Hello- We manufacture a line of Compact Flash to IDE adaptors including a SATA to CF adaptor. Please visit www.acscontrol.com for information about these products. The PATA adaptors work correctly in BIOS/DOS/Windows and Linux. The SATA adaptor works correctly in BIOS/DOS/Windows but not Linux. While we're not a Linux shop, we have verified that our SATA adaptor based upon an Acard Technology ARC-770 SATA to IDE Bridge chip doesn't work in RIP Linux v2.6.20 on an Intel 865 chipset motherboard. A frustrated Linux customer pointed us to this distro which we boot off of a Live CD. Here are the Linux Kernel error messages that are produced by this kernel running on our Intel D865GLC motherboard trying to talk to our ARC-770 based adaptor on SATA-0 : ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xE400 ctl 0xE002 bmdma 0xDC08 irq 10 scsi2 : ata_piix ata1.00: CFA, max PIO4, 8005536 sectors: LBA ata1.00: ata1: dev 0 multi count 0 ata1.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xef) ata1.00: failed to set xfermode (err_mask=0x4) ata1.00: limiting speed to PIO3 ata1: failed to recover some devices, retrying in 5 secs ata1.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xef) ata1.00: failed to set xfermode (err_mask=0x4) ata1.00: limiting speed to PIO0 ata1: failed to recover some devices, retrying in 5 secs ata1.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xef) ata1.00: failed to set xfermode (err_mask=0x4) ata1.00: disabled scsi3 : ata_piix ATA: abnormal status 0x7F on port 0xE407 You can see that that our ARC-770 based adaptor with 4GB Sandisk CF card failed to respond to the ATA Identify command. This same CF card placed into our PATA adaptor or a no-name adaptor that uses a Marvell 88SA8040 bridge chip works with no problems. A Sandisk 256M CF card produces identical results. Here is the customer's error attempting the same thing but on an Intel 875 based chipset: ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xC000 ctl 0xC402 bmdma 0xD000 irq 16 ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xC800 ctl 0xCC02 bmdma 0xD008 irq 16 scsi0 : ata_piix ATA: abnormal status 0x7F on port 0xC007 scsi1 : ata_piix ata2: port is slow to respond, please be patient (Status 0xd0) ata2: port failed to respond (30 secs, Status 0xd0) ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xec) ata2.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4) ata2: port is slow to respond, please be patient (Status 0xd0) ata2: port failed to respond (30 secs, Status 0xd0) ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xC807 ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xec) ata2.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4) ata2: port is slow to respond, please be patient (Status 0xd0) ata2: port failed to respond (30 secs, Status 0xd0) We asked Acard Technology to investigate this issue with their ARC-770 chip and Linux. It also affects their AEC7900 PATA IDE to CF adaptor that uses their same ARC-770 chip. Here's their response: "Intel chipset assigns an "nIEN (interrupt)" value 1 (disable), which is not compliant with SATA spec, and causes device failure. Marvell chip has been revised for several versions, and it does something to ignore this assignment since a certain revision, prior to the directives of SATA authority. That's why Marvel chip works regardless of MB chipset. However, In ACARD, we follow the directives and spec from SATA authority, unless we receive the notification, we won't do anything against the rules." We have asked for more information, but Acard has not been responsive. They don't see it as their problem since their chip works per the SATA specification and works in the BIOS/DOS and Windows. Amusing since they also claims that it works in Linux, but we have proven to them that it doesn't. We would like to solve this issue for our Linux customers. I contacted Greg Kroah-Hartman about his posting of Free Linux Device Driver development seeking a working driver for our adaptor. He responded that the driver already exists, and that I should post to this list asking for assistance in making the existing driver work. So here it is. I can provide our SATA to CF adaptor and a CF card to a developer who can facilitate fixing this bug and incorporate the corrections into the Linux kernel for subsequent releases. Thank you, Steven J. Ackerman ACS, Sarasota, FL (941)377-5775 steve@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ide" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
