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Some weeks ago I tried to install Debian with SCSI
support, but I did not succeed. I had the Adaptec 2940u2w SCSI controller card,
and the first problem to overcome was that the SCSI bus did not stop resetting
even if I tried to give the boot argument "aic7xxx=no_reset" (as someone on this
mailing list told me to do). At that time, I tried the current Debian
installation CD-rom (the one which is distributed as "Debian/GNU Linux"). I did
not find any method to proceed. There was always the same kind of error with the
SCSI bus.
Then I tried the Libranet configuration of Debian.
I downloaded the Libranet .iso file and burned it into CD, and the result was
promising. I managed to get the access into my SCSI disks when I booted from the
SCSI installation floppy of that Libranet configuration. I also managed to write
the complete partition tables into my LVD-SCSI hard disk. The trouble started
only later.
When I tried to initialize the Linux native
partition of my SCSI harddisk, the initialization process halted immediately
after the "inode table" phase. There was a complete freeze. For some reason the
installer software did not freeze during the initialization of Linux swap
partition, but it only freezed during the installation of Linux native partition
(about 4GB).
Then I tried another method. I formatted the Linux
native partition under Windows 98 with Partition Magic software. I checked the
formatted partitions for errors, and then I tried the Libranet Debian installer
again. This time I tried to mount the already-initialized partitions, and this
succeeded. Again, the trouble started only later. When I tried to start
installing the base system, the installer freezed immediately at the moment when
it was installing drivers. There remained only the blue box with the text
"installing drivers", and althouhg I waited for hours, the installation process
did not proceed at all.
I succeeded to install the Libranet configuration
WITHOUT SCSI support, and that worked properly with no trouble. The trouble
started only when I tried to install the system WITH SCSI support. Then I also
tried the option of installing the system with SCSI support into an IDE
harddisk. This was succesful until it was time to reboot the system from that
IDE harddisk. In other words, I succeeded installing the kernel and all of that
which is to be installed BEFORE you reboot from the harddisk to install the
additional system components. But when I tried to reboot the base system wits
SCSI support, there was an endless repetition of the following error
messages:
scsi0: Data Parity Error Detected during address or
write data phase
scsi0: PCI error Interrupt at seqaddr =
0x8
scsi0: PCI error Interrupt at seqaddr =
0x9
That endless repetition of error messages just
continued. Thus the boot was not succesful - not even in the case when the
system was installed into the IDE harddisk. The mere presence of SCSI support
made the system boot to halt.
Does anyone of you have any kind of idea about
where the problem is and how to correct it?
I have also tried to install some other Linux
distributions. ALL of them have simply freezed during the installation process
if there has been that SCSI card present in the hardware. For example, Red Hat
installation procedure freezes immediately at the moment when the Red Hat
installer is trying to install the aic7xxx driver for the SCSI card. Linux
Mandrake installer is successful in installing the SCSI driver, but Linux
Mandrake installer freezes immediately after the phase of configuring the level
of data security (and that is before the phase of file system configuration and
partitioning). Both Red Hat and Linux Madrake are installing with no problem IF
that SCSI card is physically removed from the PCI slot.
Of course there may be some defective
hardware, but I have had no troubles at all with that SCSI card when I have used
Windows 98. When I have installed Windows 2000, there has been some trouble with
the default settings. Windows 2000 works ONLY if no SCSI device except device
address 0 is included into bios scan. I.e. the bootable harddisk MUST be SCSI 0,
because if any other SCSI address except 0 is set to include into the bios scan
(in the SCSI bios), the result is that Windows 2000 in the NTFS partition is
halted. This is a strange phenomenon, but it is harmless when using Windows. It
is only these Linux distributions with which I have had real
trouble.
Thus, should I try replacing the SCSI card, or
should I rather try replacing some other hardware (like the mainboard etc.)? Or
are there some settings to change?
Janne M. Vainio
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