Suse 9.0 on 8890 woes

We'll I tried to install Suse 9 on my 8890 using Promises RAID driver. It was an odd install. It froze a couple times on it's first boot after CD-1, but resetting the laptop got it continuing with the other 4 CD's and the install. After all configs, and new updates from suse it booted into the KDE, and locked up. What's odd is that I get this message everytime now....

""Kernal panic: VFS Unable to mount root fs on 08:06"

It suggests disabling apm, acpi, ht etc. With this suggestion "VFS: Cannot open root device "sda6" or 08:06 Please append a correct "root=" boot option. I don't get it...it saw the root throughout the install. I've tried repairs - activating the partitions which suse created on the raid 0 array. I set aside 10 gb at the end of the drive, and suse created two partions...root and swap.

During the raid driver install I had to add this line....""ide0=0x1f0,0x3f6,14 ide1=0x170,0x376,15 ide2=0 ide3=0 ide4=0 ide5=0 ide6=0 ide7=0 ide8=0 ide9=0""

Anybody got a clue what happened? Diabling all the power management stuff does nothing. The readme mentions an SMP issue. Should I interpret that to mean Hyper Threading too?

Well, installed with no apci and is worked great - right up until I tried ATI's graphics driver....now it's borked again. Not too happy about no 3D support, and I think the first install may have gotten messed up during the graphics config....when I choose 1280 x 1024 for both the lcd monitor, and the resolution at 24 bit.

migjam, I also found out that running the suse update screws up my raid array all over again. I get the VFS can not find root crap. So, no updates either.

I did dl the latest driver, but ran update a few too many times. It was successful until I added the kernal update, then I got the VFS can't find root kernal panic message again. I haven't had time to start from scratch again. Now..Suse v9.1 is about a month from release...based on Kernal v2.6 and KDE v3.2 so....I thought I'd try with that release instead. It would be nice to have it see my RAID 0 array right fron the get go, and install the promise drivers. It seems anytime any change is made to base packages the whole thing gets fubar'd with v9.0

Are you sure you had the right options typed in? Click on the no ACPI installation...that adds "no ACPI" to the options string at the bottom. Then type in a space and ide0=0x1f0,0x3f6,14 ide1=0x170,0x376,15 ide2=0 ide3=0 ide4=0 ide5=0 ide6=0 ide7=0 ide8=0 ide9=0 Have the Fast Track driver on a floppy (I removed the Suse v8.2 folder so it only had one driver to use.) It should load the driver. On some of my installs I had to type the string twice...like it lost the conditions it needed. It does work on the 8890. I don't know if Clevo switched the raid controller on the 8790 - check your specs, perhaps you need a different driver.

EDIT
I just thought of something else. I had to remove an external hard drive USB, and unplug one of my camera's 256mb compact flash disks that were stuck in the PC card slots next to the floppy. Also, I would remove the mp3 player/ 6-in-1 disk drive (front right hand side)....particularly if there is any storage media in it.

You are right...."ACPI=off" I was going by memory. I guess since it still isn't seeing the drive proper...I first created a partion with Partion Magic out of the 2 60 gb drives. I left 10 gb at the end of the drive. I then booted into Xp (Formatted ntfs) and deleted the partition. I wanted it to appear as free space to Suse. I also had the boot loader mount point on root. I haven't re-installed (I did it 3-4 times) - because I was going to wait for Promises new driver for kernal 2.6 and Suse v9.1. If I do get impatient and do it again...I'll see if there is anything I forgot and post it here.

EDIT..

I have been playing with all the distro's for over three years now, but I'm hardly an expert. I really like Suse big time, and I had Wine Rack installed...as well as MS Office, and Photoshop 7. Alll were working great. Please don't be offended, but you are following the Promise readme fof new installs...aren't you? I'll paste it in here. PUSH F3....Perhaps the ftp makes it different. I just don't know.

To install the FastTrak Series Linux Driver into a NEW SYSTEM:

1) Start the SuSE installation by booting from SuSE Linux CD1.

2) When CD boots, press F3 for Driver Disk and select
"Installation" option (see Note 3.1 below).

3) contiune with step2, and type parameters (see Note 3.2 below) in the
field.

4) Insert the PROMISE FastTrak Driver Disk when it displays
"Please insert the Driver Update floppy".

5) When Diver Update Menu pop-up, press "OK" and "back" for back to
installer.

6) Continue with the installation as normal.


[NOTE]

3.1) There is a SMP issue on SuSE Linux SMP kernel. If you got problems
on SuSE with SMP system. It is recommended to append "acpi=off"
parameters into boot loader or select "Installation -ACPI Disabled"
on SuSE linux SMP.

3.2) Linux Kernels 2.4.x misidentify Promise ATA-RAID controllers as
simple IDE controllers. This results in the built-in Linux IDE
driver trying to handle the controller and can prevent the proper
FastTrak ATA RAID driver from loading.

Follow the installation instructions AND the parameter commands
referred to below section. This status we called "IDE issue".

"ide0=0x1f0,0x3f6,14 ide1=0x170,0x376,15 ide2=0 ide3=0 ide4=0
ide5=0 ide6=0 ide7=0 ide8=0 ide9=0"

I think the whole point of the Promise controller in a raid 0 array is to make the two disks act as one. Thus, during boot the controller accesses the disks in such a manner that grub or any bootloader for that matter is reading the sequencial sectors as it they were apart of one physical drive.

You have identified the problem - however. If the driver isn't making the array disks visible - you will never get it to work. Here is a link to the driver I dl'd. I'll put it up for you so you can compare it to the one you got. Otherwise, it may be a function of doing a ftp install versus a CD install.

Link

http://www.s93081652.onlinehome.us./Share/Pix/raid.zip

mliu66,
I noticed on your other threads that you have been having to reinstall XP multiple times. I have thought about blowing out my XP install and starting from scratch, but I've spent too much time installing software etc. Anyway, I would suggest you disable the raid controller (thought about doing this many times myself). Assuming the 8790 is the same as the 8890...you lift the keyboard up and flip two swicthes....format the two drives and install both XP and Suse in that order. Should be a piece of cake. You will no longer see the promise controller configuration line during bootup. On the 8890 the IDE controller reverts to an Intel chip...so you see nothing from your RAID controller at all. Just an idea.