This section explains how to prepare supported hardware boards to boot and run a QNX hypervisor system.
Preparing a target board for a QNX hypervisor system is no different from preparing one for a non-virtualized system. You need to set DIP switches to configure board behavior (such as where it looks for IPL and startup code), and connect Ethernet, USB, and serial cables so you can connect to your host system and your network (see the BSP User's Guide for your board, and the board manufacturers' documentation).
On the Intel Supermicro Denverton board, the system shell is active only on the serial port. It isn't active on the VGA console. Make sure that you connect your development host to your target board via the serial port. If you connect via the VGA console, you'll see a logo and it will seem like the board is stalled somewhere in its boot process.
On x86 boards such as the Supermicro Denverton, the default smmuman configuration instructs the service to use the board's ACPI tables to get the locations of the VT-d registers responsible for remapping PCI device DMA. Make sure that your startup doesn't include the -B option, which instructs the startup to not get the ACPI tables.
For more information, see pass in the “VM Configuration Reference” chapter, and “DMA device containment (smmuman)” in the “QNX Hypervisor: Protection Features” chapter.
To support booting the hypervisor, the Supermicro Denverton requires specific BIOS settings. To configure and verify these:
In the BIOS setup screen, verify that the BIOS settings are as shown below:
To run a virtualized system, ARM boards such as Renesas R-Car H3 boards require firmware that boots into Exception Level 2 (EL2). On some older boards the required firmware isn't installed when they are shipped. If you attempt to boot the hypervisor on these boards, the boot will fail with a message like the following:
# qvm @qnx71.qvmconf QVM disabled: hypervisor support not available
If your board doesn't boot into EL2, you probably have an old board revision that the QNX hypervisor doesn't support. Contact your board manufacturer to get a newer, supported board with a newer BSP.
With R-Car H3 boards, to support the QNX hypervisor, your board must be set to 64-bit mode and boot in Hyperflash mode. See the BSP User's Guide for your board to see the DIP switch settings to use for your board variant and revision.