Re: Unexplained Hang During Boot

Bill Pringlemeir wrote:

On 28 Jun 2006, eon_blue_80@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

I am experiencing a very bizarre problem with vxWorks and I am
hoping that someone might be able to offer some suggestions on where
to start looking to determine the root of the problem.


[snip]


The printf statement is only adding a handful of bytes to the
resultant image and larger images than the ones that fail have been
booted successfully.


This sounds like a cache problem. The "printf" is unrelated to the
code. It just changes the image size at the "right" place. You could

-- snip --

It is very good that you try to hunt this down. I've known several
"senior" people who have let this type of problem go on for ever.

It doesn't have to be a cache problem. I've seen this happen on a board with an MPC860 and the wrong program loaded to access the DRAM -- we had the timing wrong, so the memory usually worked but sometimes didn't, and it seemed to have 'magic' spots that killed it (hence changing the code would make the problem go away, at least on a particular engineering board).

My point: Check everything you've mentioned: hardware, software, phase of the moon, etc. Just because it's a purchased board don't trust the vendor, but do give him the benefit of the doubt long enough to make _sure_ that it's not you.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

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