which version of lilo are you using On Wed, 17 Apr 2002 HOFMANN_ROBERT_G_III@xxxxxxxxx wrote: > I've been wrestling with getting ataraid support for promise fasttrak > controllers working on my linux server. Here is a (somewhat) brief > summary of my setup, findings, and problems: > > The system: > MSI 694D Rev 1 motherboard, Dual Celeron 400's (FSB at 75MHz to > overclock at 450), 1GB SDRAM, Onboard PDC20265 with Full Raid BIOS > Onboard ATA100 - IDE1: ATAPI CD-ROM (/dev/hda) > Onboard ATA100 - IDE2 : MASTER - WDC21600 1.6GB (/dev/hdc); > SLAVE - WDC21600 1.6GB (/dev/hdd) > Onboard PDC20265 - IDE3: MASTER - ST34321A Seagate Medalist Pro > 4.3GB (/dev/hde) > Onboard PDC20265 - IDE4: MASTER - ST34321A Seagate Medalist Pro > 4.3GB (/dev/hdg) > Offboard PDC20262(1) - IDE1: MASTER - ST51270A Seagate Medalist SL > 1.2GB (/dev/hdi) > Offboard PDC20262(1) - IDE2: MASTER - ST51270A Seagate Medalist SL > 1.2GB (/dev/hdk) > Offboard PDC20262(2) - IDE1: MASTER - ST34321A Seagate Medalist > Pro 4.3GB (/dev/hdm) > Offboard PDC20262(2) - IDE2: MASTER - ST34321A Seagate Medalist > Pro 4.3GB (/dev/hdo) > > The problem: > > After a lot of fiddling around to get the system happy with all the add-on > cards and everything, I am able to configure arrays on the Fasttrak100 > BIOS and on the Fasttrak66 BIOS successfully. However, the ataraid and > pdcraid modules do not see all of the arrays. Specifically, they fail to > recognize arrays on the Medalist Pro 4.3GB disks. At first I thought it > might be a version problem or distribution problem or even a problem with > the controllers. I tried several distros (currently I am running a base > Gentoo distribution with the 2.4.19 kernel) and I have confirmed that the > arrays appear properly in the DOS environment. I can access and partition > all of the drives individually from linux fdisk. In the Gentoo linux > distro, the two 1.6GB Western Digital drives are even discovered as an > array on ATA100 IDE2 after they are RAID prepped by the fasttrak > controller. > > What I have found: > > After ruling out many configuration issues, I got my hands dirty and > started looking at the pdcraid.c code. I have added some printk > statements in the probedisk and superblock load routines to try to get a > handle on what is going on. It appears that the fasttrak controller, at > boot, is treating the ST34321 drives as having geometry C=523, H=255, > S=63. This is the physical CHS geometry listed on Seagate's support > page. Linux, on the other hand, is seeing the LBA geometry of C=8894, > H=15, S=63, which among other things results in a different overall sector > count. The end result is that the pdcraid computation of where to locate > the superblock (first sector of last cylinder) is coming up with a > different value than the promise BIOS, and hence is not locating the > superblock. This also explains another problem I had been having which > was that the BIOS RAID configuration would disappear upon successful > installation of a linux distro. (Promise puts the superblock in a location > where Linux thinks data can go). > > What I am looking for: > > Ideally, I'd like to figure out how to get the Promise controller to > address the disks in LBA mode, as this results in a slightly larger > capacity. Looking at things from the other side, I have not yet tried > forcing the geometry via kernel boot parameters and may do so this > evening, although that is not my preferred long term solution. > > Has anyone seen a similar situation before? Any ideas? > > Thanks, > Bob >
