Cannot get Knoppix 3.2 to recognize an Adaptec AIC-7902 SCSI

**BillyBobber** · 05-17-2003, 01:08 AM

I am using the Knoppix English ISO version 3.2, 2003-05-03 on a Gateway computer with an Adaptec AIC-7902 RAID SCSI controller.

When I boot the CD with nothing specified at the "boot:" prompt, I get a conflict with PCI device 00:1f.1 After bootup, I run "lspci" and see that the device is an IDE controller. Not a problem since the two HDs and the CD-ROM are all SCSI.

When I boot the CD with "expert" at the "boot:" prompt, it asks me for the SCSI driver to load. I type "aic7xxx.o". I don't get any feedback. After bootup, I run "lsmod" and don't see the driver loaded. I then try "modprobe aic7xxx" but I get the error "init_module: No such device", followed by suggestions that I specify more parameters.

Next I try "modprobe 'aic7xxx irq=9 io=0x3000,0x3400' ". How do I know what values to use? I hit CTRL-A at bootup and went into Adaptec's SCSI config screens to see what the card was set to. When I try the above modprobe, I get the simple error message "insmod aic7xxx irq=9 io=0x3000,0x3400 failed".

Does anyone know how I can get Knoppix to recognize the adaptec card? The copyright message printed by the card's BIOS is 2003, so it's fairly new.

If I can't get Knoppix to recognize the controller, it's going to be fairly difficult to get the install to work with the SCSI drives.

**Dave_Bechtel** · 05-17-2003, 11:45 AM

--You might have to wait for kernel 2.4.21 (should be in by 2005

) - j.k. I heard there are some fixes for the AIC7xxx driver. However, with it being a 2003 card and RAID to boot, it might be "too new for Linux." See if adaptec has any info on Linux drivers for it.

--You could try ' knoppix pci=biosirq ' in the meantime. Keep us posted.

Originally Posted by BillyBobber

I am using the Knoppix English ISO version 3.2, 2003-05-03 on a Gateway computer with an Adaptec AIC-7902 RAID SCSI controller.

When I boot the CD with nothing specified at the "boot:" prompt, I get a conflict with PCI device 00:1f.1 After bootup, I run "lspci" and see that the device is an IDE controller. Not a problem since the two HDs and the CD-ROM are all SCSI.

When I boot the CD with "expert" at the "boot:" prompt, it asks me for the SCSI driver to load. I type "aic7xxx.o". I don't get any feedback. After bootup, I run "lsmod" and don't see the driver loaded. I then try "modprobe aic7xxx" but I get the error "init_module: No such device", followed by suggestions that I specify more parameters.

Next I try "modprobe 'aic7xxx irq=9 io=0x3000,0x3400' ". How do I know what values to use? I hit CTRL-A at bootup and went into Adaptec's SCSI config screens to see what the card was set to. When I try the above modprobe, I get the simple error message "insmod aic7xxx irq=9 io=0x3000,0x3400 failed".

Does anyone know how I can get Knoppix to recognize the adaptec card? The copyright message printed by the card's BIOS is 2003, so it's fairly new.

If I can't get Knoppix to recognize the controller, it's going to be fairly difficult to get the install to work with the SCSI drives.

**aay** · 05-17-2003, 04:24 PM

The new Morphix release uses the 2.4.21 kernel (rc2 I think) so if you don't want to build your own you can try that.

**BillyBobber** · 05-20-2003, 08:17 PM

Originally Posted by Dave_Bechtel

--You might have to wait for kernel 2.4.21 (should be in by 2005

) - j.k. I heard there are some fixes for the AIC7xxx driver. However, with it being a 2003 card and RAID to boot, it might be "too new for Linux." See if adaptec has any info on Linux drivers for it.

--You could try ' knoppix pci=biosirq ' in the meantime. Keep us posted.

Gateway suggested that I either contact Adaptec and ask them for drivers, or try to delete the hardware RAID set and see if the drives could be recognized. I haven't talked to Adaptec yet. I did try to remove the RAID set but the drives are still not recognized.

At the boot: prompt, I tried "knoppix pci=biosirq" but that didn't change anything.

BTW, the CD-ROM drive is IDE. Only the two hard drives are SCSI for those of you keeping notes.

**BillyBobber** · 05-20-2003, 08:18 PM

Originally Posted by aay

The new Morphix release uses the 2.4.21 kernel (rc2 I think) so if you don't want to build your own you can try that.

Thanks. Can you suggest which ISO image I should try from there?

**BillyBobber** · 05-21-2003, 05:23 PM

Word on the street (from Gateway) is that the AIC7xxx driver doesn't work for the AIC-7902 SCSI card. They say Adaptec provides an AIC79xx driver for Linux.

Is it possible to build the next Knoppix CD with the AIC79xx driver?

Does anyone know when the next ISO image will be released? I'm not quite sure I can build my own.

**Stephen** · 05-21-2003, 06:11 PM

Originally Posted by BillyBobber

Does anyone know when the next ISO image will be released? I'm not quite sure I can build my own.

The latest version (2003-05-20) is on the web site now.

**BillyBobber** · 05-21-2003, 07:17 PM

Thanks Stephen,

I am downloading the 2003-05-20 version right now.

I looked on Adaptec's site but they only have drivers for RedHat. They have some source for downloading but I can't seem to get it to build.

If I can get an aic79xx.o file either from Adaptec, my own attempts, or someone in Knoppix-land then I can boot with "expert" and load the driver from a floppy. If anyone in Knoppix-land can build that for me, I'd really appreciate it.

**Dave_Bechtel** · 05-22-2003, 02:28 AM

5. Aic7xxx And Aic79xx Driver Updates
1 May - 7 May (12 posts) Archive Link: "Aic7xxx and Aic79xx Driver Updates"
Topics: BSD: FreeBSD
People: Justin T. Gibbs

Justin T. Gibbs announced:

I've just uploaded version 1.3.8 of the aic79xx driver and version 6.2.33 of the aic7xxx driver. Both are available for 2.4.X and 2.5.X kernels in either
bk send format or as a tarball from here:

http://people.FreeBSD.org/~gibbs/linux/SRC/

RPMs and DUDs for various distributions are also available:

http://people.FreeBSD.org/~gibbs/linux/DUD/aic7xxx/
http://people.FreeBSD.org/~gibbs/linux/DUD/aic79xx/
http://people.FreeBSD.org/~gibbs/linux/RPM/aic7xxx/
http://people.FreeBSD.org/~gibbs/linux/RPM/aic79xx/

( http://kt.zork.net/kernel-traffic/kt20030520_216.html )

Originally Posted by BillyBobber

Thanks Stephen,

I am downloading the 2003-05-20 version right now.

I looked on Adaptec's site but they only have drivers for RedHat. They have some source for downloading but I can't seem to get it to build.

If I can get an aic79xx.o file either from Adaptec, my own attempts, or someone in Knoppix-land then I can boot with "expert" and load the driver from a floppy. If anyone in Knoppix-land can build that for me, I'd really appreciate it.

**BillyBobber** · 05-23-2003, 06:14 PM

Thanks Dave,

Using another computer, I grabbed the 2.4.20 source from Kernel.org. When I downloaded the aic79xx source from Adaptec and copied it into the drivers/scsi/aic7xxx directory, the kernel wouldn't compile. When I copied the source from the first link you provided into the same location, it compiled just fine. First I did a make xconfig, went into the SCSI low-level menu, selected the aic79xx driver (as a module), saved the config, make dep, make modules, make modules_install, and show-nuff, I had the aic79xx.o file sitting there. I copied that to a floppy, booted the Knoppix 3.2 CD (2003-05-20), typed expert at the "boot:" prompt, loaded the aic79xx driver from the floppy and now knx-hdinstall was able to install onto one of the SCSI drives.

Later I tried messing with the SCSI card BIOS's settings by choosing fault tollerant and mirror options and neither of them worked. It seems the aic79xx.o module only works with that controller when the drives are just drives (no HW RAID support at all).

The fun and games doesn't stop there. After installing onto the SCSI HD, I copied the kernel source to the HD, copied the aic79xx module source, and ran make xconfig from /mnt/sda1/usr/src/linux-2.4.20 to set the kernel options for the soon-to-be-built booting kernel. I selected the aic79xx option Y (not M for module), plus selected the ext3 file system and a few other things like the Ethernet controller. When the kernel built, it couldn't copy bzImage to /vmlinuz because the root path is the CD. I manually copied bzImage to /mnt/sda1/vmlinuz_aic79xx. Next I adjusted /mnt/sda1/etc/lilo.conf to be able to find the kernel and ensure lilo used /dev/sda1, and ran lilo -r /mnt/sda1/. I then rebooted on the SCSI HD.

When the kernel was booting it displayed lots of text, then it died. One of the last few lines said, 'VFS: Cannot open root device "sda1" or 08:01'. Then another message said, "kernel panic: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on 08:01".

Why isn't this working? I even tried hitting left shift at the lilo prompt, then typing "linux root=/dev/sda1".