Hi, On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 03:55:20PM -0600, Jacob S wrote: > > > > 1) The Dell XPS comes with two 160 GB sata drives, which are only > > usable from Linux when configured for pata access[1]. I have been > > unable to enable DMA[2] on the disks, which is obviously detrimental > > to performance. Any suggestions as to how to accomplish this would be > > greatly appreciated. > > What makes you say they're configured for pata access? Did you have to > change bios settings for d-i to see them? Are you using raid? (If so, > almost all sata raid controllers built into motherboards are really a > sneaky way of using software raid, which requires additional > configuration in Debian.)
The machine comes stock with a raid controller. I had to disable the raid functionality for d-i to actually see any drives. Doing so resulted in what the dell refers to as "sata/pata combination mode". I have no idea if that is common terminology. So, to answer your question, to the best of my knowledge no raid functionality is currently enabled. > The dmesg excerpt you mention below does not convince me it sees the > drives as pata instead of sata, as all 2.4 kernels assign hd* devices to > sata drives, in my understanding. I also didn't see what kernel version > you are running (assuming it's not 2.6.9, since you mention boot > problems with that version). 2.4.27-1-386, the one installed by d-i. The entire dmesg output is at http://e.wheel.dk/~boll/stuff/dmesg.gz > > > 2) I am unable to boot the latest 2.6 kernel[3] as distributed in > > debian unstable. The boot proceeds nicely, until detecting the second > > disk, after which it just sits there. No kernel panic, nothing, it > > just sits there. The keyboard is still active (ie. anything typed > > appears on screen) but nothing happens. > > I've had the best success with a 2.6.7 kernel from Debian packages. > 2.6.8 didn't fully load the modules I needed (ps/2 mouse) and I've not > tried 2.6.9 (running Sarge). > > Also, if you really are using a 2.4 kernel during installation and then > trying to boot the 2.6.9 kernel from unstable, that is probably the > cause of your problem. 2.6 kernels label sata drives with a /dev/sd* > device and 2.4 kernels use /dev/hd*. This will cause a sudden stop when > it reads your /etc/fstab file and only sees references to /dev/hda > which now looks like a non-existent device. That would probably explain it. However, I am not certain how to change fstab in a way that will allow me to boot a 2.4 kernel, in case booting a 2.6 series kernel fails. I will fiddle with it though, to see if I can get it to work. > What does "hdparm /dev/hda" report? # hdparm /dev/hda /dev/hda: multcount = 16 (on) IO_support = 0 (default 16-bit) unmaskirq = 0 (off) using_dma = 0 (off) keepsettings = 0 (off) readonly = 0 (off) readahead = 8 (on) geometry = 19457/255/63, sectors = 160041885696, start = 0 > Using 2.6.7 kernel, it doesn't even > tell me if udma is on or off and errors out similar to yours when I tell > it to enable it. Nevertheless, hdparm -t /dev/sda and hdparm -T /dev/sda > report pretty good speeds for me: > > # hdparm -t /dev/sda > > /dev/sda: > Timing buffered disk reads: 158 MB in 3.08 seconds = 51.29 MB/sec > > # hdparm -T /dev/sda > > /dev/sda: > Timing cached reads: 1024 MB in 2.00 seconds = 511.31 MB/sec # hdparm -T /dev/hda /dev/hda: Timing cached reads: 4420 MB in 2.00 seconds = 2210.00 MB/sec # hdparm -t /dev/hda /dev/hda: Timing buffered disk reads: 12 MB in 3.28 seconds = 3.66 MB/sec > It won't make the difference between booting or not booting, but you'll > probably get better performance from a kernel ending in one of the > following instead of -386: Yeah I know, I just went with the 386 one to reduce the number of things that could potentially go wrong, ie. 686 specific instructions. Your help is greatly appreciated. -- S�ren O. ,''`. : :' : GPG key id: 0x1EB2DE66 `. `' GPG signed mail preferred. `- -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
