Linux-Hardware Digest #225, Volume #14 Mon, 22 Jan 01 15:13:08 EST
Contents:
Re: BP6 ATA66 Crashing System ("Adam Becker")
Re: Scanning SCSI hardware after startup (freedman)
Need desperate help on hardware installs!! ("Víctor Ramírez")
Re: To all linux user...... ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: Swap size / Memory upgrade ("Martin Eriksson")
Re: EZ Cam II drivers? ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: [Advice]: Multi-Modem for a Small ISP ("Martin Eriksson")
Re: Swap size / Memory upgrade (Steve Ackman)
Re: Swap size / Memory upgrade (Floyd Davidson)
Serial Terminal (Roland Scheike)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Adam Becker" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: BP6 ATA66 Crashing System
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 13:33:58 -0500
"Rinaldi J. Montessi" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Adam Becker wrote:
> >
> > > <snip>
> > >
> > > I've had the exact same thing happen with a dual celeron abit bp6 with
> > > the original gentus linux and anything I've compiled since. Short
> > > answer is hpt 366 is garbage. Get an ata pci card. Not a lockup
since
> > > I installed it. I think it was freezing during the slocate (updatedb)
> > > cron job. That's the only rigorous thing that happens after I log
off.
> > >
> > > I was (am?) using the RU BIOS and have been all along. I did not
bother
> > > testing the hpt controller in dma33 mode. You can probably buy a
> > > Promise card for $30 - 40.00. I notice Abit stopped using the hpt
> > > controller in recent releases.
> > >
> > > --
> > > Rinaldi]$
> > > "Defeat may serve as well as victory, to shake the soul and let the
> > > glory out." --Poet Edwin Markham (c. 1898)
> >
> > I added the Promise card, but the system still finds the hpt366 as
ide2&3
> > how can I disable it so the system will find the new Promise card??
> > I tried disabling Ultrdma in bios, no luck.
> > I tried ide2=0x9400,0x9802 ide3=0x9c00,0xa002 (from /proc/pci for
Promise
> > card), it still finds ide2&3 on the hpt366.
> > I tried ide4&5 on same address, no luck. Is Linux limited to ide0-3?
>
>
> Also emailed-----------
>
> Did you recompile your kernel with the Promise ATA 100 support?
>
> Let's take it from the top. What kernel are you using and how did you
> install it; rpm, *.tar.gz/bz2? Do you have the source? You composed
> this using MS, does Winblows see the Promise card? Do you know how to
> patch a kernel?
>
> I don't believe the hpt 366 can be disabled without altering the BIOS.
> I put support for both hpt and Promise in my current kernel. I still
> get the blue Highpoint screen at boot, but have nothing attached. I may
> hook a couple of udma 33's to it and do some massive data transfers and
> diff the files. If it's ok, that's good.
>
> One request: I'll gladly give you all the help you need on this, but
> please bottom post (as you did here) your replies and don't <snip> any
> of the content. It will save me from having to refer to previous posts
> for information.
>
> The law of Linux: learn what you don't know, teach what you do.
>
>
> --
> Rinaldi]$
> "Defeat may serve as well as victory, to shake the soul and let the
> glory out." --Poet Edwin Markham (c. 1898)
I have Kernel 2.2.16 SMP with ATA66 patch applied. Yes I patched it myself.
I use the SuSE 6.4 distribution.
I am currently downloading 2.4.0 to see if it works any better.
ide config:
2- 8.5Gb hda,hdb on ide0
1-atapi cdrom hdc on ide1
1-13.5Gb hde on ide2
1-13.5gb hdg on ide3
Initial I was running 2.2.13 with 'append="ide2=0x????,0x???? ide3=..."' (io
addressed pulled from /proc/pci as per mini-howto) this worked well for a
while. Later developed an intermitent problem, one of the drives not being
recognized at boot by the htp366 bios, found out that if I powered down the
box, the drive would show up in the bios again. Because of this
intermittent loss of the drive, I upgraded to htp366 support by downloading
2.2.16 and applying the latest patch for the ATA66 support and recompiled.
This worked, but the machine started locking up randomly in the middle of
the nite. I have found that it locks up during heavy disk usage (probably
locked up running updatedb on cron job).
Got advice to scrap the hpt366 and use a Promise card. Installed Maxtor
Ultra ATA/100 PCI card and moved the disks over. Initially I didnt
recompile. I just tried to give the kernel the io address of the new ide
card. This PCI card uses the Promise chip set.
Next, I disabled the hpt366 and enabled the promise chipset. Recompiled,
with:
make clean
make dep
make bzlilo
make modules
make modules_install
depmod
I added the append = "ide2=0x9c00,0xa002 ide3=0xa400,0xa802", the boot
message recognized that the hpt366 was still present, even tho I took out
the chipset support. It did find the other 2 drives on the promise card at
boot up but the following error also showed up:
ide2: Disabled unable to get IRQ 10
ide3: Disabled unable to get IRQ 10 (IRQ 10 in not in use per
/proc/interrupts)
The hpt366 showed up as ide4 and ide5 using IRQ11.
I tried the card in serveral different PCI slots to ensure that the PCI IRQ
was not conflicting with another device. It did change which IRQ was
disabled and conflicted with one of the nics in one slot. Promise card is
currently in slot4.
No promise chipset specific boot messages appeared. After some research, I
recompiled with Sharing PCI IDE interrupts ENABLED. This did not help.
Hardware:
BP6 Dual 366 SMP(no overclocking)
NJ bios
2 network cards:
eth0: 3c59x
eth1: tulip
hda Fujitsu MPD3084AT
hdb same as hda
hdc: ATAPI 40x cdrom
hde: Samsung SV1533D
hdg: same as hde
Windozes in not loaded on this machine. Therefore I cant check to determine
if there are Windoze related errors. I am posting from another Windozes
box.
Currently Im at a loss on what to do next, I will try and see if 2.4.0 can
recognize that the drives are on the Promise card and enable the card.
My goal is to put Raid-1 on hde&hdg to mirror critical data, but have been
unable to get reliable disk usage. I am using this machine as a router,
firewall, database engine(MySQL), samba file server for 5 other windoze PCs
and development box.
At this point I could care less whether the box can access the newer drives
with the ATA66 burst mode enabled, I just want the drives to work reliably!
dmesg:
Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 6.30
ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
PIIX4: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 39
ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:DMA
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdc:pio, hdd:pio
HPT366: onboard version of chipset, pin1=1 pin2=2
PCI: HPT366: Fixing interrupt 18 pin 2 to ZERO
HPT366: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 98
HPT366: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
ide4: BM-DMA at 0xb800-0xb807, BIOS settings: hdi:pio, hdj:pio
HPT366: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 99
HPT366: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
ide5: BM-DMA at 0xc400-0xc407, BIOS settings: hdk:pio, hdl:pio
hda: FUJITSU MPD3084AT, ATA DISK drive
hdb: FUJITSU MPD3084AT, ATA DISK drive
hdc: ATAPI 44X CDROM, ATAPI CDROM drive
hde: SAMSUNG SV1533D, ATA DISK drive
hdg: SAMSUNG SV1533D, ATA DISK drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
ide1 at 0x170-0x177,0x376 on irq 15
ide2: Disabled unable to get IRQ -10.
ide3: Disabled unable to get IRQ -10.
gandalf:/proc # cat interrupts
CPU0 CPU1
0: 192192 208529 IO-APIC-edge timer
1: 1 1 IO-APIC-edge keyboard
2: 0 0 XT-PIC cascade
12: 32 1 IO-APIC-edge PS/2 Mouse
13: 1 0 XT-PIC fpu
14: 2444 2617 IO-APIC-edge ide0
15: 24 2 IO-APIC-edge ide1
16: 902 935 IO-APIC-level eth0
17: 288 128 IO-APIC-level eth1
/proc/pci
Bus 0, device 17, function 0:
Unknown mass storage controller: Promise Technology Unknown device (rev
2).
Vendor id=105a. Device id=4d30.
Medium devsel. IRQ 19. Master Capable. Latency=32.
I/O at 0x9c00 [0x9c01].
I/O at 0xa000 [0xa001].
I/O at 0xa400 [0xa401].
I/O at 0xa800 [0xa801].
I/O at 0xac00 [0xac01].
Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xea000000 [0xea000000].
Bus 0, device 19, function 0:
Unknown mass storage controller: Triones Technologies, Inc. HPT366 IDE
Ultra
I/O at 0xb000 [0xb001].
I/O at 0xb400 [0xb401].
I/O at 0xb800 [0xb801].
Bus 0, device 19, function 1:
Unknown mass storage controller: Triones Technologies, Inc. HPT366 IDE
Ultra
Medium devsel. IRQ 18. Master Capable. Latency=248. Min Gnt=8.Max
Lat=
I/O at 0xbc00 [0xbc01].
I/O at 0xc000 [0xc001].
I/O at 0xc400 [0xc401].
Bus 1, device 0, function 0:
VGA compatible controller: Trident Image 975 (rev 243).
Medium devsel. Fast back-to-back capable. IRQ 16. Master Capable.
Late
Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xe5400000 [0xe5400000].
Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xe5800000 [0xe5800000].
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (freedman)
Subject: Re: Scanning SCSI hardware after startup
Date: 22 Jan 2001 19:02:32 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
On 22 Jan 2001 13:35:47 GMT, Udo Wolter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>max <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> I would like to know how to rescan the SCSI controller for new hardware. I
>> have a PCI SCSI adapter with 2 devices attached to it: a CDRW
>> (internal) and a tape drive (external).
>> The tape device is an older Python DAT drive, which has it's own power
>> supply & cooler, so it generates a lot of heat and makes a lot of noise.
>> Since I don't use it that much, I mostly have it switched off. When the
>> device is 'down', the SCSI controller doesn't see it at boot time of
>> course and the system just sees the internal SCS This means that when I
>> want to use it the only way to get it 'known' in my Linux (RH7.0) is to
>> reboot the machine. I can understand the reboot if it was a
>> Windows-system, but surely there's a Linux command somewhere which will
>> rescan the bus at 'controller-level'...
>
>At first I must say that it's not recommended for SCSI-systems if a device
>will be powered on or off. Except the bus is hot pluggable (only newer
>RAID controllers support this). Anyway, nevertheless it's possible.
>The problem is that there is no rescan-command. But if you compile your
>SCSI driver as module you can remove this module and insmod (or modprobe)
>it again so it can find the newly attached (powered on) device.
>
>This method has one problem: if you have SCSI disks it won't work because
>you can't remove the driver...
>
>But in your case it should be possible.
>
>Bye,
> Udo
>--
>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>system engineer innominate AG
> the linux architects
>tel: +49-30-308806-84 fax: -698 http://www.innominate.com
>
You can use: echo "scsi add-single-device 0 0 ID 0" > /proc/scsi/scsi to add
scsi targer id=ID and echo "scsi remove-single-device 0 0 ID 0" >
/proc/scsi/scsi to remove same.
--
Dick Freedman
------------------------------
From: "Víctor Ramírez" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Need desperate help on hardware installs!!
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 21:33:03 -0800
There are three thing things that I want to setup: Install a modem and
soundcard, and change the monitor resolution to higher than 800X600. The
modem is a winmodem so it is probable that I wont be able to get the drivers
and because of this I cant get on the internet to download the sound card
drivers when i am running Linux. Is there anyway I can get the drivers
running windows which uses fat32 and transfer the file to the linux
partition for installation?
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: To all linux user......
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 19:19:00 GMT
Tina Carter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
: I wanna learn Linux peacefully so let's not get into each other way, if you
: can't help me don't respond but If you can I thank you but don't insult me
: and my Microsoft OS or your linux terrorism and racism will be answer and
: PURGED.
You suck
--
Jeff Gentry [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
SEX DRUGS UNIX
------------------------------
From: "Martin Eriksson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.setup,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Swap size / Memory upgrade
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 20:21:30 +0100
Linux will not put data on the swap disk until main memory get full. Why
people recommend as much swap as memory is uncomprehendable to me. Maybe in
some critical servers where you just CANT let processes die because of
memory shortage.
But for example, if ONE instantiation of a program uses 1GB RAM... you
should count on the event that accidentally TWO such processes start, and
thus will use 2GB RAM. Then you would want to have 1.5GB swap "just in
case".
Well, you get it... The actual point is: Linux does not use more swap only
because you give it more swap space.
"ekk" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Trying to make a judgement call without enough experience -
>
> I just upgraded from 512 RAM to 1 GB. My swap space is 768. Should
> I increase the swap? We do often use all of the RAM available on a
> machine, but we of course try to avoid using the swap.
>
> In the same way, I also downgraded a 1 GB RAM machine to 512 (bad RAM).
> Do I need to lower the swap space?
>
> In both situations disk space is not a concern.
>
> I assume the best way to adjust the swap is to use Partition Magic?
> I don't want to go through a whole reinstall of either machine.
>
> Ken
>
>
>
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: EZ Cam II drivers?
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 19:26:37 GMT
I am about to run VMWare on my machine so that I can use my old Windoze
98 that came with my machine(off restore cd) so that I can figure out
how to write drivers for it. After that, it is just some reverse
engineering, which any total geek, like me, would enjoy. I'll keep you
posted.
Justin Hibbits
"Hack the planet" -Hackers (1995)
Static-Pulse <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I've got an EX Can II (from Eztronics) that I'd love to hook up to my
> SuSE Linux (kernel version 2.2.14) box. Can someone tell me if this
> is possible? And if so how do I go about doing it (i.e. what tar.gz
> to I download and from where)? Any and all help will be GREATLY
> appreciated. Thanks in advance!
>
> --
>
> Static-Pulse
> ------------------------------------------
> http://www.kerovia.net : Kerovia Networks
> http://hope.dnsalias.net : The Hope FTP
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] :: ICQ: 1537067
> ------------------------------------------
> "Human? Did I forget my spots?" - Ezri Dax
> "Stinkin' Decepticon piece of cheese!" - Rattrap
> "...I will discharge unconditionally." - Al Gore
>
Sent via Deja.com
http://www.deja.com/
------------------------------
From: "Martin Eriksson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Advice]: Multi-Modem for a Small ISP
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 20:29:49 +0100
Hmm.. have you checked with your ISP that it's OK to do this?
Anyway, I'd say you would get away cheapest with a multi-com-port card and
four modems.
"Youngert" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:IIZa6.29088$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Hi,
>
> My linux system is connected to the Internet through a cable modem. So
> far, I have setup my Linux machine as a PPP dial-in for several accounts
and
> am planning to provide a four local PPP dial-in for my friends whom do not
> have a cable modem access. What I am looking for is a small equipment I
> can use to connect to my Linux machine and phone lines so that my Linux
> machine can act as a small ISP for my friends. It will also be nice if
> such equipment can emulate a phone line in the sense that I can connect my
> aplio/phone as well as webTV and dreamcast machine to my Linux. Any
> suggestion on the equipment part as well as software setup?
>
> TIA.
>
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Steve Ackman)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.setup,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Swap size / Memory upgrade
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 14:06:26 -0500
On Mon, 22 Jan 2001 10:03:55 -0500, ekk <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Trying to make a judgement call without enough experience -
>
>I just upgraded from 512 RAM to 1 GB. My swap space is 768. Should
>I increase the swap? We do often use all of the RAM available on a
>machine, but we of course try to avoid using the swap.
>
>In the same way, I also downgraded a 1 GB RAM machine to 512 (bad RAM).
>Do I need to lower the swap space?
>
>In both situations disk space is not a concern.
>
>I assume the best way to adjust the swap is to use Partition Magic?
>I don't want to go through a whole reinstall of either machine.
>
>Ken
Swap space is "virtual RAM." It's there for when your machine
requires more memory than it has physically installed.
If you never touch swap space, then you certainly don't need to
enlarge it. As a matter of fact, it's just going to waste. On
machine one, I daresay you could probably do without any swap at
all.
On machine 2, you need to *increase* your swap if the kernel is
killing off processes due to insufficient memory. Otherwise,
just leave it alone.
--
Steve Ackman
http://twovoyagers.com
Registered Linux User #79430
------------------------------
From: Floyd Davidson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.setup,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Swap size / Memory upgrade
Date: 22 Jan 2001 09:58:47 -0900
ekk <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Thanks, Jamess for your advice. The person whose job I inherited told me
>that the swap space should be double the amount of RAM for up to 512 MB,
>1.5x for 512 - 1024, and 1x for above 1024 MB.
That is not valid for Linux, though it may have been good advice
for certain UNIX systems about ten-fiften years ago... ;-)
>I'm not terribly sure why he
>thought so much swap was required, but I think he arrived at those ratios
>through experience dealing with many different machines and RAM amounts.
>The machines he set up are stable and rarely get bogged down, as long as the
>users don't push them over the RAM!
Which might have been purely an accident, given the above advice.
To determine the size of RAM and the size of swap necessary for
a given machine you need to know something about the memory
requirements for the processes that will be running.
There should be enough RAM that swap is not normally used. (One
way to look at that is just buy as much RAM as the budget will
allow.)
Then, swap should be sized to bring the total virtual memory
(RAM-size + swap-size) to a large enough number that it will
_never_ be exceeded by the requirements of running processes.
Hence if your processes commonly use 600Mb of memory day in and
day out, you certainly want more RAM than that. Likewise if
your processes only use 128Mb, something more than that would
be enough.
If the machine using 600Mb normally will on rare occassions use
up to as much a 800Mb, then 786Mb of RAM and 210Mb of swap would
be just fine. If the machine that normally uses about 128Mb can
also hit a high of 800Mb, the perhaps something like 196Mb of
RAM and 800Mb of swap would be right. In both cases the total
virtual memory is 996Mb, which is a comfortable margin more than
the 800Mb known to be necessary.
As you can see, if the absolute maximum requirement for virtual
memory is the same (in this case 800Mb), then the more RAM that
is installed the less swap is needed. For that reason ratios
such as 2:1 swap to RAM are just not a useful method to determine
RAM and swap space on a Linux box.
And that is why it was suggested that on the machine where you
have reduced the RAM from 1G to 512Mb it might be more appropriate
to _increase_ the amount of swap space. (That assumed you were
running the same processes before and after the memory change.)
A couple of other points need to be mentioned. One is to use
the "free" command, but be aware that it also reports how much
RAM is being used to buffer/cache disk i/o. Having more RAM
than is required for processes will allow Linux to use it to
speed up disk i/o. Hence, once again... buy all the RAM that
your budget allows.
The other point is that disk space is cheap now. Being very
conservative about swap space made sense in years past, but
it is false economy today. My rule of thumb right now is that
whatever your wildest dream about swap space requirements might
be? double it. Or better yet, triple it. It's cheap and you
can't lose.
Floyd
>Thank you kindly,
>Ken
>
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
>> ekk wrote:
>> >
>> > Trying to make a judgement call without enough experience -
>> >
>> > I just upgraded from 512 RAM to 1 GB. My swap space is 768. Should
>> > I increase the swap? We do often use all of the RAM available on a
>> > machine, but we of course try to avoid using the swap.
>> >
>> > In the same way, I also downgraded a 1 GB RAM machine to 512 (bad RAM).
>> > Do I need to lower the swap space?
>> >
>> > In both situations disk space is not a concern.
>> >
>> > I assume the best way to adjust the swap is to use Partition Magic?
>> > I don't want to go through a whole reinstall of either machine.
>> >
>> > Ken
>>
>> I have 256 MB RAM and 128 MB swap on my box. It hardly ever uses any of
>> the swap at all except for programs like Netscape, and then it uses very
>> little swap. I don't think that you need more than 128 MB of swap when
>> you have a lot of ram.
>>
>> jamess
>> --
>> "On the side of the software box, in the 'System Requirements' section,
>> it said 'Requires Windows 95 or better'. So I installed Linux."
>>
>> -Anonymous
>
--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://www.ptialaska.net/~floyd>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) [EMAIL PROTECTED]
------------------------------
From: Roland Scheike <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Serial Terminal
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 20:52:35 +0100
Hi,
I try to connect a Siemens/Nixdorf TC20 terminal to
a linux box via the serial line.
My settings of the terminal are:
v.24/ 38400 / 8n1/ xon,off, ANSI
On my linux-box I setted up inittab with the following:
S0:23:respawn:/sbin/agetty -L 38400 ttyS0 ansi
Now I have the problem that there is no response at all.
Getty is running fine- but there is no login-prompt on the
terminal.
Can anyone help me?
Btw. I don`t get any entries in my log file concerning
agetty. Can I change this?
Thanks,
Roland
------------------------------
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