Tarjei Huse wrote: > Hi, I'm working on getting Linux to use my SATA drives on an IBM x306 > running a HostRaid controller that uses the adaptech 9405w chipset. > > I found this thread on the list: > http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.scsi/29040/focus=29040 Basically Luben Tuikov developed the original aic94xx SAS driver for Linux when he was working for Adaptec. Soon after he made it available, the Linux SCSI community decided to fork the development for various reasons. The "Linux SCSI community" version seems to have passed through various hands, currently it seems to Darrick Wong's headache. In the meantime Mr Tuikov has continued developing his "version" which I can report is now very stable and feature rich on my hardware (an adaptec 48300 HBA with a aic-9410w chip in it). Some people involved are still quite upset about what happened and it shows in the email exchange you referred to. One unfortunate aspect of the GPL and what the "community" did is that the source code still has the copyright notices of Adaptec and Luben Tuikov. That may lead an observer to think that either or both still have an interest or control over that driver. As far as I can see that is not the case and a note should be added to the source code to that end. So given the above, Linux distribution vendors have a problem when they try to "certify" hardware containing Adaptec SAS aic94xx series chips. > What I'm wondering about is: > a) Where can I get the patches that mr Tuikov maintains for this > chipset? You need to contact Luben Tuikov < ltuikov@xxxxxxxxx > directly. b) Are they maintained wrt to different kernel versions, i.e. > do they apply cleanly to a 2.6.20 or 2.6.16 kernel? You need different driver versions for different kernels. > c) In the thread Darrick Wong refers to another branch[1] that contains > (according to him) a lot of fixes for this chipset. Is that branch > confirmed to work with my chipset? I haven't checked recently but Adaptec used to have their own linux driver, named the adp94xx driver. It would seem that Adaptec has lost interest in Linux. > My main goal is to get this box up and running using debian or ubuntu. I > have managed to get it to run the debian 2.6.9 kernel as outlined in [2] > using the adp94xx driver, but I cannot get that driver to compile on > newer kernels. See my previous note. > I have also tried to compile the latest rc of the 2.6.20 kernel and > loaded up the aic94xx driver + firmware. I then ended up getting the > same errors that started the above mentioned thread on this list. Here are my thoughts on the 48300 HBA and the available drivers. I bought the device about 12 months ago so I assumed it at least had production firmware on it. It required two firmware upgrades before it was stable in POST+scan in non-trivial SAS toplologies (by which I mean connected to SAS expanders). [Since I also had a LSI MPT Fusion SAS controller, it was relatively simple for me to determine the source of my problems.] All drivers I tried (although I could never get the adp94xx driver working because it was too old) showed the same problems (tmf timeouts). Then Luben Tuikov sent me a version of his driver with a "use_msi" related fix in it. My 48300 has been rock solid since. The last time I tried "Darrick's" driver (about a week ago) it failed in the fashion unto which I have become accustomed. I have encouraged people to talk amongst themselves about the use_msi patch, but I don't believe that I should be reverse engineering that patch. There are other issues. As you may understand from the above, I am walking on a bit of a tight rope here. I can also report that the same hardware works fine in Windows 2000, Vista RC1 and that FreeBSD doesn't have an aic94xx driver yet. > So what is the best solution here? Has anyone managed to get a newer > kernel to run on this chipset? > > 1. > http://www.kernel.org/git/?p=linux/kernel/git/jejb/aic94xx-sas-2.6.git;a=summary > > 2. http://www.jimmy.co.at/weblog/?p=71 This last thread may help explain IBM's interest in getting the aic94xx working reliably. Is there a best solution? Doug Gilbert - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-scsi" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
