bochsrc(5) The Bochs Project bochsrc(5) NAME bochsrc - Configuration file for Bochs. DESCRIPTION Bochsrc is the configuration file that specifies where Bochs should look for disk images, how the Bochs emulation layer should work, etc. The syntax used for bochsrc can also be used as command line ar- guments for Bochs. The .bochsrc file should be placed either in the cur- rent directory before running Bochs or in your home directory. Starting with Bochs 1.3, you can use environment variables in the bochsrc file, for example: floppya: 1_44="$IMAGES/bootdisk.img", status=inserted Starting with version 2.0, two environment variables have a built-in de- fault value which is set at compile time. $BXSHARE points to the "share" directory which is typically /usr/local/share/bochs on UNIX machines. See the $(sharedir) variable in the Makefile for the exact value. $BXSHARE is used by disk images to locate the directory where the BIOS images and keymaps can be found. If $BXSHARE is not defined, Bochs will supply the default value. Also, $LTDL_LIBRARY_PATH points to a list of directories (separated by colons if more than one) to search in for Bochs plugins. A compile-time default is provided if this variable is not defined by the user. OPTIONS #include This option includes another configuration file. It is possible to put installation defaults in a global config file (e.g. location of rom images). Example: #include /etc/bochsrc plugin_ctrl: Controls the presence of optional device plugins. These plugins are loaded directly with this option and some of them install a config option that is only available when the plugin device is loaded. The value "1" means to load the plugin and "0" will unload it (if loaded before). These plugins will be loaded by default (if present): 'biosdev', 'extfpuirq', 'gameport', 'iodebug','parallel', 'serial', 'speaker' and 'unmapped'. These plugins are also supported, but they are usually loaded di- rectly with their bochsrc option: 'e1000', 'es1370', 'ne2k', 'pcidev', 'pcipnic', 'sb16', 'usb_ehci', 'usb_ohci', 'usb_uhci', 'usb_xhci' and 'voodoo'. Example: plugin_ctrl: unmapped=0, e1000=1 # unload 'unmapped' and load 'e1000' config_interface: The configuration interface is a series of menus or dialog boxes that allows you to change all the settings that control Bochs's be- havior. Depending on the platform there are up to 3 choices of con- figuration interface: a text mode version called "textconfig" and two graphical versions called "win32config" and "wx". The text mode version uses stdin/stdout or gui console (if available / runtime config) and is always compiled in, unless Bochs is compiled for wx only. The choice "win32config" is only available on win32/win64 and it is the default on these platforms. The choice "wx" is only avail- able when Bochs is compiled with wxWidgets support. If you do not write a config_interface line, Bochs will choose a default for you. NOTE: if you use the "wx" configuration interface, you must also use the "wx" display library. Example: config_interface: textconfig display_library: The display library is the code that displays the Bochs VGA screen. Bochs has a selection of about 10 different display library imple- mentations for different platforms. If you run configure with mul- tiple --with-* options, the display_library command lets you choose which one you want to run with. If you do not write a display_li- brary line, Bochs will choose a default for you. The choices are: x X windows interface, cross platform win32 native win32 libraries carbon Carbon library (for MacOS X) macintosh MacOS pre-10 amigaos native AmigaOS libraries sdl SDL 1.2.x library, cross platform sdl2 SDL 2.x library, cross platform term text only, uses curses/ncurses library, cross platform rfb provides an interface to AT&T's VNC viewer, cross platform vncsrv use LibVNCServer for extended RFB(VNC) support wx wxWidgets library, cross platform nogui no display at all NOTE: If you use the "wx" configuration interface, you must also use the "wx" display library. Specific options: Some display libraries now support specific op- tions to control their behaviour. These options are supported by more than one display library: "cmdmode" - call a headerbar button handler after pressing F7 (x, sdl, sdl2) "fullscreen" - startup in fullscreen mode (sdl, sdl2) "gui_debug" - use GTK debugger gui (sdl, sdl2, x) "hideIPS" - disable IPS output in status bar (rfb, sdl, sdl2, term, vncsrv, wx, x) "nokeyrepeat" - turn off host keyboard repeat (sdl, sdl2, x) "no_gui_console" - use system console instead of builtin gui con- sole (rfb, sdl, sdl2, vncsrv, x) "timeout" - time (in seconds) to wait for client (rfb, vncsrv) NOTE: Setting up options without specifying display library is also supported. Examples: display_library: x display_library: sdl2, options=fullscreen,hideIPS display_library: options=cmdmode cpu: This defines cpu-related parameters inside Bochs: model: Selects CPU configuration to emulate from pre-defined list of all supported configurations. See the bochsrc sample for supported val- ues. add_features: Enable one of more CPU feature in the CPU configuration selected by MODEL. Could be useful for testing CPU with newer imaginary config- urations by adding a specific feature or set of features to existing MODEL. The list of features to add supplied through space or comma separated string. exclude_features: Disable one of more CPU feature from CPU configuration selected by MODEL. Could be useful for testing CPU without a specific feature or set of features. When experiening issues booting a modern OS it could be useful to disable CPU features(s) to see if they responsi- ble for the failures. The list of features to exclude supplied through space or comma separated string. count: Set the number of processors:cores per processor:threads per core when Bochs is compiled for SMP emulation. Bochs currently supports up to 14 threads (legacy APIC) or 254 threads (xAPIC or higher) run- ning simultaniosly. If Bochs is compiled without SMP support, it won't accept values different from 1. quantum: Maximum amount of instructions allowed to execute by processor be- fore returning control to another cpu. This option exists only in Bochs binary compiled with SMP support. reset_on_triple_fault: Reset the CPU when triple fault occur (highly recommended) rather than PANIC. Remember that if you trying to continue after triple fault the simulation will be completely bogus ! cpuid_limit_winnt: Determine whether to limit maximum CPUID function to 2. This mode is required to workaround WinNT installation and boot issues. mwait_is_nop: When this option is enabled MWAIT will not put the CPU into a sleep state. This option exists only if Bochs compiled with --enable-mon- itor-mwait. brand_string: Set the CPUID brand string returned by CPUID(0x80000002 .. 0x80000004). This should be at most a forty-eight-character ASCII string. Keep it empty to use original CPUID brand string. msrs: Define path to user CPU Model Specific Registers (MSRs) specifica- tion. See example in msrs.def. ignore_bad_msrs: Ignore MSR references that Bochs does not understand; print a warn- ing message instead of generating #GP exception. This option is en- abled by default but will not be available if configurable MSRs are enabled. ips: Emulated Instructions Per Second. This is the number of IPS that Bochs is capable of running on your machine. You can recompile Bochs with --enable-show-ips option enabled, to find your worksta- tion's capability. Measured IPS value will then be logged into your log file or status bar (if supported by the gui). IPS is used to calibrate many time-dependent events within the bochs simulation. For example, changing IPS affects the frequency of VGA updates, the duration of time before a key starts to autore- peat, and the measurement of BogoMips and other benchmarks. Example Specifications[1] Bochs Machine/Compiler Mips -------------------------------------------------------------- 2.4.6 3.4Ghz Core i7 2600 w/ Win7x64/g++ 4.5.2 85-95 Mips 2.3.7 3.2Ghz Core 2 Q9770 w/ WinXP/g++ 3.4 50-55 Mips 2.3.7 2.6Ghz Core 2 Duo w/ WinXP/g++ 3.4 38-43 Mips 2.2.6 2.6Ghz Core 2 Duo w/ WinXP/g++ 3.4 21-25 Mips 2.2.6 2.1Ghz Athlon XP w/ Linux 2.6/g++ 3.4 12-15 Mips [1] IPS measurements depend on OS and compiler configuration in addition to processor clock speed. Example: cpu: count=2, ips=10000000, msrs="msrs.def" memory: Set the amount of physical memory you want to emulate. guest: Set amount of guest physical memory to emulate. The default is 32MB, the maximum amount limited only by physical address space limita- tions. host: Set amount of host memory you want to allocate for guest RAM emula- tion. It is possible to allocate less memory than you want to emu- late in guest system. This will fake guest to see the non-existing memory. Once guest system touches new memory block it will be dynam- ically taken from the memory pool. You will be warned (by FATAL PANIC) in case guest already used all allocated host memory and wants more. Example: memory: guest=512, host=256 megs: The 'megs:' option sets the 'guest' and 'host' memory parameters to the same value. In all other cases the 'memory' option should be used instead. Example: megs: 32 romimage: The ROM BIOS controls what the PC does when it first powers on. Normally, you can use a precompiled BIOS in the source or binary distribution called BIOS-bochs-latest. The default ROM BIOS is usu- ally loaded starting at address 0xfffe0000, and it is exactly 128k long. The legacy version of the Bochs BIOS is usually loaded start- ing at address 0xffff0000, and it is exactly 64k long. The usage of external large BIOS images (up to 512k) at memory top is now sup- ported, but we still recommend to use the BIOS distributed with Bochs. file: Name of the BIOS image file. You can use the environment variable $BXSHARE to specify the location of the BIOS. address: The start address is optional, since it can be calculated from image size. options: The Bochs BIOS currently only supports the option "fastboot" to skip the boot menu delay. flash_data: This parameter defines the file name for the flash BIOS config space loaded at startup if existing and saved on exit if modified. The Bochs BIOS doesn't use this feature yet. NOTE: If you use the BIOS-bochs-legacy romimage BIOS option, you cannot use a PCI enabled VGA ROM BIOS. NOTE: If you use a SeaBIOS binary in romimage BIOS option, you must use a PCI enabled VGA ROM BIOS. Examples: romimage: file=bios/BIOS-bochs-latest, options=fastboot romimage: file=$BXSHARE/BIOS-bochs-legacy romimage: file=$BXSHARE/i440fx.bin, flash_data=escd.bin romimage: file=asus_p6np5.bin, flash_data=escd.bin romimage: file=mybios.bin, address=0xfff80000 vgaromimage: You also need to load a VGA ROM BIOS into 0xC0000. Examples: vgaromimage: file=bios/VGABIOS-elpin-2.40 vgaromimage: file=$BXSHARE/VGABIOS-lgpl-latest.bin vgaromimage: file=$BXSHARE/VGABIOS-lgpl-latest-cirrus.bin optromimage1: , optromimage2: , optromimage3: or optromimage4: You may now load up to 4 optional ROM images. Be sure to use a read- only area, typically between C8000 and EFFFF. These optional ROM im- ages should not overwrite the rombios (located at F0000-FFFFF) and the videobios (located at C0000-C7FFF). Those ROM images will be initialized by the bios if they contain the right signature (0x55AA). It can also be a convenient way to upload some arbitrary code/data in the simulation, that can be retrieved by the boot loader Example: optromimage1: file=optionalrom.bin, address=0xd0000 vga: This defines parameters related to the VGA display. extension: Here you can specify the display extension to be used. With the value 'none' you can use standard VGA with no extension. Other sup- ported values are 'vbe' for Bochs VBE, 'cirrus' for Cirrus SVGA sup- port and 'voodoo' for Voodoo Graphics support (see 'voodoo' option). update_freq: This parameter specifies the number of display updates per second. The VGA update timer by default uses the realtime engine with a value of 10 (valid: 1 to 75). This parameter can be changed at run- time. The special value 0 enables support for using the frame rate of the emulated graphics device. realtime: If set to 1 (default), the VGA timer is based on realtime, otherwise it is driven by the cpu and depends on the ips setting. If the host is slow (low ips, update_freq) and the guest uses HLT appropriately, setting this to 0 and "clock: sync=none" may improve the responsive- ness of the guest GUI when the guest is otherwise idle. ddc: This parameter defines the behaviour of the DDC emulation that re- turns the monitor EDID data. By default the 'builtin' values for 'Bochs Screen' are used. Other choices are 'disabled' (no DDC emula- tion) and 'file' (read monitor EDID from file / path name separated with a colon). vbe_memsize: With this parameter the size of the memory for the Bochs VBE exten- sion can be defined. Valid values are 4, 8, 16 and 32 MB (default is 16 MB). Examples: vga: extension=none, update_freq=10, realtime=0, ddc=disabled vga: extension=cirrus, update_freq=30, ddc=file:monitor.bin vga: extension=vbe voodoo: This defines the Voodoo Graphics emulation (experimental). Currently supported models are 'voodoo1', 'voodoo2', 'banshee' and 'voodoo3'. The Voodoo2 support is not yet complete, but almost usable. The Ban- shee / Voodoo3 support is under construction, but basically usable. The 2D/3D cards require an external VGA BIOS the vga extension op- tion to be set to 'voodoo'. If the i440BX PCI chipset is selected, they can be assigned to AGP (slot #5). The gui screen update timing for all models is controlled by the related 'vga' options. Example: voodoo: enabled=1, model=voodoo1 keyboard: This defines parameters related to the emulated keyboard: type: Type of keyboard return by a "identify keyboard" command to the key- board controller. It must be one of "xt", "at" or "mf". Defaults to "mf". It should be ok for almost everybody. A known exception is french macs, that do have a "at"-like keyboard. serial_delay: Approximate time in microseconds that it takes one character to be transferred from the keyboard to controller over the serial path. paste_delay: Approximate time in microseconds between attempts to paste charac- ters to the keyboard controller. This leaves time for the guest os to deal with the flow of characters. The ideal setting depends on how your operating system processes characters. The default of 100000 usec (.1 seconds) was chosen because it works consistently in Windows. If your OS is losing characters during a paste, increase the paste delay until it stops losing characters. keymap: This enables a remap of a physical localized keyboard to a virtual- ized us keyboard, as the PC architecture expects. Using a language specifier instead of a file name is also supported. A keymap is also required by the paste feature. user_shortcut: This defines the keyboard shortcut to be sent when you press the "user" button in the header bar. The shortcut string is a combina- tion of maximum 3 key names (listed below) separated with a '-' character. Valid key names: "alt", "bksl", "bksp", "ctrl", "del", "down", "end", "enter", "esc", "f1", ... "f12", "home", "ins", "left", "menu", "minus", "pgdwn", "pgup", "plus", "power", "print", "right", "scrlck", "shift", "space", "tab", "up" and "win". Examples: keyboard: type=mf, serial_delay=150, paste_delay=100000 keyboard: keymap=gui/keymaps/x11-pc-de.map keyboard: user_shortcut=ctrl-alt-del mouse: This defines parameters for the emulated mouse type, the initial status of the mouse capture and the runtime method to toggle it. type With the mouse type option you can select the type of mouse to emu- late. The default value is 'ps2'. The other choices are 'imps2' (wheel mouse on PS/2), 'serial', 'serial_wheel', 'serial_msys' (one com port requires setting 'mode=mouse') 'inport' and 'bus' (if present). To connect a mouse to a USB port, see the 'usb_uhci', 'usb_ohci', 'usb_ehci' or 'usb_xhci' option (requires PCI and USB support). enabled The Bochs gui creates mouse "events" unless the 'enabled' option is set to 0. The hardware emulation itself is not disabled by this. Unless you have a particular reason for enabling the mouse by de- fault, it is recommended that you leave it off. You can also toggle the mouse usage at runtime (RFB, SDL, Win32, wxWidgets and X11 - see below). toggle The default method to toggle the mouse capture at runtime is to press the CTRL key and the middle mouse button ('ctrl+mbutton'). This option allows to change the method to 'ctrl+f10' (like DOSBox), 'ctrl+alt' (legacy QEMU), Examples: mouse: enabled=1 mouse: type=imps2, enabled=1 mouse: type=serial, enabled=1 mouse: enabled=0, toggle=ctrl+f10 pci: This defines the parameters to set up the Bochs PCI emulation: enabled If Bochs is compiled with PCI support, it is enabled by default. chipset Currently the chipsets i430FX, i440FX and i440BX (limited) are sup- ported and the default is i440FX. slotX It is possible to specify the devices connected to PCI slots. Up to 5 slots are available. For combined PCI/ISA devices assigning to slot is mandatory if the PCI model should be emulated (cirrus, ne2k and pcivga). Setting up slot for PCI-only devices is also supported, but they are auto-assigned if not specified (e1000, es1370, pcidev, pcipnic, usb_ehci, usb_ohci, usb_xhci, voodoo). All device models except the network devices ne2k and e1000 can be used only once in the slot configuration. In case of the i440BX chipset, the slot #5 is the AGP slot. Currently only the 'voodoo' device can be assigned to AGP. advopts With the advanced PCI options it is possible to control the behav- iour of the PCI chipset. These options can be specified as comma- separated values. By default the "Bochs i440FX" chipset enables the ACPI and HPET devices, but original i440FX doesn't support them. The options 'noacpi' and 'nohpet' make it possible to disable them. The option 'noagp' disables the incomplete AGP subsystem of the i440BX chipset. Example: pci: enabled=1, chipset=i440fx, slot1=pcivga, slot2=ne2k, ad- vopts=noacpi clock: This defines the parameters of the clock inside Bochs. sync This defines the method how to synchronize the Bochs internal time with realtime. With the value 'none' the Bochs time relies on the IPS value and no host time synchronization is used. The 'slowdown' method sacrifices performance to preserve reproducibility while al- lowing host time correlation. The 'realtime' method sacrifices re- producibility to preserve performance and host-time correlation. It is possible to enable both synchronization methods. rtc_sync If this option is enabled together with the realtime synchroniza- tion, the RTC runs at realtime speed. This feature is disabled by default. time0 Specifies the start (boot) time of the virtual machine. Use a time value as returned by the time(2) system call or a string as returned by the ctime(3) system call. If no time0 value is set or if time0 equal to 1 (special case) or if time0 equal 'local', the simulation will be started at the current local host time. If time0 equal to 2 (special case) or if time0 equal 'utc', the simulation will be started at the current utc time. Syntax: clock: sync=[none|slowdown|realtime|both], time0=[timeValue|lo- cal|utc] Default value are sync=none, rtc_sync=0, time0=local Example: clock: sync=realtime, time0=938581955 # Wed Sep 29 07:12:35 1999 clock: sync=realtime, time0="Sat Jan 1 00:00:00 2000" # 946681200 cmosimage: This defines a binary image file with size 128 bytes that can be loaded into the CMOS RAM at startup. The rtc_init parameter controls whether initialize the RTC with values stored in the image. By de- fault the time0 argument given to the clock option is used. With 'rtc_init=image' the image is the source for the initial time. Example: cmosimage: file=cmos.img, rtc_init=time0 private_colormap: Requests that the GUI create and use it's own non-shared colormap. This colormap will be used when in the bochs window. If not en- abled, a shared colormap scheme may be used. Once again, en- abled=1 turns on this feature and 0 turns it off. Example: private_colormap: enabled=1 floppya: or floppyb: Point this to the pathname of a floppy image file or device. Floppya is the first drive, and floppyb is the second drive. If you're booting from a floppy, floppya should point to a bootable disk. You can set the initial status of the media to 'ejected' or 'in- serted'. Usually you will want to use 'inserted'. The parameter 'type' can be used to enable the floppy drive without media and status specified. Usually the drive type is set up based on the media type. The optional parameter 'write_protected' can be used to control the media write protect switch. By default it is turned off. Example: 2.88M 3.5" media: floppya: 2_88=path, status=ejected 1.44M 3.5" media (write protected): floppya: 1_44=path, status=inserted, write_protected=1 1.2M 5.25" media: floppyb: 1_2=path, status=ejected 720K 3.5" media: floppya: 720k=path, status=inserted 360K 5.25" media: floppya: 360k=path, status=inserted Autodetect floppy media type: floppya: image=path, status=inserted Use directory as 1.44M VFAT media: floppya: 1_44=vvfat:path, status=inserted 1.44M 3.5" floppy drive, no media: floppya: type=1_44 ata0: , ata1: , ata2: or ata3: These options enables up to 4 ata channels. For each channel the two base io addresses and the irq must be specified. ata0 and ata1 are enabled by default, with the values shown below. Examples: ata0: enabled=1, ioaddr1=0x1f0, ioaddr2=0x3f0, irq=14 ata1: enabled=1, ioaddr1=0x170, ioaddr2=0x370, irq=15 ata2: enabled=1, ioaddr1=0x1e8, ioaddr2=0x3e0, irq=11 ata3: enabled=1, ioaddr1=0x168, ioaddr2=0x360, irq=9 ata[0-3]-master: or ata[0-3]-slave: This defines the type and characteristics of all attached ata de- vices: type= type of attached device [disk|cdrom] path= path of the image mode= image mode [flat|concat|sparse|vmware3|vmware4|un- doable|growing|volatile|vpc|vbox|vvfat], only valid for disks cylinders= only valid for disks heads= only valid for disks spt= only valid for disks status= only valid for cdroms [inserted|ejected] biosdetect= type of biosdetection [auto|cmos|none] translation=type of translation of the bios, only for disks [none|lba|large|rechs|auto] model= string returned by identify device command journal= optional filename of the redolog for undoable, volatile and vvfat disks Point this at a hard disk image file, cdrom iso file, or a physical cdrom device. To create a hard disk image, try running bximage. It will help you choose the size and then suggest a line that works with it. In UNIX it is possible to use a raw device as a Bochs hard disk, but WE DON'T RECOMMEND IT. The path is mandatory for hard disks. Disk geometry autodetection works with images created by bximage if CHS is set to 0/0/0 (cylin- ders are calculated using heads=16 and spt=63). For other hard disk images and modes the cylinders, heads, and spt are mandatory. In all cases the disk size reported from the image must be exactly C*H*S*512. The mode option defines how the disk image is handled. Disks can be defined as: - flat : one file flat layout - concat : multiple files layout - sparse : stackable, commitable, rollbackable - vmware3 : vmware3 disk support - vmware4 : vmware4 disk support (aka VMDK) - undoable : flat file with commitable redolog - growing : growing file - volatile : flat file with volatile redolog - vpc : fixed / dynamic size VirtualPC image - vbox : fixed / dynamic size Oracle(tm) VM VirtualBox image (VDI version 1.1) - vvfat: local directory appears as read-only VFAT disk (with volatile redolog) The disk translation scheme (implemented in legacy int13 bios func- tions, and used by older operating systems like MS-DOS), can be de- fined as: - none : no translation, for disks up to 528MB (1032192 sectors) - large : a standard bitshift algorithm, for disks up to 4.2GB (8257536 sectors) - rechs : a revised bitshift algorithm, using a 15 heads fake physical geometry, for disks up to 7.9GB (15482880 sectors). (don't use this unless you understand what you're doing) - lba : a standard lba-assisted algorithm, for disks up to 8.4GB (16450560 sectors) - auto : autoselection of best translation scheme. (it should be changed if system does not boot) Default values are: mode=flat, biosdetect=auto, translation=auto, model="Generic 1234" The biosdetect option has currently no effect on the bios Examples: ata0-master: type=disk, path=10M.sample, cylinders=306, heads=4, spt=17 ata0-slave: type=disk, path=20M.sample, cylinders=615, heads=4, spt=17 ata1-master: type=disk, path=30M.sample, cylinders=615, heads=6, spt=17 ata1-slave: type=disk, path=46M.sample, cylinders=940, heads=6, spt=17 ata2-master: type=disk, path=62M.sample, cylinders=940, heads=8, spt=17 ata2-slave: type=disk, path=112M.sample, cylinders=900, heads=15, spt=17 ata3-master: type=disk, path=483M.sample, cylinders=1024, heads=15, spt=63 ata3-slave: type=cdrom, path=iso.sample, status=inserted boot: This defines the boot sequence. Now you can specify up to 3 boot drives, which can be 'floppy', 'disk', 'cdrom' or 'network' (boot ROM). Legacy 'a' and 'c' are also supported. The new boot choice 'usb' is only supported by the i440fx.bin BIOS. Examples: boot: network, usb, disk boot: cdrom, floppy, disk floppy_bootsig_check: This disables the 0xaa55 signature check on boot floppies The check is enabled by default. Example: floppy_bootsig_check: disabled=1 log: Give the path of the log file you'd like Bochs debug and misc. ver- biage to be written to. If you really don't want it, make it /dev/null. Example: log: bochs.out log: /dev/tty (unix only) log: /dev/null (unix only) logprefix: This handles the format of the string prepended to each log line : You may use those special tokens : %t : 11 decimal digits timer tick %i : 8 hexadecimal digits of cpu0 current eip %e : 1 character event type ('i'nfo, 'd'ebug, 'p'anic, 'e'rror) %d : 5 characters string of the device, between brackets Default : %t%e%d Examples: logprefix: %t-%e-@%i-%d logprefix: %i%e%d panic: If Bochs reaches a condition where it cannot emulate correctly, it does a panic. This can be a configuration problem (like a mis- spelled bochsrc line) or an emulation problem (like an unsupported video mode). The "panic" setting in bochsrc tells Bochs how to respond to a panic. You can set this to fatal (terminate the session), ask (ask user how to proceed) or report (print infor- mation to the log file). The safest setting is action=fatal or action=ask. If you are get- ting panics, you can try action=report instead. If you allow Bochs to continue after a panic, don't be surprised if you get strange behavior or crashes if a panic occurs. Please report panic messages unless it is just a configuration problem like "could not find hard drive image." Examples: panic: action=fatal panic: action=ask error: Bochs produces an error message when it finds a condition that really shouldn't happen, but doesn't endanger the simula- tion. An example of an error might be if the emulated software produces an illegal disk command. The "error" setting tells Bochs how to respond to an error con- dition. You can set this to fatal (terminate the session), ask (ask user how to proceed), warn (show dialog with message and continue), report (print information to the log file), or ignore (do nothing). Example: error: action=report error: action=warn info: This setting tells Bochs what to do when an event occurs that generates informational messages. You can set this to report (print information to the log file), or ignore (do nothing). For general usage, the "report" option is probably a good choice. Example: info: action=report debug: This setting tells Bochs what to do with messages intended to assist in debugging. You can set this to report (print informa- tion to the log file), or ignore (do nothing). You should gener- ally set this to ignore, unless you are trying to diagnose a par- ticular problem. NOTE: When action=report, Bochs may spit out thousands of de- bug messages per second, which can impact performance and fill up your disk. Example: debug: action=ignore debugger_log: Give the path of the log file you'd like Bochs to log debugger out- put. If you really don't want it, make it '/dev/null', or '-'. Example: log: debugger.out log: /dev/null (unix only) log: - com1: , com2: , com3: or com4: This defines a serial port (UART type 16550A). In the 'term' mode you can specify a device to use as com1. This can be a real serial line, or a pty. To use a pty (under X/Unix), create two windows (xterms, usually). One of them will run bochs, and the other will act as com1. Find out the tty the com1 window using the `tty' com- mand, and use that as the `dev' parameter. Then do `sleep 1000000' in the com1 window to keep the shell from messing with things, and run bochs in the other window. Serial I/O to com1 (port 0x3f8) will all go to the other window. In socket* and pipe* (win32 only) modes Bochs becomes either socket/named pipe client or server. In client mode it connects to an already running server (if connection fails Bochs treats com port as not connected). In server mode it opens socket/named pipe and waits until a client application connects to it before starting simula- tion. This mode is useful for remote debugging (e.g. with gdb's "target remote host:port" command or windbg's command line option -k com:pipe,port=\.ipeipename). Socket modes use simple TCP communication, pipe modes use duplex byte mode pipes. Other serial modes are 'null' (no input/output), 'file' (output to a file specified as the 'dev' parameter and changeable at runtime), 'raw' (use the real serial port - partly implemented on win32) and 'mouse' (standard serial mouse - requires mouse option setting 'type=serial', 'type=serial_wheel' or 'type=serial_msys') Examples: com1: enabled=1, mode=term, dev=/dev/ttyp7 com2: enabled=1, mode=file, dev=serial.out com1: enabled=1, mode=mouse parport1: or parport2: This defines a parallel (printer) port. When turned on and an output file is defined the emulated printer port sends characters printed by the guest OS into the output file. On some platforms a device filename can be used to send the data to the real parallel port (e.g. "/dev/lp0" on Linux). The output file can be changed at run- time. Examples: parport1: enabled=1, file=parport.out parport2: enabled=1, file="/dev/lp0" parport1: enabled=0 sound: This defines the lowlevel sound driver(s) for the wave (PCM) input / output and the MIDI output feature and (if necessary) the devices to be used. It can have several of the following properties. All properties are in the format sound: property=value waveoutdrv: This defines the driver to be used for the waveout feature. Possible values are 'file' (all wave data sent to file), 'dummy' (no output) and the platform-dependant drivers 'alsa', 'oss', 'osx', 'sdl' and 'win'. waveout: This defines the device to be used for wave output (if necessary) or the output file for the 'file' driver. waveindrv: This defines the driver to be used for the wavein feature. Possible values are 'dummy' (recording silence) and platform-de- pendent drivers 'alsa', 'oss', 'sdl' and 'win'. wavein: This defines the device to be used for wave input (if necessary). midioutdrv: This defines the driver to be used for the MIDI output feature. Possible values are 'file' (all MIDI data sent to file), 'dummy' (no output) and platform-dependent drivers 'alsa', 'oss', 'osx' and 'win'. midiout: This defines the device to be used for MIDI output (if necessary). driver: This defines the driver to be used for all sound features with one property. Possible values are 'default' (platform default) and all other choices described above. Overriding one or more settings with the specific driver parameter is possible. Example for one driver (uses platform-default): sound: driver=default, waveout=/dev/dsp Example for different dri- vers: sound: waveoutdrv=sdl, waveindrv=alsa, midioutdrv=dummy speaker: This defines the PC speaker output mode. In the 'sound' mode the beep is generated by the square wave generator which is a part of the lowlevel sound support. In this mode the 'volume' parameter can be used to set the output volume (0 - 15). The 'system' mode is only available on Linux and Windows. On Linux /dev/console is used for output and on Windows the Beep() function. The 'gui' mode forwards the beep to the related gui methods (currently only used by the Car- bon gui). Example: speaker: enabled=1, mode=sound, volume=15 sb16: This defines the SB16 sound emulation. It can have several of the following properties. All properties are in this format: sb16: property=value PROPERTIES FOR sb16: enabled: This optional property controls the presence of the SB16 emula- tion. The emulation is turned on unless this property is used and set to 0. midimode: This parameter specifies what to do with the MIDI output. 0 = no output 1 = output to device specified with the sound option (system de- pendent) 2 = MIDI or raw data output to file (depends on file name exten- sion) 3 = dual output (mode 1 and 2 at the same time) midifile: This is the file where the midi output is stored (midimode 2 or 3). wavemode: This parameter specifies what to do with the PCM output. 0 = no output 1 = output to device specified with the sound option (system de- pendent) 2 = VOC, WAV or raw data output to file (depends on file name ex- tension) 3 = dual output (mode 1 and 2 at the same time) wavefile: This is the file where the wave output is stored (wavemode 2 or 3). log: The file to write the sb16 emulator messages to. loglevel: 0 = No log. 1 = Resource changes, midi program and bank changes. 2 = Severe errors. 3 = All errors. 4 = All errors plus all port accesses. 5 = All errors and port accesses plus a lot of extra information. It is possible to change the loglevel at runtime. dmatimer: Microseconds per second for a DMA cycle. Make it smaller to fix non-continuous sound. 1000000 is usually a good value. This needs a reasonably correct setting for the IPS parameter of the CPU option and also depends on the clock sync setting. It is possible to adjust the dmatimer value at runtime. Examples for output modes: sb16: midimode=2, midifile="output.mid", wavemode=1 # MIDI to file sb16: midimode=1, wavemode=3, wavefile="output.wav" # wave to file and device es1370: This defines the ES1370 sound emulation (recording and playback - except DAC1+DAC2 output at the same time). The parameter 'enabled' controls the presence of the device. The wave and MIDI output can be sent to device, file or both using the parameters 'wavemode', 'wave- file', 'midimode' and 'midifile'. See the description of these para- meters at the SB16 directive. Example for using 'sound' parameters: es1370: enabled=1, wavemode=1 Example for sending output to file: es1370: enabled=1, wavemode=2, wavefile=output.voc ne2k: Defines the characteristics of an attached ne2000 isa card : card=CARD, type=TYPE, ioaddr=IOADDR, irq=IRQ, mac=MACADDR, ethmod=MODULE, ethdev=DEVICE, script=SCRIPT, bootrom=BOOTROM PROPERTIES FOR ne2k: CARD: This is the zero-based card number to configure with this ne2k config line. Up to 4 devices are supported now (0...3). If not spec- ified, the following parameters apply to card #0. TYPE: This is the card type to emulate ('isa' or 'pci'). If not specified, card #0 defaults to 'pci' if assigned to a pci slot. For the additional cards the type parameter should be set up. IOADDR, IRQ: You probably won't need to change ioaddr and irq, un- less there are IRQ conflicts. These parameters are ignored if the NE2000 is assigned to a PCI slot. MAC: The MAC address MUST NOT match the address of any machine on the net. Also, the first byte must be an even number (bit 0 set means a multicast address), and you cannot use ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff be- cause that's the broadcast address. For the ethertap module, you must use fe:fd:00:00:00:01. There may be other restrictions too. To be safe, just use the b0:c4... address. ETHMOD: The ethmod value defines which low level OS specific module to be used to access physical ethernet interface. Current imple- mented values include - fbsd : ethernet on freebsd and openbsd - linux : ethernet on linux - win32 : ethernet on win32 - tap : ethernet through a linux tap interface - tuntap : ethernet through a linux tuntap interface - slirp : built-in Slirp support with DHCP / TFTP servers If you don't want to make connections to any physical networks, you can use the following 'ethmod's to simulate a virtual network. - null : All packets are discarded, but logged to a few files - vde : Virtual Distributed Ethernet - vnet : ARP, ICMP-echo(ping), DHCP, DNS, FTP and TFTP are simu- lated The virtual host uses 192.168.10.1 DHCP assigns 192.168.10.15 to the guest The FTP and TFTP servers use 'ethdev' for the root di- rectory TFTP doesn't overwrite files, DNS for server and client only - socket : Connect up to 6 Bochs instances with external program 'bxhub' (simulating an ethernet hub). It provides the same ser- vices as the 'vnet' module and assigns IP addresses like 'slirp' (10.0.2.x). ETHDEV: The ethdev value is the name of the network interface on your host platform. On UNIX machines, you can get the name by run- ning ifconfig. On Windows machines, you must run niclist to get the name of the ethdev. Niclist source code is in misc/niclist.c and it is included in Windows binary releases. The 'socket' module uses this parameter to specify the UDP port for receiving packets and (optional) the host to connect. SCRIPT: The script value is optional, and is the name of a script that is executed after bochs initialize the network interface. You can use this script to configure this network interface, or enable masquerading. This is mainly useful for the tun/tap devices that only exist during Bochs execution. The network interface name is supplied to the script as first parameter. The 'slirp' module uses this parameter to specify a config file for setting up an alterna- tive IP configuration or additional features. The 'vnet' module also uses this parameter to specify a config file similar to slirp, but with only a few settings. BOOTROM: The bootrom value is optional, and is the name of the ROM image to load. Note that this feature is only implemented for the PCI version of the NE2000. For the ISA version using one of the 'op- tromimage[1-4]' options must be used instead of this one. Examples: ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:00, ethmod=fbsd, ethdev=xlo ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:00, ethmod=linux, ethdev=eth0 ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:01, ethmod=win32, ethdev=MYCARD ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=fe:fd:00:00:00:01, ethmod=tap, ethdev=tap0 ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=fe:fd:00:00:00:01, ethmod=tuntap, ethdev=/dev/net/tun0, script=./tunconfig ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:01, ethmod=vde, ethdev="/tmp/vde.ctl" ne2k: ioaddr=0x300, irq=9, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:01, ethmod=vnet, ethdev="c:/temp" ne2k: mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:01, ethmod=socket, ethdev=40000 # use lo- calhost ne2k: card=0, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:01, ethmod=socket, ethdev=myma- chine:40000 ne2k: mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:01, ethmod=slirp, script=slirp.conf, bootrom=ne2k_pci.rom pcipnic: To support the Bochs/Etherboot pseudo-NIC, Bochs must be compiled with the --enable-pnic configure option. It accepts the same syntax (for mac, ethmod, ethdev, script, bootrom) and supports the same networking modules as the NE2000 adapter. Example: pnic: enabled=1, mac=b0:c4:20:00:00:00, ethmod=vnet e1000: To support the Intel(R) 82540EM Gigabit Ethernet adapter, Bochs must be compiled with the --eanble-e1000 configure option. The E1000 ac- cepts the same syntax (for card, mac, ethmod, ethdev, script, bootrom) and supports the same networking modules as the NE2000 adapter. Example: e1000: card=0, enabled=1, mac=52:54:00:12:34:56, ethmod=slirp, script=slirp.conf usb_uhci: This option controls the presence of the USB root hub which is a part of the i440FX PCI chipset. With the portX parameter you can connect devices to the hub (currently supported: 'mouse', 'tablet', 'keypad', 'keyboard', 'disk', 'cdrom', 'floppy', 'hub' and 'printer'). If you connect the mouse or tablet to one of the ports, Bochs for- wards the mouse movement data to the USB device instead of the se- lected mouse type. When connecting the keypad to one of the ports, Bochs forwards the input of the numeric keypad to the USB device in- stead of the PS/2 keyboard. If the keyboard is selected, all key events are sent to the USB device. To connect a disk image as a USB hardisk you can use the 'disk' de- vice. Use the 'path' option in the optionsX parameter to specify the path to the image separated with a colon. To use other disk image modes similar to ATA disks the syntax 'path:mode:filename' must be used (see below). To emulate a USB cdrom you can use the 'cdrom' device and the path to an ISO image or raw device name can be set with the 'path' option in the optionsX parameter also separated with a colon. An option to insert/eject media is available in the runtime configuration. To emulate a USB floppy you can use the 'floppy' device and the path to a floppy image can be set with the 'path' option in the optionsX parameter separated with a colon. To use the VVFAT image mode simi- lar to the legacy floppy the syntax 'path:vvfat:directory' must be used (see below). An option to insert/eject media is available in the runtime configuration. The device name 'hub' connects an external hub with max. 8 ports (default: 4) to the root hub. To specify the number of ports you have to use the 'ports' option in the optionsX parameter with the value separated with a colon. Connecting devices to the external hub ports is only available in the runtime configuration. The device 'printer' emulates the HP Deskjet 920C printer. The PCL data is sent to a file specified in the 'file' option with the op- tionsX parameter. The current code appends the PCL code to the file if the file already existed. The output file can be changed at run- time. The optionsX parameter can be used to assign specific options to the device connected to the corresponding USB port. The option 'speed' can be used to set the speed reported by device ('low', 'full', 'high' or 'super'). The available speed choices depend on both HC and device. The option 'debug' turns on debug output for the device at connection time. The option 'pcap' turns on packet logging in PCAP format. For the USB 'disk' device the optionsX parameter can be used to specify an alternative redolog file (journal) of some im- age modes. For 'vvfat' mode USB disks the optionsX parameter can be used to specify the disk size (range 128M ... 128G). If the size is not specified, it defaults to 504M. For the USB 'floppy' device the optionsX parameter can be used to specify an alternative device ID to be reported. Currently only the model "teac" is supported (can fix hw detection in some guest OS). The USB floppy also accepts the parameter "write_protected" with valid values 0 and 1 to select the access mode (default is 0). Examples: usb_uhci: port1=mouse, port2=disk, options2="path:usbstick.img" usb_uhci: port1=hub, options1="ports:6" usb_uhci: port2=disk, options2="path:undoable:usbdisk.img, jour- nal:u.redolog" usb_uhci: port2=disk, options2=""path:usbdisk2.img, sect_size:1024" usb_uhci: port2=disk, options2="path:vvfat:vvfat, debug, speed:full" usb_uhci: port2=cdrom, options2="path:image.iso" usb_uhci: port1=printer, options1="file:printdata.bin" usb_uhci: port2=floppy, options2="path:vvfat:diskette, model:teac" usb_ohci: This option controls the presence of the USB OHCI host controller with a 2-port hub. The portX parameter accepts the same device types with the same syntax as the UHCI controller (see above). The op- tionsX parameter is also available on OHCI. Example: usb_ohci: enabled=1 usb_ehci: This option controls the presence of the USB EHCI host controller with a 6-port hub. The portX parameter accepts the same device types with the same syntax as the UHCI controller (see above). The op- tionsX parameter is also available on EHCI. Example: usb_ehci: enabled=1, port1=tablet, options1="speed:high" usb_xhci: This option controls the presence of the USB xHCI host controller with a 4-port hub. The portX parameter accepts the same device types with the same syntax as the UHCI controller (see above). The op- tionsX parameter is also available on xHCI. NOTE: port 1 and 2 are USB3 and only support super-speed devices, but port 3 and 4 are USB2 and support speed settings low, full and high. Example: usb_xhci: enabled=1 pcidev: Enables the mapping of a host PCI hardware device within the PCI subsystem of the Bochs x86 emulator. This feature requires Linux as a host OS. Example: pcidev: vendor=0x1234, device=0x5678 The vendor and device arguments should contain the vendor ID respec- tively the device ID of the PCI device you want to map within Bochs. The PCI mapping is still very experimental and not maintained yet. LICENSE This program is distributed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation. See the LICENSE and COPYING files located in /usr/share/doc/bochs/ for details on the license and the lack of warranty. AVAILABILITY The latest version of this program can be found at: https://bochs.sourceforge.io/getcurrent.html SEE ALSO bochs(1), bochs-dlx(1), bximage(1) The Bochs IA-32 Emulator site on the World Wide Web: https://bochs.sourceforge.io Online Bochs Documentation https://bochs.sourceforge.io/doc/docbook AUTHORS The Bochs emulator was created by Kevin Lawton (kevin@mandrake- soft.com), and is currently maintained by the members of the Bochs x86 Emulator Project. You can see a current roster of members at: https://bochs.sourceforge.io/getinvolved.html BUGS Please report all bugs to the bug tracker on our web site. Just go to https://bochs.sourceforge.io, and click "Bug Reports" on the sidebar under "Feedback". Provide a detailed description of the bug, the version of the program you are running, the operating system you are running the program on and the operating system you are running in the emulator. bochsrc 15 Feb 2025 bochsrc(5)
NAME | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | LICENSE | AVAILABILITY | SEE ALSO | AUTHORS | BUGS
Want to link to this manual page? Use this URL:
<https://man.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=bochsrc&sektion=5&manpath=FreeBSD+Ports+15.1.quarterly>