[CentOS] CentOS 5.x on Geode LX

At Wed, 27 Oct 2010 13:31:38 -0500 (CDT) CentOS mailing list <centos at centos.org> wrote:

> 
> Greetings all-
> 
> I'm currently working with CentOS 5.x (various version 5.0 - 5.5)
> attempting to run it on a system based on the AMD Geode LX CPU. There
> are known issues with this CPU running Centos 5, specifically those
> listed here:
> 
> http://bugs.centos.org/view.php?id=2552
> 
> The kernel and system run fine on the Geode LX, but the installer
> detects the CPU as i586. Since there is no i586 kernel package
> available, the installer dies. I've attempted the workaround here:
> 
> http://lists.baseurl.org/pipermail/yum-devel/2009-August/005767.html
> 
> It basically tells anaconda the CPU arch is i686. I extracted the
> stage2.img, updated the specified files, then recreated the squashfs
> image. But, it still does not work. Apparently this works on Fedora...

Is the processor an i686 or is in in fact an i586?  That is, is the
installer really confused?

> 
> So, does anyone have any thoughts on getting CentOS 5.x to install on
>a Geode LX?

This was posted to the CentOS list back in March of 2009:

--------
As a follow-up, I found the documentation I wrote how to install CentOS
without any installer:


# First, setup your disks to your liking. You can use whatever you want here,
# RAID, LVM, etc... Remember your disk configuration because you'll need it
# to configure grub, menu.lst and fstab. Using RAID, LVM, or others will require
# more configuration than this guide covers. To keep it simple I'm using a
# single disk. An example:

$ fdisk /dev/sda
$ mount /dev/sda3 /target
$ mkdir /target/boot
$ mount /dev/sda1 /target/boot

# Depending on the host OS you're using, you may need to initialize the
rpm db
# on the host OS
$ rpm --initdb

# Use the following command to install the packages. I'll be addressing
this
# command as $rpm.

$ rpm --root /target -i 

# Use your shell's tab completion to complete the package filenames. I
# deliberatly left out the versions so these instructions apply to a
wide range
# of versions

# Let's install some basics
$rpm setup basesystem filesystem

# Install bash first, this is needed for post-install scripts
$rpm bash glibc glibc-common termcap libgcc tzdata mktemp libtermcap

# Install some dependencies (this is mainly to keep the next command
smaller)
$rpm grep pcre libstdc++ info ncurses zlib gawk sed ethtool

# Install the bulk of the system
$rpm coreutils libselinux libacl libattr pam audit-libs cracklib-dicts \
cracklib libsepol mcstrans libcap chkconfig python db4 openssl readline \
bzip2-libs gdbm findutils krb5-libs initscripts util-linux popt udev MAKEDEV \
centos-release shadow-utils keyutils-libs iproute sysfsutils SysVinit \
net-tools module-init-tools e2fsprogs e2fsprogs-libs glib2 mingetty \
device-mapper sysklogd psmisc centos-release-notes procps libsysfs iputils 

# Install package manager
$rpm rpm beecrypt elfutils-libelf rpm-libs sqlite

# Install YUM
$rpm yum python-elementtree rpm-python yum-metadata-parser python-sqlite \
expat libxml2 python-urlgrabber m2crypto python-iniparse


# You may also want to install your favorite editor
$rpm nano

# This provides /root with some defaults, like color highlighting on `ls`
$rpm rootfiles

# Right now you have system which you can chroot to, so we can start setting up
# the basics

# Mount directories for chroot operation
$ mount --bind /dev /target/dev
$ mount -t proc none /target/proc
$ mount -t sysfs none /target/sysfs
$ chroot /target

# This constructs /etc/shadow
$ pwconv

# Configure fstab
$ nano -w /etc/fstab

# Installing the kernel. Do this back outside the chroot in the host OS system
$ exit
$rpm kernel mkinitrd cpio device-mapper-multipath dmraid gzip kpartx lvm2 nash \
tar less device-mapper-event

# Install the bootloader, grub.
$rpm grub diffutils redhat-logos

# Let's chroot again to configure our bootloader
$ chroot /target

# We start by configuring the bootloader. Open /boot/grub/menu.lst, and
put the
# following there

<<<MENU.LST
timeout 5
default 0

# (0) CentOS
title CentOS
root (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.18-92.el5 root=/dev/sda3 ro
initrd /initrd-2.6.18-92.el5.img
>>>

# If this command gives an error, you can safely ignore this because
it's not
# of importance. What is important is that grub-install copied the right
files
# to /boot/grub that we need for booting.
$ /sbin/grub-install /dev/sda

# Manually install grub if the previous step failed. - means type it in
the grub
# shell
$ grub
$- root (hd0,0)
$- setup (hd0)

# Optional packages
# You may want to install passwd so you can set passwords ;-)
$rpm passwd libuser openldap cyrus-sasl-lib

# These are used to set the keyboard language (loadkeys)
$rpm kbd usermode


# ** Right now you should have a bootable system! Here are some tips to
help you
# through your 1st boot ***

# Most of the system configuration happens in /etc/sysconfig. See

/usr/share/doc/initscripts

for full documentation.

Some quick post-install tips:
* Configure your keyboard in 
/etc/sysconfig/keyboard
using the KEYTABLE variable

* Configure networking
Take a look at /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts. See ifcfg-lo for an
example.

# This recreates the RPM database. If the host OS you used has a different
# version of db, rpm will complain with
# rpmdb: unable to lock mutex: Invalid argument
$ rpmdb --rebuilddb
------------

This is basically a quick-and-dirty way to cross-install CentOS without
using the installer at all.

You might be able to actually do this if you can manage to get a LiveCD
to boot up and run, so long as you have a second DVD-ROM drive or can
get the networking up and running.

> 
> Tim Nelson
> Systems/Network Support
> Rockbochs Inc.
> (218)727-4332 x105
> _______________________________________________
> CentOS mailing list
> CentOS at centos.org
> http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos
> 
>                                                                        

-- 
Robert Heller             -- 978-544-6933 / heller at deepsoft.com
Deepwoods Software        -- http://www.deepsoft.com/
()  ascii ribbon campaign -- against html e-mail
/\  www.asciiribbon.org   -- against proprietary attachments