TiVo Community Forums Archives - Everything I put in the rc.sysinit disappears

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Everything I put in the rc.sysinit disappears
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Posted by: The Softwizard

I need help with the basics of getting a bash prompt and/or my TiVonet working. I have read just about as many threads as I can before giving up... so I thought I'd post to see if it truly is just me, or does my TiVo hate me ;)

I have a Phillips DSR6000 (2.5) with two 80 GB Maxtor harddrives. I have been running this configuration successfully since last November after I ran MFSTOOLS on my original drives, TIVOMADD'd the A drive using the latest boot disk (nuboot6).

To get the bash prompt, I editted both rc.sysinit files on partitions 4 and 7. Interestingly they were different from each other - from what I have read, one looks like it is used once and the other one looks like a "normal" rc.sysinit file. At the end of either file, I placed the line
/bin/bash < /dev/ttyS3 >& /dev/ttyS3 &.
I checked and made sure it was there (i.e. tail rc.sysinit)
Then I place the drive back in TiVo and boot it. I know my serial cable is good because 1) when I reimage my drive and then TiVoMADD it, the first time it reboots it gives me a bunch of diagnostics about "Trev's rc.sysinit for DirecTiVo BETA 4" and 2) if I run the Xtreme2.5 image, bash works just fine.
Nothing is ever seen from the TiVo on the serial port.
Here's the kicker, if I remount the A drive in my PC and boot to Dylan's - the rc.sysinit file is changed back to the original, uneditted, unbash'd state! WHY?

The same thing applies if I install TiVonet from Worly's floppy. I KNOW it makes the changes, but for some reason I think that the rc.sysinit is never getting executed - something is overwriting it. Again, I know the TiVonet card is good because if I boot to an Xtreme2.5 image, it works great, (but I don't want to do that).

Is there something about TiVoMADD that prevents changes from the rc.sysinit file? By running the Xtreme2.5 image, did I burn my prom so that this is happening? Or is this a function of a normal 2.5 system?

Thanx!

Posted by: Otto

This is normal to a 2.5 D-Tivo system. It undoes changes that you make to critical files. To fix it you need to:
a) patch the PROM.
b) disable initrd.

Go read the TurboNet install instructions for the D-Tivo, it tells you how to do both of these: http://www.silicondust.com/turbonet...l_software.html

Posted by: The Softwizard

Otto... thanx for the quick reply. Not sure why this was not blatently obvious in all of the "How-To's" out there...

My question for you about your suggestions is:

TurboNet install instructions say that I need to Boot to my Dylan disk, mount another disk (FAT32 partition that I have unzipped the TiVoFLASH to), install the flash utility, re-install the TiVo drive and let the TiVo boot once to reflash the system.

Then it looks like to disable initrd, the command is:
dd if=/dev/zero of=dev/hdc3 bs=1k seek=852 count=1196

THEN, I install the TiVonet drivers.

Right?

Will flashing my ROM cause problems for future TiVo upgrades (like 3.0)? I'd rather stay as "legitimate" as possible... But based on the number of people who have DTiVo who are running TiVonet/TurboNet boards, I can only assume that other people are not worried...

Thanx again!

Posted by: Otto

quote:
Originally posted by The Softwizard
TurboNet install instructions say that I need to Boot to my Dylan disk, mount another disk (FAT32 partition that I have unzipped the TiVoFLASH to), install the flash utility, re-install the TiVo drive and let the TiVo boot once to reflash the system.

Then it looks like to disable initrd, the command is:
dd if=/dev/zero of=dev/hdc3 bs=1k seek=852 count=1196

THEN, I install the TiVonet drivers.

Right?

Right. You have to do the TivoFLASH thing (which will flash the prom on the first boot) and then boot with it once to actually flash the prom. Only then can you remove it again and disable the initrd.

The PROM has a kernel signature check in it, and it won't boot a modified kernel. Flashing the PROM will disable that. Only then can you modify the kernel (initrd) via the dd command. Oh, and the "hdc3" might be "hdc6" instead. There's two kernels on there, which one is correct to do depends on which one is active. It can't really hurt to do both, I think. Just have a backup handy.

quote:
Will flashing my ROM cause problems for future TiVo upgrades (like 3.0)?

No. Not in the slightest. The upgrade installs wholly new software. It might undo your modifications, but that's the extent of it. For D-Tivo's, it will probably reflash your PROM to the non-hacked one again when it updates.

That really shouldn't be a problem though, 3.0 will have TiVoNet support built right in.

Posted by: The Softwizard

Otto, again great job of moderating this forum and for the quick turn around on answers like this. Of coruse, after your first reply I was able to find a bunch of similar posts, but none that were blatently obvious that a person with a DTiVo running 2.5 would be required to do this just to get a bash or TiVonet to work. It remains a mystery to me why it is not in any of the How-To's - it's almost like they have been written to assume pre-2.5

In any case, a couple of other questions...
*Do I really have to take the system back to 2.0 just to flash the prom, or can I load the flash onto my 2.5 image and let it run (twice) and then make the mods?
*Why aren't there more references to the flash files (i.e. downloads)? I have two different files I have downloaded, one looks like it is going the 25xtream route since it includes a 25xtream.bin in the zip file. The other one has getprom and prom.bin. Can you just provide a link to the best site to use (IYO)?
*If I DD both kernels, isn't that guaranteed to mess things up? How can I tell which one is active?
*One last thing, I understand that we are setting IP addresses statically on the TiVonet now, and in the future (with 3.0) DHCP will likely be required. Can I do DHCP now?

Posted by: stormsweeper

The tivoflash script outputs which partition is your active kernel partition. Or, at least it's supposed to. I've read (and edited) the script, but not actually run it (as I don't have a DTivo to play with).

Posted by: Otto

quote:
Originally posted by The Softwizard
1. Do I really have to take the system back to 2.0 just to flash the prom, or can I load the flash onto my 2.5 image and let it run (twice) and then make the mods?
2. Why aren't there more references to the flash files (i.e. downloads)? I have two different files I have downloaded, one looks like it is going the 25xtream route since it includes a 25xtream.bin in the zip file. The other one has getprom and prom.bin. Can you just provide a link to the best site to use (IYO)?
3.If I DD both kernels, isn't that guaranteed to mess things up? How can I tell which one is active?
4.One last thing, I understand that we are setting IP addresses statically on the TiVonet now, and in the future (with 3.0) DHCP will likely be required. Can I do DHCP now?

1. I don't know, I've never done it. As I understand it, the TivoFlash will do it just fine, regardless of what version you have. TivoFlash basically puts a 2.0 kernel on the non-active kernel partition. Then it puts software on the non-active root partition to do the flash. Then it switches the active boot over. When you boot this in your Tivo, the Tivo boots, flashes, changes itself back to the other boot partition, then reboots itself. Voila, that's all there is to it. It *has* to be done this way because the only way to modify the software with the existing prom is to use a kernel that passes the signature check but won't undo changes to the software. Once the PROM is flashed, going back to the 2.5 kernel is easy. And then you can patch the 2.5 kernel (with dd) to allow changes.

2. The 25xtrem.bin is fine to use, it's just a copy of the prom ripped out of the xtreme code. All it changes is a few bytes.

3. No, the non-active kernel is not the one being used anymore. So who cares what it has on it. A software upgrade will overwrite it eventually anyway. :p

4. If you can find a DHCP client for the Tivo, sure. I don't know of any offhand.

Posted by: stormsweeper

quote:
Originally posted by Otto
2. The 25xtrem.bin is fine to use, it's just a copy of the prom ripped out of the xtreme code. All it changes is a few bytes.

It's not even done by the guys at xtreme - they copied it from somewhere else and renamed it for whatever reason.

Posted by: Otto

Whatever. It's all the same was the point. ;)

Posted by: The Softwizard

To reply to my own questions...
*Yes, I need to go back to a 2.0 image if I want to flash the prom, otherwise I couldn't run the GETPROM program from a bash (it doesn't exist in 2.5)
*Yes, I can safely DD both partitions, but it is not necessary because when I flash, it will tell me which one to DD
*There is no DHCP (yet) for TiVo. But it would be a good port for someone to do! ;)

Posted by: Otto

quote:
Originally posted by The Softwizard
*Yes, I need to go back to a 2.0 image if I want to flash the prom, otherwise I couldn't run the GETPROM program from a bash (it doesn't exist in 2.5)

:confused:

No. You don't need to restore a 2.0 image. TivoFlash does all that for you. Just run the bloody thing. You don't need getprom at all (unless you want to make a backup of your PROM, and it's not needed... really).

http://www.9thtee.com/tivoflash.zip

Posted by: The Softwizard

Okay, here is where I am... hopefully, others will be able to follow this and learn from my mistakes:
*I did restore from a clean 2.0 image, and then tried to flash my PROM manually. I kept getting the message PROM UPDATE NOT REQUIRED. Maybe I was already running the hacked PROM, which when I did a getprom -checksum, DID show that I was running it. It must have been there from previous attempts or when I ran 25xtream.
*Now I wanted to go back to 2.5 - I restored MY 2.5 image, and this is where I got lost.

My 2.5 image was taken from MFSTOOLS when I took my 2 drives and created the image. I am trying to restore to 2 new drives, both of bigger sizes. So, if I was not trying to get the bash prompt/tivonet to work, I would normally just restore my 2.5 image and run TiVoMADD4 (MADDTB4/setup.cd) and be done with it (after two reboots)

However, when do I DD the HDC3/HDC6 partitiions? After the restore, but before I TIVOMADD the drives? When I do this, I get hung at a "Welcome, Powering up..." screen.

I checked and the rc.sysinit files are the two different ones I referenced in the first message. Partition 4 has one that looks like the completion of the TIVOMADD process. It ends with a REBOOT command, so I doubt it will ever get to the bash process execution.
The other partition (7) has a rc.sysinit that looks normal.

But now, I think I need to go back, restore my image, TiVoMADD, let it run, THEN Tivoflash. I wonder what version I will be running after this? My goal is to get to 2.5 with bash (and not with xtream...)

Thanx again!

Posted by: Otto

You're really making this much, much harder than it needs to be.

If you've ever installed and run 2.5xtreme, then your PROM is already flashed.

If you've not, then all you need to do is to run TivoFlash on any bootable drive.

That's it. Nothing more complex than that.

As far as dd, get a *working* 2.5 restore, then make sure it works and boots. THEN do the dd.