Hello LQ Community,

I am having some issues using SCSI device with Red Hat and was hoping that someone may have some ideas as to what the problem may be. Essentially, the device I am attempting to use is a media reader (called a MiroCID). This reader is externally connected via a SCSI cable that is plugged into a SCSI adapter card internally. The adapter plugs into a PCI slot on the motherboard (believe the hardware model is a SCSI Card 2940U). Upon booting up, the BIOS seems to recognize both the SCSI adapter card and the SCSI reader (connected through the adapter). When Linux boots, I get the message regarding the card/periphreal:

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:08:03:0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ169
scsi2: Adaptec AIC7XXX EISA/VLB/PCI SCSI HBA DRIVER, Rev 6.2.36
<Adaptec 2940A Ultra SCSI adapter>
aic7860: Ultra Single Channel A, SCSI Id=7, 3/253 SCBs

(scsi2:A:0:0): refuses synchronous neogtiation. Using asynchronous transfers.
Vendor: FAIRCHLD Model: MICROCID Rev: 201C
Type: Direct-Access ANSI SCSI revision: 02

It seems to have automatically detected the necessary drivers and even lists the device correctly under SCSI devices in Hardware Settings. However, I was under the impression that whenever a card was connected (to be read) a new device would appear under the /dev directory as /dev/sdb, /dev/st0, /dev/scd, /dev/sg1 or something similiar. However, the only scsi device I can find is /dev/sda which I believe is the main hard drive for the machine. Does anyone have any advice as to how I can transfer data and preferably mount this device and use it similiar to a hard drive? If it helps, I am running Red Hat with kernel version 2.6.9-67.ELsmp

Thanks in advance!
Chris

Welcome to LinuxQuestions.

I am unfamiliar with the microCID media reader and therefore do not know how it operates. However, whereas USB, Firewire and SATA were designed for hotplugging (both hardware and drivers) from the beginning that isn't the case for SCSI. AFAIK the 2940 is not hotplug capable.

Have you tried booting the computer with a card already connected? If so and no device is being created you might have to manually install some additional modules.

Here is a script to rescan the SCSI bus but do not know if it will work in your case.
http://www.garloff.de/kurt/linux/res...si-bus.sh-1.25

Thanks for the reply. I have tried booting both with and without media present in the reader with no luck. I will give your script a try and see what happens.

You might also need to load scsi_mod and sd_mod modules. i.e. (as root)
modprobe scsi_mod
modprobe sd_mod

Still no luck. Is there any way to "ping" the scsi device to see if the OS can even recognize/communicate with it?

Look at the output of the dmesg command. Might be some clues.

Ok, a bit more digging seems to show that the reader is in fact being identified correctly. If this is true, how do a "read"/mount the media in the reader? Here's a bit more info...

As far as dmesg... I am getting the same info as posted in the original post.

Doing:

cat /proc/scsi/scsi

Shows:

Attached devices:
Host: scsi0 Channel: 00 Id: 00 Lun: 00
Vendor: ATA Model: ST3250310NS Rev: SN06
Type: Direct-access ANSI SCSI revision: 05

Host: scsi2 Channel: 00 Id: 01 Lun: 00
Vendor: FAIRCHLD Model: MICROCID Rev: 201C
Type: Direct-access ANSI SCSI revision: 02


cat /proc/scsi/scsi/aic7xxx/2

Shows:

Adaptec AIC7XXX driver version: 6.2.36
Adaptec 2940A Ultra SCSI adapter
aic7860: Ultra Single channel A, SCSI Id=7, 3/253 SCBs
Allocated SCBs: 4, SG List Length: 128

Serial EEPROM:
0x028d......
.
.
.
.

Target 0 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)
Target 1 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)
Goal: 3.300MB/s transfers
Curr: 3.300MB/s transfers
Channel A Target 1 Lun 0 Settings
Commands Queued 4
Commands Active 0
Command Openings 1
Max Tagged Openings 0
Device Queue Frozen Count 0
Target 3 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)
Target 4 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)
Target 5 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)
Target 6 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)
Target 7 Negoation Settings
User: 20.000MB/s transfers (20.000MHz, offset 127)

Bump...

Anyone else have any ideas? Still struggling with this.

Thats a good news that ur media hub or card reader is being detected .. try to insert it with media card and do following:

check Disk Utility if it shows the device in there too ?? ..

second option u can try is to use mount commmand like mount [path]

hope it helps.