Confirmed SATA Installs

[sandy_mcclintoc]

The Tyan S8228 Twin Opteron board works OK.
I was hoping to use RAID-0 SATA but Fedora 3 just grabbed the two drives and configured them as one big volume. I suppose its a sort of RAID-0

[lprince83068]

Motherboard: MSI K8T Neo-FIS2R
HardDisk: Samsung 160GB SP1614C SATA

Succeeded in installing drive. Although a 160GB drive, during boot it only shows it as a 149GB as well as Win XP Pro SP2 shows it as a 149GB?

What is the problem? Any fixes?

Thanks!

[kmkale]

Just installed on a Tyan Tiger K8W. This board has the Silicon Image Sil3114 SATA controller that can do RAID 0 and 1. Installing to the SATA drives works fine. Installing to a RAID 0 or 1 array (created in the Silicon Image bios) doesn't work. FC2 still sees the two drives as separate.

This isn't a problem for me, I set up a software RAID 1 in FC2 that does the same thing.

Brad

How did you install FC to tyan k8w with sata drive as the boot device? Please guide me as I need to install this machine in my college lab most urgently.

[kmkale]

Just finished a fresh install of FC3 64 on a Tyan Tiger K8W
(S2875) with two Opterons. Installation on SATA was not a
problem but could not get RAID on the boot partition working
during install. (I was previously using software mirror RAID
on my boot partition).

rudi

Hello,
On the k8w did you install boot on sata drive? if yes could you please tell me how? I am unable to get FC3 to boot on the sata drive. Tried inserting the drivers s per instructions found on tyan site & everywhere else but no go.
Please guide me as i need to install this mchine pronto in my college lab.

[ashokpai]

i have been trying 15 hours a day, non stop for the last 8 days. i have tried, ubuntu, fc3 - amd 64 and x86 versions, in all combinations. just coudlnt get my machine working. (my specs are similar to most here - amd 3000+ newcastle, asus k8n, samsung 160gb sata, 40 gb seagate - ide drive, 512 mb ram, etc.). i was trying to install linux on ide/slave and get the grub/ lilo install on the winxp on sata/master. somehow it wouldnt write it on to the mbr on sata disk. i tried it every way - making it slave or master. different version of linux, lilo and grub, all of them drew a blank.
i read someplace that i have to use "noapic" in grub, i am not familiar with the usage, but i can read a bit and use it - or if suggested. in some other forums they suggested that the sata_nv was loaded as a seperate module and this made it not recognise the disk to write to the mbr (even though it could be written to or read - as in mounting drives, etc). the solution there was to include the sata_nv into the kernel and recompile the kernel. for a not-so-seasoned linux user like me this isnt a very happy job - recompiling kernel.
could someone help me here? thanx! help much appreciated.

[ashokpai]

Motherboard: MSI K8T Neo-FIS2R
HardDisk: Samsung 160GB SP1614C SATA

Succeeded in installing drive. Although a 160GB drive, during boot it only shows it as a 149GB as well as Win XP Pro SP2 shows it as a 149GB?

What is the problem? Any fixes?

Thanks!

i too have a samsung sata disk, you can use thier disk manager utility (samsung- www.samsung.com/Products/HardDiskDrive/utilities/ ). you can use it to partition or format your hard disk, and the maximum usable space (around 160 gb.) yu need to use that before yo install anything, uh, need a floppy too to boot from it and do the needful. thats a small utility.

[Flanker]

i too have a samsung sata disk, you can use thier disk manager utility (samsung- www.samsung.com/Products/HardDiskDrive/utilities/ ). you can use it to partition or format your hard disk, and the maximum usable space (around 160 gb.) yu need to use that before yo install anything, uh, need a floppy too to boot from it and do the needful. thats a small utility.

The hd-size that Samsung gives is the, well let´s say "marketing"-size. It is the size that the unformated disk has. The formated hd will have a smaller size. All other hd-vendors trying to fool us likewise.
But the main point is the way Linux/Unix creates partitions. Have a look at the man-page of mkfs.ext3 or mkfs.ext2. Check the " -m" option. By default Linux will reserve 5% of the filesystem-blocks for the superuser.
5% from 160 GB makes 9GB. Keep in mind the formated size of your hd and you will get 149 GB.

To avoid this, create your partitions by using the install disk or similar and use the mkfs.ext3 command with the "-m" option.

cu

[ashokpai]

The hd-size that Samsung gives is the, well let´s say "marketing"-size. It is the size that the unformated disk has. The formated hd will have a smaller size. All other hd-vendors trying to fool us likewise.
But the main point is the way Linux/Unix creates partitions. Have a look at the man-page of mkfs.ext3 or mkfs.ext2. Check the " -m" option. By default Linux will reserve 5% of the filesystem-blocks for the superuser.
5% from 160 GB makes 9GB. Keep in mind the formated size of your hd and you will get 149 GB.

To avoid this, create your partitions by using the install disk or similar and use the mkfs.ext3 command with the "-m" option.

cu

u r correct there. i hadnt seen the correct numbers, initially, when i had installed my winxp, it just showed me 130 gb or so. later, i had to get the disk manager to fix it. yeah, its the marketing numbers that usually fool us - there's plenty of debate online this regarding the "available" disk space, "total" disk space, "formatted" disk space. thanks for pointing it out. i did a bit of digging and am wiser now

[kmkale]

I got my Tyan k8w to work with the sata disk after a fashion by inserting the drivers during install by doing linux dd.
Also you may find the following usefull for installing the mbr. It workes for me on a 64bit amd bord from asus but did not work for this dual procesor tyan k8w board.
Here goes............................ you can ignore the raid stuff if you dont want to use it.

Overall approach - Here are the high-level steps to get the beast running smoothly:

1) Install FC3, creating bootable RAID and second RAID LVM group,
2) Partially complete GRUB install,
3) Complete RAID install,
4) Complete GRUB install,
5) Test, test, and more test

DETAILS:
--------

1) INSTALL FC3, CREATING BOOTABLE RAID AND SECOND RAID LVM GROUP. Keys to success: both drive pairs must be partitioned exactly the same, with the appropriate partitions matched into RAID1 arrays. On the primary bootable array, I reserved 100MB for use with md0 (on both drives), 2GB for swap (both drives), and allocated the remaining space as md1. On the second drive pair, I allocated all the space to md2. I then mapped /boot to md0, and joined md1 and md2 into a LVM volume group, and mapped / to the new volume group.

At completion of the install, I tried a reboot, and the machine froze at GRUB.

2) PARTIALLY COMPLETE GRUB INSTALL - keys to success: boot from your CD using "linux rescue" option to get a command prompt. Change root to the newly created system (>> chroot /mnt/sysimage), and run grub. Below are the commands I used (you would substitute for your first SATA hard disk - mine was /dev/sda)

grub
> device (hd0) /dev/sda
> root (hd0,0)
> setup (hd0)

These commands make the first hard disk of your RAID array bootable. However, the second can't be made bootable until RAID is up and running properly. See step 3.

3) COMPLETE RAID INSTALL - Keys to success: boot the new hard disk, and check to see that your RAID arrays are working properly, using > cat /proc/mdstat.

[root@jigsaw ~]# cat /proc/mdstat

Personalities : [raid1]
md1 : active raid1 sdb2[1] sda2[0]
33945280 blocks [2/2] [UU]

md2 : active raid1 sdc1[0] sdd1[1]
156288256 blocks [2/2] [UU]

md0 : active raid1 sdb1[0] sda1[1]
104320 blocks [2/2] [UU]

This shows a properly working array. Note md0 - both partitions are listed. My first time through, I found that I was missing the other half of my RAID pair. SO - I needed to add them "hot" and rebuild the RAID. Here is the trick:

>> mdadm /dev/md0 --add /dev/sdb1

This will "hot add" /dev/sdb1 back into /dev/mdO and rebuild the RAID pair. For larger drives, this syncing make take a while. You can check the status with "cat /proc/mdstat"

4) COMPLETE THE GRUB INSTALL - Keys to success: once the /boot partition is properly synced (see step 3), then you can tell GRUB to boot from either disk. Let's repeat step two, activating the MBR for the first partition on each drive of the RAID array on /boot.

grub
> device (hd0) /dev/sda
> root (hd0,0)
> setup (hd0)
> device (hd1) /dev/sdb
> root (hd1,0)
> setup (hd1)

If you try this without completing the RAID install, you'll get "ERROR 15: file not found". Why? the /boot partition isn't properly mirrored across the disks.

5) TEST, TEST, and TEST - Keys to success: patience. a) power down, b) unplug a drive, c) power up and watch the bios, d) ensure you get a boot, e) check to see if all data is accessible, f) power down, g) replug the drive, h) power up and watch the bios, i) rebuild the array using "mdadm /dev/mdx --add /dev/sdyy"

[wdtj]

Not exactly Fedora related, but worth a menton here.

Well, after trying to get my MSI K8T800 with the VT8237 chip to talk SATA to two new Western Digital WD800JD disks, I found there is a compatibility issue with the WD800JD drives. Seems they want to talk SATA2 and the VT8237 get's confused. It only does SATA150.

I ended sending the WD800JD to WDC and they sent me 2 new WD1200 sata drives that did work.

Now, if only I could get hardware RAID to work with FC4T1.

[pza]

Gigabyte K8NS 939 Ultra has 4 SATA channels. 2 are with some silicon chip, and to nvidia ones (which are hot pluggable). The FC3 installation only works with the 2 nvidia channels, however using the latest FC3 kernel update, you can access all 4 channels.

FC4 (Test 1) installation works with all 4 channels.

[JLF_65]

Not exactly Fedora related, but worth a menton here.

Well, after trying to get my MSI K8T800 with the VT8237 chip to talk SATA to two new Western Digital WD800JD disks, I found there is a compatibility issue with the WD800JD drives. Seems they want to talk SATA2 and the VT8237 get's confused. It only does SATA150.

I ended sending the WD800JD to WDC and they sent me 2 new WD1200 sata drives that did work.

Now, if only I could get hardware RAID to work with FC4T1.

The K8T800 doesn't do hardware RAID. It's software RAID only. It has drivers for Windows built into the BIOS, and a driver disk for Windows, but these are just software RAID targetted at Windows. If you don't need Windows compatibility, don't even try to use these. Just stick to standard linux software RAID and you'll be fine. The linux RAID driver from VIA for Windows compatibility is really old and buggy. I don't recall seeing any reports of people using it successfully.

I have two 80G Hitachi SATA drives running under linux software RAID in FC3 on my MSI K8T800 mobo. One thing, as noted above, booting off RAID is a royal pain. I suggest you not bother. Just make the boot partition non-RAID and the rest of the partitions RAID.

[wdtj]

Thank you, I know the VT8237 will not do hardware raid. The problem I had was the the drives were never visible to the BIOS, so I couldn't even define a hardware RAID.

I called WDC support. They acknowledged that there is a compatiblity issue. They shipped me two new 120Gb Sata drives that work great.

Just wanted others to know about the problem so it doesn't cause them a months worth of headaches like it did me.

[Ridgerunner]

I got my Tyan k8w to work with the sata disk after a fashion by inserting the drivers during install by doing linux dd.
Also you may find the following usefull for installing the mbr. It workes for me on a 64bit amd bord from asus but did not work for this dual procesor tyan k8w board.
Here goes............................ you can ignore the raid stuff if you dont want to use it.

Overall approach - Here are the high-level steps to get the beast running smoothly:

1) Install FC3, creating bootable RAID and second RAID LVM group,
2) Partially complete GRUB install,
3) Complete RAID install,
4) Complete GRUB install,
5) Test, test, and more test

DETAILS:
--------

1) INSTALL FC3, CREATING BOOTABLE RAID AND SECOND RAID LVM GROUP. Keys to success: both drive pairs must be partitioned exactly the same, with the appropriate partitions matched into RAID1 arrays. On the primary bootable array, I reserved 100MB for use with md0 (on both drives), 2GB for swap (both drives), and allocated the remaining space as md1. On the second drive pair, I allocated all the space to md2. I then mapped /boot to md0, and joined md1 and md2 into a LVM volume group, and mapped / to the new volume group.

At completion of the install, I tried a reboot, and the machine froze at GRUB.

2) PARTIALLY COMPLETE GRUB INSTALL - keys to success: boot from your CD using "linux rescue" option to get a command prompt. Change root to the newly created system (>> chroot /mnt/sysimage), and run grub. Below are the commands I used (you would substitute for your first SATA hard disk - mine was /dev/sda)

grub
> device (hd0) /dev/sda
> root (hd0,0)
> setup (hd0)

These commands make the first hard disk of your RAID array bootable. However, the second can't be made bootable until RAID is up and running properly. See step 3.

3) COMPLETE RAID INSTALL - Keys to success: boot the new hard disk, and check to see that your RAID arrays are working properly, using > cat /proc/mdstat.

[root@jigsaw ~]# cat /proc/mdstat

Personalities : [raid1]
md1 : active raid1 sdb2[1] sda2[0]
33945280 blocks [2/2] [UU]

md2 : active raid1 sdc1[0] sdd1[1]
156288256 blocks [2/2] [UU]

md0 : active raid1 sdb1[0] sda1[1]
104320 blocks [2/2] [UU]

This shows a properly working array. Note md0 - both partitions are listed. My first time through, I found that I was missing the other half of my RAID pair. SO - I needed to add them "hot" and rebuild the RAID. Here is the trick:

>> mdadm /dev/md0 --add /dev/sdb1

This will "hot add" /dev/sdb1 back into /dev/mdO and rebuild the RAID pair. For larger drives, this syncing make take a while. You can check the status with "cat /proc/mdstat"

4) COMPLETE THE GRUB INSTALL - Keys to success: once the /boot partition is properly synced (see step 3), then you can tell GRUB to boot from either disk. Let's repeat step two, activating the MBR for the first partition on each drive of the RAID array on /boot.

grub
> device (hd0) /dev/sda
> root (hd0,0)
> setup (hd0)
> device (hd1) /dev/sdb
> root (hd1,0)
> setup (hd1)

If you try this without completing the RAID install, you'll get "ERROR 15: file not found". Why? the /boot partition isn't properly mirrored across the disks.

5) TEST, TEST, and TEST - Keys to success: patience. a) power down, b) unplug a drive, c) power up and watch the bios, d) ensure you get a boot, e) check to see if all data is accessible, f) power down, g) replug the drive, h) power up and watch the bios, i) rebuild the array using "mdadm /dev/mdx --add /dev/sdyy"

Did you have 4 hard drives for this install??

Ken

[kmkale]

Did you have 4 hard drives for this install??

Ken

YES. Had 4 drives 2 SATA & 2 IDE. Had trouble inserting mbr on SATA. I found this post somewhere on the net while trying to solve this problem. Found it VERY usefull so gave it here verbatim. My many thanks to the original poster.