I am dubbing about this for a some time. As I am using LFS and a CLFS x86_64 under construction, I am building the kernel from source, but even if I build with halve a ton of driver, it does not contain the right driver for my the sata chip on my P5K/EPU bord. Because it does not contain the right driver the disk performance is horrible. I am currently running LFS from a native IDE drive, which gives good disk performance, but that is only a work around, because I want to use my sata disk.
Currently the 2.6.26.5 kernel I use for LFS now sees the drive as IDE (BIOS settings allow that) and the cdrom is also sata, meaning it is also seen as IDE.
I know Ubuntu (and others) have the right driver, but is there now way I can that for my (C)LFS?
As last the lspci output which may help:
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation 82G33/G31/P35/P31 Express DRAM Controller (rev 02)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82G33/G31/P35/P31 Express PCI Express Root Port (rev 02)
00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #4 (rev 02)
00:1a.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #5 (rev 02)
00:1a.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #6 (rev 02)
00:1a.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #2 (rev 02)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 02)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 1 (rev 02)
00:1c.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 5 (rev 02)
00:1c.5 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) PCI Express Port 6 (rev 02)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #1 (rev 02)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #2 (rev 02)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB UHCI Controller #3 (rev 02)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller #1 (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev 92)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801IB (ICH9) LPC Interface Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801IB (ICH9) 2 port SATA IDE Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.5 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) 2 port SATA IDE Controller (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation GeForce 8800 GTS 512 (rev a2)
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8056 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 12)
03:00.0 IDE interface: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE6101 single-port PATA133 interface (rev b2)
05:03.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6306 Fire II IEEE 1394 OHCI Link Layer Controller (rev c0)

check ahci and libata driver or ata_piix one of those should do the trick.

it-etch:~# modinfo ahci
filename: /lib/modules/2.6.18-6-686/kernel/drivers/scsi/ahci.ko
author: Jeff Garzik
description: AHCI SATA low-level driver
license: GPL
version: 2.0
vermagic: 2.6.18-6-686 SMP mod_unload 686 REGPARM gcc-4.1
depends: libata,scsi_mod

it-etch:~# modinfo libata
filename: /lib/modules/2.6.18-6-686/kernel/drivers/scsi/libata.ko
author: Jeff Garzik
description: Library module for ATA devices
license: GPL
version: 2.00
vermagic: 2.6.18-6-686 SMP mod_unload 686 REGPARM gcc-4.1
depends: scsi_mod
srcversion: 26F21185FD60B09940EBE71
parm: ata_probe_timeout:Set ATA probing timeout (seconds) (int)
parm: fua:FUA support (0=off, 1=on) (int)
parm: atapi_dmadir:Enable ATAPI DMADIR bridge support (0=off, 1=on) (int)
parm: atapi_enabled:Enable discovery of ATAPI devices (0=off, 1=on) (int)

I would try to recompile a 2.6.26.x kernel. I will make sure both of those options are ticked (I always build a kernel with tons of options, may, not very nice, way to make sure it works). However I vaguely remember having those options, but I am not sure. So rebuild for the go then.

The recompile delivered the same value, same result as first. And yes all those options were checked.

From what I understand there are two drivers that will work for that depending on what mode you have set for the controller in the BIOS. If the BIOS is set for ahci that is the driver you need. if it's set for IDE then you need the ata_piix Driver. so theres a coordination of settings you need to have set in order for things to work. Beyond that I dunno what else to recommend.

The bios is set to allow sata as ide. I can try to convert that back and force ahci instead of also allowing IDE.