General kernel parameters: PuppyLinux

This is actually a parameter that is used by the kernel/init process before Puppy takes over, but you are likely to get strange error messages and a failed boot if your command line does not include the expected
root=/dev/ram0 because Puppy normally loads into a ramdisk.

INITRD

The initial ramdisk should always be initrd=image.gz with Puppy Linux 1.x and initrd=initrd.gz with Puppy 2.x.

RAMDISK_SIZE

This may be needed by people who have remastered Puppy 1.x. The kernel is configured with a 12288KB maximum ramdisk, and image.gz once expanded has to fit into this. If bigger, the boot parameter "ramdisk_size=" has to be used to specify a suitable size to hold all of image.gz (uncompressed) plus some spare space. For example: ramdisk_size=15360 would result in a 15360KB maximum ramdisk.

LOGLEVEL

This controls the amount of messages displayed while booting (log level). If you are having problems booting then increasing this could give you more info helpful for debugging/troubleshooting.

Beginning with Puppy 2.11, loglevel=3 is used by default, which reduces the onboot display of messages to be limited to noncritical & critical errors. With Puppy 2.11 and later, the detailed boot messages are logged to /tmp/bootkernel.log, /initrd/tmp/bootinit.log, /tmp/sysinit.log. Detailed ongoing messages are logged to /tmp/xerrs.log (X) and /var/log/messages (kernel).

Using loglevel=4 would show everything mentioned before and warning conditions that should be taken care of.

Normally, without this parameter being specified, the log level would be set to 5, which would display everything mentioned before and normal but significant events. Recent versions of (Puppy 2.10 or later?) have the log level set to 3 in the kernel.

Using loglevel=7 would show all the messages during boot including kernel debugging messages, and would be recommended to use for troubleshooting problems during booting.

DEBUG/QUIET

Using debug is the same as loglevel=7 & quiet is the same as loglevel=4. They would be used by themselves without a = and see the above loglevel section for more.

ACPI

If this is omitted then Puppy Linux will automatically determine if ACPI is available. Now if the BIOS is dated 2000 or earlier for Puppy 1.x or 2001 or earlier for Puppy 2.x then ACPI won't be used. But if you are sure that your BIOS has ACPI support anyways then use acpi=force to enable it. Now, also, using ACPI may cause problems with some computers, so you can outright disable it by using acpi=off. But some other options would be to use acpi=noirq to specify to not use ACPI for IRQ routing, add acpi=strict option to be less tolerant of platforms that are not strictly ACPI specification compliant (i.e. disable platform workarounds), and acpi=ht to run only enough ACPI to enable Hyper-Threading.

APM

If this is omitted then Puppy Linux will automatically determine if APM should be used if ACPI is not available. To enable/disable APM yourself, use apm=on or apm=off.

IDE

Booting from some CompactFlash and other drives need this: ide=nodma

PCI

pci=noacpi
Do not use ACPI for IRQ routing or for PCI scanning. Doesn't disable as much as acpi=off does so try this instead if ACPI is causing problems.

pci=bios
Force the use of the PCI BIOS by not accessing the hardware directly. This means that the kernel should trust the BIOS, which is not the standard thing to do (as BIOSes are known to lie more often than they are known to be valid). Use this only if your machine has a nonstandard PCI host bridge and the normal boot method is not working properly.

pci=nobios
Do not use the PCI BIOS, but access the hardware directly instead. This is the default method of probing for PCI devices in all kernels after 2.6.13 (which includes Puppy 2.x).

pci=biosirq
Use PCI BIOS calls to get the interrupt routing table. These calls are known to be buggy on several machines and hang these machine when used, but on other machines they are the only way to get the interrupt routing table. Try this option if the kernel is unable to allocate IRQs or discover secondary PCI buses on your motherboard.

PNPBIOS

Set the main Plug and Play (PnP) BIOS settings. pnpbios=on enables the PnP BIOS subsystem. pnpbios=off disables the PnP BIOS subsystem. pnpbios=curr tells the PnP BIOS subsystem to use the current static settings and pnpbios=no-curr tells the subsystem to probe for dynamic settings if possible.

KBD-RESET

"Normally on i386 based machines, the Linux kernel does not reset the keyboard controller at boot, since the BIOS is supposed to do this. But as usual, not all machines do what they should. Supplying this option may help if you are having problems with your keyboard behaviour. It simply forces a reset at initialization time. (Some have argued that this should be the default behaviour anyways)."

VGA

When the kernel is booted with boot-parameter vga=791 (for 1024x768 for example), the Puppy commandline (prior to starting X) is a VESA graphics mode, meaning that you get more lines on the screen and more characters per line. You also get a penguin logo while booting. If you use vga=ask then it will prompt you with a list of various video modes that you can use. Then you can use the corresponding number in place of ask for the next boot.

There are some additional arguments for SCSI peripherals and old CD-ROMs (Non-SCSI/ATAPI/IDE). Also you can try ide1=0x180,0x386 or ide2=0x180,0x386 if your PCMCIA IDE CD-ROM is not being detected.

Useful titbits of info

48MB = 49152KB, 64MB=65536KB, 128MB=131072KB, 512MB=524288KB, 1GB=1048576KB - i.e. there are 1024 kilobytes (KB) in a megabyte (MB). Puppy v0.7.4 uses a 64MB ramdisk, v0.7.6 uses only 48MB, recent versions need 64-128MB.

See Barry's old notes on configuring Puppy.
This page is suggested by http://www.murga.org/~puppy/viewtopic.php?p=8550#8550.

See also from Barry, for newer puppies Extended help at bootup

See The Linux BootPrompt-HowTo for a detailed explanation of most of the Linux boot prompt arguments.

The book, Linux Kernel in a Nutshell, specifically Chapter 9: Kernel Boot Command-Line Parameter Reference, is freely available online and is very helpful for more on this subject, as well.

For a more complete list, see the documentation in kernel-parameters.txt included with kernel source that you're Puppy is using. For example, kernel 2.4.22 is similar to the version used with Puppy 1.x or the one included with kernel 2.6.11.8 which would be similar for Puppy 2.x.

bootparam - Introduction to boot time parameters of the Linux kernel

BootLoaders
InstallationFrugal
TableOfBIOSKeys

PuppyLinux : BootParametersGeneral