Re: SATA/IDE Dual Mode w/Intel 945 Chipset or HOW TO LIQUIFY a flash IDE chip under 2.6.18

[Jeff Garzik <jeff@garzik.org>]

Jeff V. Merkey wrote:
> Jeff Garzik wrote:
>
> > Jeff V. Merkey wrote:
> >
> > > I just finished pulling out a melted IDE flash drive out of a Shuttle 
> > > motherboard with the intel 945 chipset which claims to support
> > > SATA and IDE drives concurrently under Linux 2.6.18.
> > >
> > > The chip worked for about 30 seconds before liquifying in the 
> > > chassis.  I note that the 945 chipset in the shuttle PC had some serious
> > > issues recognizing 2 x SATA devices and a IDE device concurrently.   
> > > Are there known problems with the Linux drivers
> > > with these newer chipsets.
> > >
> > > One other disturbing issue was the IDE flash drive was configured 
> > > (and recognized) as /dev/hda during bootup, but when
> > > it got to the root mountint, even with root=/dev/hda set, it still 
> > > kept thinking the drive was at scsi (ATA) device (08,13)
> > > and kept crashing with VFS cannot find root FS errors.
> >
> >
> > We have two sets of ATA drivers now, and Intel motherboards support 
> > bazillion annoying IDE modes, so you will need to provide more info 
> > than this.
> >
> > Is the motherboard in combined mode?
>
>
> Yes.  "Enhanced mode" is how it is listed in the BIOS.

Combined mode is a technical term.  Judging from your answers, you are 
not using combined mode.


> > native mode?  AHCI or RAID mode?
>
> No RAID, just enhanced mode (SATA 3.0 + IDE)

Judging from your answers, you are not in AHCI mode.

Side note:  You should use AHCI if available.  Emulating a PATA 
interface for SATA devices is error prone [in the silicon].  AHCI is 
native SATA, "enhanced mode" is not.


> > The cannot-find-root-FS errors are definitely caused by driver and/or 
> > initrd misconfiguration.  The melted flash, I dunno, maybe you managed 
> > to get two drivers fighting over the same hardware.
>
> No.  Seems related to the chipset problems.  If I say "root=/dev/hda2" I 
> have better not be getting errors claiming device 08:13 could not mount 
> as root.  memory corruption?

If the kernel cannot mount the requested root= disk, it tries the 
default that is encoded into the vmlinuz image at build time, which is 
probably 08:13.


> The melted flash seems power related (like pin 20 was live for some 
> reason on a standard IDE).

Probably, otherwise we would have many more reports like this than just 
yours.

	Jeff


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