xseries 226 + FreeBSD amd64/intel64 = b0rk!

Like I wrote earlier, I got a nice IBM eserver xseries 226.

After I figured out that the CPU was, in fact, 64-bit capable (amd64/intel64 – EM64T), I went and downloaded the x86_64 version of FreeBSD 6.2, burned it on CD, popped it into the drive, and….

nothing

Okay, nothing is an overstatement really, but as soon as it got to:

ips0: resetting adapter, this may take up to 5 minutes

The box completely froze, and nothing could persuade the thing to continue booting. (actually, even numlock didn’t work any more, which pretty much means that the box died trying.)

Now, no real harm done, the box isn’t production yet, and it has a good install in good old 32-bit mode, but I went ahead and e-mailed one of the developers for the ips driver (Scott Long), and told him about what I encountered. He confirmed that this was probably a 64-bit related bug, and would look into it. How is that for support?! (seriously, we are talking opensource, free of charge software here, and still I get a reply in a matter of a couple of hours! I don’t see certain commercial software houses doing that)

Anyhow, can’t wait to see what happens, because hey, what’s the use of having a perfectly good 64-bit cpu, if you are not going to use it to it’s full potential?