[TriLUG] Linux on SATA?

[Chris Bullock]

Can you please clarify, that you are using SATA drives with the SATA
cables, you refer to switching back to PATA and everything is well, just
want to make sure you are not using PATA drives for a SATA RAID card.  We
have several systems running RHEL on SATA without any problems.  Sorry I
couldn't answer the question though.
Good luck,
Chris
--- James Brigman <jbrigman at nc.rr.com> wrote:
> Wow...nothing will make you feel more like a n00b than falling on your
> face at the beginning of the install process...and on a "sugar-
> sweetened" distro like SuSE 9.x or RHEL/CentOS 4....
> 
> I'm having a problem getting Linux to install on a system with built-in
> SATA RAID. The mbd. is that low-cost "Chaintech 7NJL6". It's an nVidia
> nForce 2 board with the built-in MCPS controller system. The board has
> two RAID-capable SATA connectors, which I want to use so I will get to
> use the fantastic little SATA cables instead of the mongo PATA cables. 
> 
> The particular problem is that sata_nv driver won't "see" the drives on
> the SATA interfaces, even though they are A-OK in the BIOS. 
> 
> If all else fails, I can fall back to plain old parallel-ATA, but that's
> very yucky compared to getting to use the slick SATA cables. If I can
> avoid going back to ATA133, that would be great. 
> 
> SuSE and CentOS try to install the "sata_nv" driver. There's a timing
> bug, however, that's manifest in the kernels used by SuSE 9.2 and
> CentOS4. Good description of the bug can be found here:
> http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Hardware/sata.html
> 
> I guess what made me feel better is that SATA problems are rampant in
> the Linux community, apparently for lack of standards among hardware
> manufacturers. I'm surprised by this: I thought mfr's had come a long
> way from the days of incompatible IDE implementations. Apparently, they
> haven't learned much from their own history. 
> 
> There's been some progress on this bug, found in Kernel 2.6.8.x as
> outlined here:
> http://bugme.osdl.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3352
> 
> The particular bug is with the ATA_FLAG_SATA_RESET: removing the
> variable from the header of the driver is reported to solve the problem.
> 
> My questions to the group are:
> 
> 1) Are there any magic incantations that could be typed at the
> bootloader prompt such that bugs in the sata_nv driver could be
> sidestepped? (SuSE 9.2/CentOS 4 x86) Or, similarly, anyone know anything
> about getting a fixed sata_nv driver, dropping it on a floppy, and
> booting with an amended driver?
> 
> 2) Has anyone taste-tested SuSE 9.3 on SATA yet, an particularly, nVidia
> SATA? Can anyone out there report success with SuSE 9.3 on built-in SATA
> controller hardware?
> 
> 3) Is anyone getting ANY distro to work with nVidia-based mbds with
> SATA? Or with the Chaintech 7NJL6 working under ANY distro? This board
> has been on sale at TigerDirect for some time, and costs $40 or less,
> after rebate. So I figure someone in the local area has, at least, seen
> this problem too. 
> 
> All experienced feedback welcome. Tangential comments not related to the
> solution to /dev/null, please.
> 
> JKB
> 
> 
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