Re: [SLE] Adaptec 39160 SCSI controller with SuSE9.0 Pro?

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To: suse-linux-e@suse.com
Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2003 14:46:13 -0600

On Thursday 06 November 2003 10:53, Alex Daniloff wrote:
> Hello SuSE folkz,
> I've attempted to install SuSE 9.0 Pro
> on a newly assembled workstation with
> Adaptec 39160 U160 SCSI PCI card and Maxtor
> Atlas 10K II SCSI hard drives.
> Only DVD ROM is an ATA device on this system.
> Installation hangs for about 15 minuts
> trying to determe hardware configuration.
> When it comes back, it can't find SCSI hard
> drives. My attempts to load Adaptec AIC7xxx
> driver module from SuSE DVD or CD have failed.
> Installer reports that it's unable to load that
> driver. I assumed that Adaptec 39160 is a hardware
> SCSI controller which has its own BIOS, therefore
> Linux OS should see connected SCSI hard drives just
> like any other ATA/IDE devices. Apparently it's not so.
> Could somebody please help me with this issue or point
> to the sources of information.
> Many thanks in advance.
>
> Alex

Alex,

You didn't give any examples of the exact errors you are getting so I can't be
sure at what system level the problems are occurring. I can supply you with
some of my experiences with SuSE 8.2 Professional that are similar. Maybe you
can get some ideas from them.

I've have a similar problem on an older dual 400MHz xeon system that I have
that has an integrated 7896 dual channel SCSI controller on an Intel G440GX+
motherboard.

When I try to manually load the newer aic7xxx driver during install the system
just hangs and will not continue. If I try loading the old aic7xxx driver the
system keeps giving timeout errors and repeatedly resetting the SCSI bus. I
have searched the support database and found several things to try but none
of them have worked.

I read that the 2.4.x version kernels have new code internally that replaces
the code in the older 2.2.x kernels that do the same function. It said that
the newer SCSI devices have additional commands in their command sets that
this code is suppose to work with. However, I've tried 4 generations of SCSI
HDs with no luck. On my system I may have a problem with the drivers not
working with that particular SCSI controller but I'm not sure yet. I have the
Maxtor U160 SCSI 10k HDs also. I was able to load SuSE 7.0 Professional and
FreeBSD 4.6 on this same machine without any problems at all. Everything was
auto-detected by both of those OSes so I suspect that there may be something
to what I read about the low-level SCSI code being changed in the 2.4.x
kernel. From what I understood this code being changed "could" affect how
well the 2.4.x kernel detects the older SCSI systems but I wouldn't think
that it would be a problem with newer devices and controllers.

However, on a new Soltek MRN-L motherboard with an Adaptec 2940 U2W controller
and older IBM 9Gig 10k SCSI HD SuSE 8.2 auto-detected that just fine. That
controller is a little newer than the 7896 in my dual xeon box however and it
is not dual channel. I don't know yet if that is having any affect on things.
I also replaced the Adaptec controller with an older DPT controller that I
had just to increase my test bed and it worked just fine with SuSE 8.2 Pro
also. These were both single channel controllers.

Here are a couple things that I have found in the past that do make a
difference when getting an OS to detect SCSI devices. You might try these to
see if it helps your problem...

Disable Wide negotiation on the controller in its SCSI setup and on the SCSI
HD.
Turn off the Disable disconnect feature in your SCSI setup.
Be sure that your SCSI bus is properly terminated.

You might also try searching the Support Database on SuSE's website and also
in SuSE 8.2 itself. There is some good information in both places.

Hope you have better luck than I have.

Regards,
Jack A.

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