It's me again. After several unsuccessful tries to update the BIOS I brought it back to my dealer to let him do it. He now says that the mainboard is broken and I get my money back.
Now my question is should I go for the same mainboard again or what do you recommend? I suppose the LSI problem was due to the broken mainboard but the dealer also said that the LSI has the C7P67 not listed as a compatible board. What I want to connect to the mainboard is: 2x PCIe x8 for the LSI and the expander 1x PCIe x1 for the graphics card 1-2x PCIe x1 for TeVii sat card(s) 1-2x PCI for PVR-500 analogue TV card(s) It would be nice if it had a connector for the lan chassis LEDs :-) Best regards Ramon On Wed, 30 May 2012 17:38:01 -0500 Stan Hoeppner <s...@hardwarefreak.com> wrote: > On 5/30/2012 4:52 PM, Ramon Hofer wrote: > > On Tue, 29 May 2012 20:49:32 -0500 > > Stan Hoeppner <s...@hardwarefreak.com> wrote: > > > >> On 5/29/2012 7:09 AM, Ramon Hofer wrote: > >>> On Sun, 20 May 2012 21:37:19 -0500 > >>> Stan Hoeppner <s...@hardwarefreak.com> wrote: > >>> > >>> (...) > >>> > >>>> Does the mobo BIOS show the disk device? If not, does the 9240 > >>>> BIOS show the disk device, RAID level, and its size? > >>>> > >>>> What we need to figure out is whether this is a BIOS problem at > >>>> this point or a Debian installer kernel driver problem. > >>> > >>> I have finally found some time to work on the problem: > >>> > >>> I set up a raid1 in the hba bios. I couldn't install onto it with > >>> the supermicro mb. > >>> > >>> Then I mounted the lsi hba into my old server with an Asus mb > >>> (can't remember which one it is, must have to check it at > >>> home...). It (almost) works like a charm. > >>> The only issue is that I can't enter the hba BIOS when it's > >>> mounted in the Asus mb. But when I put it back into the > >>> Supermicro mb I can access it again. Very strange! > >> > >> This behavior isn't strange. Just about every mobo BIOS has an > >> option to ignore or load option ROMs. On your SuperMicro board > >> this is controlled by the setting "AddOn ROM Display Mode" under > >> the "Boot Feature" menu. Your ASUS board likely has a similar > >> feature that is currently disabled, preventing the LSI option ROM > >> from being loaded. > > > > Very interesting! I didn't know that. > > The values I can choose for the "AddOn ROM Display Mode" are > > "Keep current" and "Force Bios". I have chosen the Force Bios > > option. And I have disable the two options you describe below. > > In the supermicro the hba's init screen isn't displayed at all now. > > On the other hand in the asus I saw the init screen when the > > attached discs are listed I just can't enter the configuration > > program with ctrl+h although the message to press these keys is > > shown. > > > > I'm now able to boot into the 2.6.32-5 kernel. > > It takes quite a while until the megasas module was loaded (I > > suppose: the over-current messages are shown for a while ~2 mins > > and then it's boot normally until the login prompt. > > When I leave it alone I get the message: > > > > INFO: task scsi_scan_0:341 blocked for more than 120 seconds. > > "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this > > message. > > > > After booting the first time this evening I installed the bpo 3.2 > > kernel. > > When I try to reboot the stable kernel the system hangs after the > > message "Will now restart." > > > > After a while the above message about the blocked task appears > > again. > > > > The bpo kernel 3.2 seems to fail. The two over current-messages are > > shown and then this message: > > http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=XqVunR9e > > > > > > When I load the stable kernel it stop for a while again after the > > over-current message then finally gets to the login prompt. After a > > while I got this message: > > http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=w409KaFN > > > > > >>> But apart from that I could install Debian onto the raid1. Then I > >>> set > >> > >> This was on the ASUS board correct? Were you able to boot the > >> RAID1 device after install? If so this indeed would be strange as > >> you should not be able to boot from the HBA if its ROM isn't > >> loaded. > > > > No I wasn't able to boot the kernel installed to the RAID1. Grub was > > loaded but only because I've installed it to the disk directly > > attached to the MB's SATA controller. > > But when choosing the RAID1 kernel it stopped (can't remember the > > message anymore). I thought I haven't set the boot option for the > > raid1 in the hba bios properly. > > > > > >>> the bios to use the disks as jbods and installed Debian gain to a > >>> drive directly attached to the mb sata controller. > >>> With the original squeeze kernel the disks attached to the hba > >>> weren't visible. But after updating to the bpo kernel I can fdisk > >>> them separately and put it into a raid5 (in the end I want to > >>> apply the 500G partition method Cameleon suggested). > >> > >> This experience with the ASUS board leads me to wonder if disabling > >> the option ROM and INT19 on the SM board would allow everything to > >> function properly. Try that before you take the board to the > >> dealer for flashing. Assuming you've deleted any BIOS configured > >> RAID devices in the HBA BIOS already and all drives are configured > >> for JBOD mode, drop the HBA back into the SM board, go into the SM > >> BIOS, set "PCI Slot X Option ROM" to "DISABLED" where X is the > >> number of the PCIe slot in which the LSI HBA is inserted. Set > >> "Interrupt 19 Capture" to "DISABLED". Save settings and reboot. > >> > >> You should now see the same behavior as on the ASUS, including the > >> HBA BIOS not showing up during the boot process. Which I'm > >> thinking is the key to it working on the ASUS as the ROM code is > >> never resident. Thus it is not causing problems with kernel > >> driver, which is apparently assuming the 9240 series ROM will not > >> be resident. > > > > Maybe I wasn't clear about that. The hba BIOS seems to be loaded in > > the asus as well but I just can't enter its setting with ctrl+h. > > > > Does all of this tell us anything :-? > > > > > >> This loading of the option ROM code is what some would consider the > >> difference between "HBA RAID mode" and "HBA JBOD mode". > > > > Well then it seems as if I want to use Linux software raid I would > > better keep the setting to disable the loading of the option ROM :-/ > > > > > >>>> Did you already flash the C7P67 BIOS to the latest version? I > >>>> can't recall. > >>> > >>> I have tried to do that but it was quite strange. > >>> I created a freedos usb stick with unetbootin and copied the files > >>> for the update from supermicro into the stick. I did exactly what > >>> the readmes told me. But when I did it the first time there was no > >>> output of the flash process and the directory where the supermicro > >>> files were located on the stick was empty. > >>> When I tried to do the procedure again it complains that I have to > >>> first install version 1. > >> > >> Unfortunately flashing mobo BIOS is still not always an uneventful > >> nor routine process, even in 2012. > > > > Yes, I've had issues with both times I tried to do that (now and > > about a year ago with an Intel mainboard) :-( > > Maybe this should tell me something ;-) > > > > > >>> I will now bring it to my dealer who can do the BIOS update for > >>> me. > >>> > >>> And I will write to Supermicro if they are aware of the issue. > >> > >> Try what I mention above before doing either of these things. > > > > I've already mailed both of them on Monday. > > > > The dealer tells me to do anything on my own. > > > > But Supermicro is very helpful. They described how to flash the bios > > before they knew about the problem I have with the v1.10 that the > > BIOS updater wants me to install first. > > They even attached the zip. Unfortunately it wasn't complete (the > > installer complained about a missing file). > > > > They're also helping me to install v1.10 but again I can't find > > a .ROM file which I should rename according to their instruction in > > the mail. So I asked again this evening... > > > > Hopefully I can flash v1.10 to the Supermicro tomorrow and then > > update to the newest version. > > Maybe I then am already able to boot :-) > > Or I try the steps you described about a week ago again and keep the > > load option ROM setting off. > > If this doesn't help neither I will try the newest firmware from lsi > > which has just been released on May 21, 2012. > > > > Is this a good idea or do you have a better advice? > > I'd get the mobo and HBA BIOS to the latest revs. Then if it still > doesn't work, as I recommended earlier, you need to try another > non-Debian based distro to eliminate the possibility that Debian is > doing something goofy in their kernels. If neither the latest > versions of SuSE nor Fedora work, then it's clear you have an > upstream kernel issue, or a hardware issue. Either way, that gives > you good information to present to LSI Support when you contact them. > > Ultimately, if anyone is to have the answer to this mystery, it will > be LSI, or upstream kernel devs, as you've performed pretty much all > possible troubleshooting steps of an end user. You may want to post a > brief description of the problem to the linux-scsi list. The guys who > wrote and maintain the upstream LSI Linux drivers are on that mailing > list. > > FWIW, LSI certifies the 9240-4i (all their boards actually) as > compatible with all point releases of Debian 5.x. They don't have a > compat doc later than Dec 2010 for this board series, so I'm not sure > what their support policy is for Debian 6. > -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20120606163652.7cf48dda@hoferr-x61s.hofer.rummelring
