Re: Initrd not loading

[David Huffman <ppc-dev@storix.com>]

As far as I know, you can only use an initrd image with an uncompressed
kernel. This may not apply to 2.6 kernels. 

(From some notes I have)

To uncompress a compressed kernel:
objcopy -j .kernel:vmlinux -O binary vmlinuz vmlinux.gz

To tell if a kernel is compressed:
readelf -l <unknown kernel binary> | grep '.kernel:vmlinux'
if it contains a '.kernel:vmlinux' section, then that means it's a
zImage (ie compressed kernel)

On Wed, 2004-10-27 at 10:55 +0200, List User wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> Running Debian on an IBM pSeries, I'm able to boot the machine with the
> munged zImage.initrd combination, but every try to use yaboot for loading
> the initrd fails. It is just ignored by the kernel.
> 
> /etc/yaboot.conf ------------------------------------------------------------
> boot=/dev/sda1
> partition=2
> root=/dev/sda2
> timeout=30
> install=/usr/lib/yaboot/yaboot
> 
> image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.8.1-pseries
>         label=Linux
>         read-only
>         initrd=/boot/initrd-2.6.8.1-pseries
>         initrd-size=8192
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Is it possible to use the initrd option from PPC PReP partitions, or do I have
> to write a script to munge kernel and initrd together with some objdump magic?
> Can't scroll when the kernel panic appears, so I might have a look for some
> serial cables...
> 
> I'm using debian's yaboot (1.3.13-2).
> 
> Any hints would be appreciated,
> Cajus
>