Can't install on i386 system with LSI 53C1030 SCSI Host driver

[Olivier Cappe <comcap@free.fr>]

Hi everyone,

I am trying to install Woody on a i386 system which has two SCSI disks that need
the Fusion MPT SCSI drivers. RH 8.0 installs correctly on this one and reports

SCSI subsystem driver Revision: 1.00
kmod: failed to exec /sbin/modprobe -s -k scsi_hostadapter, errno = 2
Fusion MPT base driver 2.01.10
Copyright (c) 1999-2002 LSI Logic Corporation
PCI: Found IRQ 9 for device 02:07.0
PCI: Sharing IRQ 9 with 01:00.0
PCI: Sharing IRQ 9 with 02:01.2
mptbase: Initiating ioc0 bringup
ioc0: 53C1030: Capabilities={Initiator}
PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 02:07.1
PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 00:1f.3
PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 00:1f.5
PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 02:02.1
mptbase: Initiating ioc1 bringup
ioc1: 53C1030: Capabilities={Initiator}
mptbase: 2 MPT adapters found, 2 installed.
Fusion MPT SCSI Host driver 2.01.10
scsi0 : ioc0: LSI53C1030, FwRev=01011800h, Ports=1, MaxQ=222, IRQ=9
scsi1 : ioc1: LSI53C1030, FwRev=01011800h, Ports=1, MaxQ=222, IRQ=11
  Vendor: FUJITSU   Model: MAP3367NP         Rev: 5605
  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03
  Vendor: FUJITSU   Model: MAP3367NP         Rev: 5605
  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03
Attached scsi disk sda at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Attached scsi disk sdb at scsi1, channel 0, id 1, lun 0
SCSI device sda: 71132959 512-byte hdwr sectors (36420 MB)
Partition check:
 sda: sda1 sda2 sda3 sda4 < sda5 sda6 >
SCSI device sdb: 71132959 512-byte hdwr sectors (36420 MB)
 sdb: unknown partition table

at boot time.


However, I could not install Debian on this system. The first thing is that as
said here,

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&threadm=20030108221007%244657%40gated-at.bofh.it&rnum=2&prev=/groups%3Fq%3Ddebian%2Bmptbase%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26selm%3D20030108221007%25244657%2540gated-at.bofh.it%26rnum%3D2

the mptbase.o (and mptscsih.o) from

2.4.18-bf2.4_scsi_and_bcm5700_preload_floppy-1440.bin

as available in http://people.debian.org/~blade/install/preload/

can not be loaded with the bf24 flavor of the kernel as featured on the Debian
3.0 disc 1 (modules fail to load). Maybe a note on this should be added on the
Woody Errata page (http://www.debian.org/releases/woody/errata.en.html)! Also,
the "nousb" option to the bf24 kernel on the Debian
3.0 disc 1 does not work or is non existent (the USB keyboard module was causing
a freeze of my actual - non USB - keyboard and I had to remove the USB support
from the BIOS to work around this problem).

I finally went for the updated module preload floppy 2.4.20-modules.bin from
http://people.debian.org/~blade/install/preload/ together with bootbf2.4.iso as
found in http://people.debian.org/~blade/boot-floppies/netinst-full-pre/. This
time I could load the mptbase.o and mptscsih.o modules from the floppy and
proceed up to the "reboot" item in the installation (thereby erasing my RH
install). In addition to these two modules, I also added sg support in the
"Insert kernel modules" section.

The problem is that I can't reboot: reboot from disk fails with "No operating
system" while reboot from the boot floppy created during the installation
apparently lacks the two mpt* modules so that I see the following message

kmod: failed to exec /sbin/modprobe -s -k scsi_hostadapter, errno = 2

3 times and then:

VFS: Cannot open root device "sda5" or 08:05
Please append a correct "root=" boot option
Kernel panic: VFS: Unable tp mount root fs on 08:05


Any ideas on what to do next (other than reinstalling RH) ?
Thanks,

--
olivier