Talk:Emulating the XO/Quick Start

Qemu: You do not have enough space in '/dev/shm'

When I run:

$ qemu -m 256 -kernel-kqemu -soundhw es1370 -net user -net nic,model=rtl8139 \
       -hda olpc-redhat-stream-ship.2-devel_ext3.img
Could not configure '/dev/rtc' to have a 1024 Hz timer. This is not a fatal
error, but for better emulation accuracy either use a 2.6 host Linux kernel or
type 'echo 1024 > /proc/sys/dev/rtc/max-user-freq' as root.
You do not have enough space in '/dev/shm' for the 256 MB of QEMU virtual RAM.
To have more space available provided you have enough RAM and swap, do as root:
umount /dev/shm
mount -t tmpfs -o size=272m none /dev/shm

I did what qemu suggests about /dev/shm and it worked. Awesome! --Ashawley 16:00, 27 December 2007 (EST)

Net and Sound on Windows XP

I've got the emulator working with the 657 dev build, but the "-net user -net nic,model=rt18139" parameters won't work, nor does "-soundhw es1370" or "-soundhw all".

I'm running a Dell Inspiron 1520 laptop with WinXP, and the sound hardware is a SigmaTel HiDef audio device, but I can't figure out what to feed the -soundhw argument to let it use this device.

For Networking I'm using an ASIX AX88772 USB 2.0 to Fast Ethernet converter, though I could go to the Broadcom 440x 10/100 Integrated controller. For wireless I'm using the Dell Wireless 1390 WLAN mini-card.

Are there known parameters (args) I can feed the two options, or am I stuck without sound and networking until my G1G1 arrives?

Just to clarify, the emulator and OLPC (Sugar, etc.) boot and run OK, it's just that I'm without sound and networking.

Thanks, Shortly 13:48, 10 January 2008 (EST)

• Hi there, yes sound is currently not working with the XO emulation, I also run a SigmaTel HiDef card and the sound does not work. The networking however should work, although at first it didn't for me, try and see if you typed in the command wrong (maybe missed spaces or hyphens/underscores somewhere), as that was my problem in the beginning. Also make sure that when typing the this section: "-net user -net nic,model=rtl8139" that you are typing the letter L in rtl and not rt1.

Hope this helped, Mitra

---

You did it for me, Mitra. replacing the 1 with an l did the trick. ifconfig had shown the network up, but nothing there, and pinging didn't, of course work. Roaming thru /etc networking and sysconfig stuff didn't do help, nor anything else I could find. But that one character made all the difference.

Thanks very much. Shortly 19:28, 10 January 2008 (EST)

Feedback on changes of 10 January 2008

The purpose of this page is to provide simple, straight-forward, easily followed, step-by-step recipes for getting started. Thus:

• I has to be basically OS neutral. Everyone comes here for Quick Start. A Mac or linux user should not have to wade through Windows-specific content. So all the new Windows content should be moved to its own page.
• The "Minimum system requirements" is too much ink spent for too little benefit here. To a first approximation, everyone is running x86, x86_64, or PowerPC. It's not worth increasing the clutter they have to deal with, in order to make things slightly easier for a tiny number of users with other cpus. Perhaps move the section to Qemu? With some clarification added? I myself am unsure what it is saying. The XO, and thus the disk images, are x86. So why does it matter what other cpu's are emulated?
• Once those two are gone, it should be possible to recapture an "oh, this looks easy" simplicity.

It would be simpler for users if the instructions for obtaining builds, the qemu arguments, and the final steps, were all on the OS-specific pages. That's how it was done long ago. The reason for the current, more awkward structure, of getting builds here, doing OS-specific install on other pages, and then coming back to a command line and final steps, is that those three common ones keep changing. So in the past, half the OS-specific pages would have obsolete information on builds, qemu arguments, and tweaking sugar. And having to do updates is more than one place, meant updates were less often done.

Perhaps it might be architected differently, with those three on subpages, this quick start page simply linking to complete OS-pages, which themselves then link to the common subpages. With emulation becoming less important, and alternate approaches (eg, the olpc-xo-qemu wrapper for linux) perhaps becoming available, its not clear whether its worth the effort. If someone is willing to keep the Windows page continuously maintained, perhaps it could include that information, and be linked from a "bypass" on Quick Start ("If you are using Windows, ignore the rest of this page and go to x").

But the the highest payoff for Windows would be to create a single step install of qemu, kqemu, and a launcher script, like pendrivelinux.com has for ubuntu (see Improving emulation). MitchellNCharity 17:14, 11 January 2008 (EST)