAID controller, that could be an issue. It might be possible to flash it a different firmware that will make it perform better, but that has to be done very carefully.

What do you mean by drive controller? I just have 9 sata drives plugged in. No Raid Controller installed in this config. I am very skeptical about flashing the bios and I am not sure exactly what software I need. Haven't done the research.

Did you follow the manual information at 2.4?:

2.4. Installation Troubleshooting
If the system does not boot into FreeNAS®, there are several things that can be checked to resolve the situation.

Check the system BIOS and see if there is an option to change the USB emulation from CD/DVD/floppy to hard drive. If it still will not boot, check to see if the card/drive is UDMA compliant.

If the system BIOS does not support EFI with BIOS emulation, see if it has an option to boot using legacy BIOS mode.

When the system starts to boot but hangs with this repeated error message:

run_interrupt_driven_hooks: still waiting after 60 seconds for xpt_config

Go into the system BIOS and look for an onboard device configuration for a 1394 Controller. If present, disable that device and try booting again.

If the system starts to boot but hangs at a mountroot> prompt, follow the instructions in Workaround/Semi-Fix for Mountroot Issues with 9.3.

If the burned image fails to boot and the image was burned using a Windows system, wipe the USB stick before trying a second burn using a utility such as Active@ KillDisk. Otherwise, the second burn attempt will fail as Windows does not understand the partition which was written from the image file. Be very careful to specify the correct USB stick when using a wipe utility!

This machine is over 15 years old but just to confirm nowhere in the bios is there an option for legacy.
The run_interrupt error was adjusted by me disabling the 1394 controller.
The system hanging I looked into. I can't get past the esc button to follow its next steps.

So that is where we stand right now. We are at the mountroot hang.

 

[Redcoat]

I can't get past the esc button to follow its next steps.

What precisely do you mean? What happens at Steps 2 and 3 in the procedure? I'm trying hard to help you here but getting information is like pulling teeth...

 

[RobbieG1977]

What precisely do you mean? What happens at Steps 2 and 3 in the procedure? I'm trying hard to help you here but getting information is like pulling teeth...

In your above post I clicked on the link to " Workaround/Semi-Fix for Mountroot Issues with 9.3." In that article in said you will see the a grub option for like 5 seconds. Hit ESC on the keyboard to bypass the grub options. So I can't get past step 1 because step 2 and 3 don't appear. I thank you greatly for your help. Sorry I don't seem informative with my answers to you.

 

[Redcoat]

OK, so you see "Welcome to GRUB! but never get to the GRUB screen (which in your case won't have the list of installs that the example shows but just the install version that you are attempting).

What I would do is ensure that USB is the first item in the boot order and, if possible, remove any other devices from the BIOS list of boot devices. Then make a new USB stick from the ISO precisely following the manual instructions and use it to boot up the machine and attempt an install of FreeNAS to another USB stick, keeping the HDD's "out of the picture for now".

Let us know what happens.

 

[RobbieG1977]

Awesome, thank you. I will try that and repost my findings.

 

[RobbieG1977]

Finally, I got it to work. I removed ALL hard drives. I reimaged the USB drive using the DD mode versus the ISO mode. Everything installed very smoothly. Now I am logged into the web interface. I plugged the disks back and I can see them all. Thank you Redcoat for your help!

 

[Redcoat]

Excellent! My next suggestion would have been to unplug all the HDD's but you got there anyway. I guess that we don't know exactly what did it for you but maybe it's raised your confidence in the manual's contents. With it and this forum's many members you've got good support resources if you tap in to them in the right way (take a look at Forum Rules in the masthead to see the expectations).
Good luck!

 

[RobbieG1977]

Excellent! My next suggestion would have been to unplug all the HDD's but you got there anyway. I guess that we don't know exactly what did it for you but maybe it's raised your confidence in the manual's contents. With it and this forum's many members you've got good support resources if you tap in to them in the right way (take a look at Forum Rules in the masthead to see the expectations).
Good luck!

Will certainly do that, again thank you!