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Date:      Mon, 20 Jan 1997 15:35:09 +0900
From:      Kazutaka YOKOTA <yokota@zodiac.mech.utsunomiya-u.ac.jp>
To:        Scott Gasch <scott@perl.guru.org>
Cc:        hackers@freebsd.org, yokota@zodiac.mech.utsunomiya-u.ac.jp
Subject:   Re: Q: problem with keyboard reset in kernel boot... 
Message-ID:  <199701200635.PAA28392@zodiac.mech.utsunomiya-u.ac.jp>
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 14 Jan 1997 17:29:53 EST." <199701142229.RAA01678@perl.guru.org> 
References:  <199701142229.RAA01678@perl.guru.org> 

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>I've had the following problem whenever I have tried to install
>FreeBSD on a particular (old, strange) machine...  The machine is an
>old Compaq luggable with a Hauppage 386-16 chip/motherboard.  The
>problem is that the keyboard is hardwired onto the motherboard and
>uses a strange voltage and number of pins...
>
>When the FBSD bootdisk boots, there is a problem resetting the
>keyboard which leaves the keyboard locked up (controller hung?).
>In the user config section of the install the keyboard works fine
>and it is not until the actual kernel boot that the thing locks up.
>The actual message is: "scprobe: keyboard won't accept RESET command"

Which version of FreeBSD are you trying to install? Judging from the
error message, I guess it must be one of 2.1.X's or 2.2-ALPHA.

>I've looked in /usr/src/.../i386/isa/syscons.c at the code around this
>message... according to the comment above this section of code the
>keyboard controller is supposed to get popped back into line in the
>case of a reset error by the insuing function calls.
>
>I have a few questions: 1) has anyone worked aroudn this before?  2)
>what is the purpose of the keyboard reset; could I comment out the
>whole darn thing and put a custom kernel on the bootfloppy?  3) does
>anyone have any other solutions (besides hard drive swaping)?

My first suggestion is to try either 2.2-BETA or 3.0-970118-SNAP. 
(SNAP is better as far as keyboard access code is concerned.)  They
use entirely new keyboard I/O routines, and the new routines are
expected to work better than the ones which they replace... well, 
in theory :-)

However, if your Compaq luggable has a really unusual keyboard and a
keyboard controller, even they may not work though ;-<

Commenting keyboard reset code out may or may not work; I really don't
know.  The purpose of keyboard reset is to detect the keyboard,
initialize it and place it in the known state, AFAIU.

Kazu




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