PIP9-1x Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

The PIP9-11 and PIP9-12 have replaced the former PIP9 versions. The following information and downloads are valid for the PIP9-1x versions only. FAQs for the older PIP9-1 (revision A to C) can be found here.




If it is the former, please do the following:
  • check the status indicators (LEDs) if any.
  • press the power button if available.
  • check the power supply, cabling and fuse.
If it is the latter, please do the following:
  • recover the system from a backup.



Please follow the steps below:

Question #351: Since I updated to Linux Kernel 2.6.30 or higher, all I2C peripherals (like temperature sensors or EEPROM) are not working any longer. With an older kernel, everything is working fine.
Answer: Is there a message similar to:
  • "ACPI: I/O resource ... conflicts with ACPI region SMB0"
  • "ACPI Warning: SystemIO range ... conflicts with OpRegion ... (\_SB.PCI0.SBUS.SMBI) "
 present in the kernel log?

If yes, please add "acpi_enforce_resources=lax" to the kernel command line.

  4. Start the MPL provided BIOS Update Image EXE file.

Question #381:
  • Does the PIP10 / MIP10 platform support Win7?
  • Where do I find a Win7 graphics driver for my PIP10 / MIP10 based SBC?
Answer: Most of the PIP10 / MIP10 hardware is supported by Win7 out-of-the-box. One of the exceptions is the graphics part for which Intel does not provide a full-featured WDDM driver as documented here: Running Windows 7 on older Intel graphics products

Depending on the actual graphics requirements of your application, the use of the "Standard-VGA" driver of Win7 or the old Intel XPDM driver for WinXP may be a possible option.

If there is a need for graphics to be fully supported by Win7, the upgrade path, depending on your other system requirements (like PC/104 or IDE), would be a member of the PIP20 or PIP30 family.



Question #272: What is delivered with the PIP?

Standard PIP 62 - 1 -
PIP80 78 - 2 -
PIP83 82.5 1 2 -
PIPPCI-1 62 - - 1
PIPPCI-2 82.5 - 1 2
PIPPCI-3 82.5 1 1 2
PIPPCI-4 120 2 1 4
PIPPCI-5 120 4 1 4
PIPPCI-L1 120 - 2 1
PIPPCI-L2 120 - - 2
PIP104PLUS-1 120 2 4 -





Question #350: Since I updated to Linux Kernel 2.6.29 or higher, the on-board ethernet is not working any longer. The correct driver is loaded and there are no error messages, but no packets are received or transmitted.
Answer: Is there a message in the kernel log about "boot interrupt" being disabled? If yes, please add "pci=noioapicquirk" to the kernel command line. On some kernels/distributions, "pci=noioapicreroute" may work as well. Alternatively, you can disable the "CONFIG_X86_REROUTE_FOR_BROKEN_BOOT_IRQS" compile time option and recompile the kernel.

Question #341: I am using one of your SBC and try to run an application on a RTOS, but I am facing some strange problems like missed hardware interrupts, increased variance of interrupt latency, ... . Is the SBC faulty?
Answer: Chances are that you are facing a problem with "System Management Mode (SMM)".
If you wish to use a RTOS or an application with some (hard) real time constrains, it is recommended to disable SMM (or one of the features depending on SMM) in the BIOS setup.
For more information about SMM, please check the corresponding chapter in the "BIOS Users Manual" for your MPL product.

Question #336: I'm using Linux and after a (mostly short) random period of time, the on-board ethernet port stops working. In the kernel log, there is a message about "irq 9: nobody cared". How can I fix this?
Answer: Is ACPI activated in the BIOS? If yes, is ACPI also active under Linux? Please check the ACPI related messages in the kernel log ("dmesg | fgrep -i acpi").
  • If ACPI support is completely missing in the kernel, either use an ACPI enabled kernel or disable ACPI in the BIOS.
  • If ACPI is supported by the kernel, but disabled (for whatever reason), adding "acpi=force" to the kernel command line may help. As an alternative, you may try to disable ACPI in the BIOS, but this is not recommended.

Question #331: I have a problem while receiving data from some external device through the serial line(s) of your SBC. Everything works flawless at slow baud rates but if I switch to a faster baud rate, the data received becomes corrupt. And it gets even worse the higher the baud rate is.
Answer: First, please check that your cabling is correct and within specification. If the cabling is correct, chances are that you are facing an UART "Overrun Error" problem.
Please try the following points:
  1. Make sure that the Rx FIFO is enabled by the SW driver.
  2. Reduce the Rx FIFO trigger level.
  3. Disable "USB Mass Storage" support in the BIOS. Please check the corresponding BIOS manual for details.
  4. Disable "System Management Mode (SMM)" in the BIOS. Please check the corresponding BIOS manual for details.
  5. Reduce the baud rate.


Question #326: Under Linux, serial port 1 and serial port 3 work as expected, but serial port 2 and serial port 4 seem to use a wrong baudrate. If I test it under Windows for example, all four serial ports work correctly.
Answer: The input clock of the DUART chip, which is responsible for Serial 2 and Serial 4, is not ~1.8MHz, but ~7.3MHz (4x). This difference is compensated by an additional input clock divider inside the DUART chip. Unfortunately the Linux serial driver is reprogramming this divider to its default value.
Please use the "setserial" tool to set the correct input clock. Something like "setserial /dev/ttySx baud_base 460800" should do it.

Please note that the above applies to the following PIP hardware versions only:
  • PIP7-11, PIP8-11, PIP9-11, PIP10-1, PIP10-2, PIP10-11 if PCB version A or B is used
  • PIP9-1E, PIP10-1E, PIP11-1E
  • all customer-specific products and Panel-PIP systems based on one of the hardware platforms mentioned above
All other versions of the PIP hardware use the same input clock for all 4 on-board serial lines.

Question #372:
  • If QNX is booted with PnP enabled in the BIOS, starting of the Photon GUI fails with the following error message: "io-display is not running"
    If QNX is booted with PnP disabled, the Photon GUI works. What's wrong?
  • If QNX is booted with PnP enabled in the BIOS, QNX does recognize (according to the QNX "pci" tool) the ethernet controller(s), but the network does not work correctly.
    If QNX is booted with PnP disabled, network is working. What's wrong?
Answer: The PnP enumerator of QNX seems to handle PCI bridges with sub-type "PCI (4)" only, but completely ignoring sub-type "HOST (0)".

Add the following line (below the existing "device(pnpbios, ...)") to the "/etc/system/enum/devices/bridge" file:
 device(pnpbios, .type=$(PNPBIOS_TYPE_BRIDGE), .subtype=$(PNPBIOS_BRIDGE_HOST))

Question #328: I'm trying to install [Windows NT | Windows 2K | Windows XP] on a CF card, but the installation fails or the OS does not work as expected. Does the PIP/MIP/IDE2CF not support this application?
Answer: Please make sure that you use a CF card which is configured to report itself as "fixed disk" device to the host system.
Basically there are two "different kind" of CF cards. Most CF cards for the "consumer market" report themselves as "removable" devices, while CF cards for the "industrial market" are normally configured to report a "fixed disk" device.
Although a successful installation of [Windows NT | Windows 2K | Windows XP] is theoretically possible on both kind of CF cards, there may be some tricky problems when using a "removable" CF card.
Our recommendation is to use "fixed disk" CF cards for this purpose.

Question #316: What operating system is installed on the PIP9?
Answer: If you did not order a specific OS with your PIP9, we normally installl FreeDOS so you can start it up right away. A list of operating systems available for the PIP9 can be found in the PIP9 Software Installations section of the PIP9 Product description. Other operating systems may be available upon request.

Question #312: The BIOS POST screen is not displayed after the system is powered. All I get is a blinking cursor in the upper, left corner of the screen, but nothing more. There is also no reaction to keyboard input.
Answer: Most probably, "Console Redirection" is activated in the BIOS Setup. Please check the corresponding chapter in the "BIOS User's Manual" for your MPL product, which is downloadable from the Documentation area on the MPL homepage.

Question #310: I'm having some troubles to get Serial 2 and/or Serial 4 to work. Whatever I tried, nothing is transmitted nor received on this interfaces. On the other hand, Serial 1 and Serial 3 are working flawlessly.
Answer: Chances are that the serial port modules (SERIF) for Serial 2 and/or Serial 4 are not installed in your PIP. As written in the "Serial-2 and Serial-4 Connector" chapter of the corresponding "PIP Technical Reference Manual", these modules are optional. If you did not order these modules preinstalled in the PIP, you can order them belatedly.



Question #294: After installing Windows on the PIP, the device manager shows two COM2 ports and two COM4 ports, each using identical I/O addresses and Interrupts, resulting in a device conflict.
Answer: Please uninstall both COM2 ports and both COM4 ports in the device manager and reboot Windows. COM2 and COM4 will be properly detected and installed upon reboot.

Question #286: After installing Windows on my [PIP | MIP], I get no video output anymore. After the startup screen is shown, the monitor gets blank.
Answer: The [PIP | MIP] SBC with DVI interface support various display combinations. If the type of display (analog, digital) connected to the DVI-I interface changes between consecutive Windows boots, the graphics driver does not necessarily detect the new display device as it still tries to use the last known working combination. This can result in a blank screen after the graphics driver has been loaded in Windows.
In this case, try and use one of the following hot key combinations (depending on the display device) to get a display output:
Monitor Type Connection Key combination
Analog Monitor DVI-I <CTRL><ALT><F1>
Digital Monitor DVI-I <CTRL><ALT><F4>
LVDS Panel Internally <CTRL><ALT><F3>

Please also note that the Intel Graphics Driver Control Applet has to be running for the hot keys to work!

Question #322: What operating system runs on the PIP9?
Answer: So far, we have tested DOS, Windows 2000, Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Embedded and various Linux Distributions. All other OS that will run on a standard PC should normally also work on the PIP9 as well as it is 100% PC/AT compatible.

Question #319: How many PC/104-Plus cards can I use on a PIP9?
Answer: Without using one of the PIPPCI Extensions, up to four bus master capable PC/104-Plus slots can be used on a PIP9.

Question #297: What's the MTBF of your PIP products?



Question #273: Is the PIP9 being supplied with the CE mark?

Question #271: Is the PIP9 board available without the housing?
Answer: Yes, the PIP9 board is available without the housing. Compared to equivalent boards like Little board or similar the PIP9 still has the big advantage of the standard connectors. Wiring costs a fortune!

ManufacturerPhoenix Contact
Order Number1827729
TypeMC 1,5/ 4-STF-3,81
Wire gauge diameter1.5 mm2
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