Change to Kernel 2.6.30.9, booting always hang

Weibin Zheng · 11-20-2009, 03:45 AM

Hi,

I have Redhat EL5 installed, with Intel (ICH10 Family) 4 port SATA IDE Controller. It runs ok. But when I compile the new kernel of 2.6.30.9 and boot, it always hangs. Sort of errors like ' Could not find device /dev/root'.

I have tried to use ata_piix.ko or piix.ko in initrd. -- failed.

I tried to compile 'Intel ESB, ICH, PIIX3, PIIX4 PATA/SATA support' as builtin, failed again.

How can I make my machine run?

lazlow · 11-20-2009, 08:53 AM

What version (full version number) of the RHEL kernel where you running before? You do understand that while RHEL uses a 2.6.18 based kernel (and always will) that this kernel is back ported to be (hardware and security wise) the rough equivalent of a much newer vanilla kernel? The -164.6 kernel is much closer to a vanilla .30 kernel than it is to a vanilla .18 kernel.

DrLove73 · 11-21-2009, 04:07 AM

You should compile with support for LVM and RAID. LVM is installed by default on any RHEL 5.x

I agree with lazlow, newer kernel with no support for it defies RHEL's purpose as STABLE platform. RHEL <=5.4 does have problems with Audio on ICH10, but there is no real reason to void stability because of it. And RHEL's kernels are one of most tested and stable kernels around.

Weibin Zheng · 11-21-2009, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lazlow

What version (full version number) of the RHEL kernel where you running before? You do understand that while RHEL uses a 2.6.18 based kernel (and always will) that this kernel is back ported to be (hardware and security wise) the rough equivalent of a much newer vanilla kernel? The -164.6 kernel is much closer to a vanilla .30 kernel than it is to a vanilla .18 kernel.

I do not know its exact version. How to get it? 'uname -a' gets the kernel version '2.6.18-8.el5'.

Thank you for your advise. I will try the kernel-2.6.18-164.6 stuff.

Weibin Zheng · 11-21-2009, 09:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DrLove73

You should compile with support for LVM and RAID. LVM is installed by default on any RHEL 5.x

I agree with lazlow, newer kernel with no support for it defies RHEL's purpose as STABLE platform. RHEL <=5.4 does have problems with Audio on ICH10, but there is no real reason to void stability because of it. And RHEL's kernels are one of most tested and stable kernels around.

Compiled with LVM/RAID support does not help me. I will try the Redhat kernels. In fact, I use the 2.6.30 for the Realtek 8111/8138 ethernet card and the RT73, ath5/9 Wireless card support.

lazlow · 11-21-2009, 10:47 PM

For wireless you can see this link:

Quote:

http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/Laptop...47452d2ca61fb5

Elrepo also has Kmods for the 8111:

Quote:

http://elrepo.org/tiki/kmod-r8168

Weibin Zheng · 11-22-2009, 03:16 AM

I downloaded the kernel-2.6.18-164.6.1.el5.src.rpm from Redhat ftp site. Installed it using 'rpm -i', I got a lot of patches and linux-2.6.18.tar.bz2. Do not know how to patch all these patch-files in one command. I unzip the linux-2.6.18.tar.bz2, and try the following command.
-- 'find ../ -name "linux*patch" | xargs cat | patch -p1'.

But it seems not working.

lazlow · 11-22-2009, 09:42 AM

Why not just pull the precompiled binary rpm?

DrLove73 · 11-22-2009, 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lazlow

Why not just pull the precompiled binary rpm?

Exactly. You could also try installing kernel from centosplus repository, it has all of the modules enabled so there is no need for custom kernel.

Weibin Zheng · 11-22-2009, 08:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DrLove73

Exactly. You could also try installing kernel from centosplus repository, it has all of the modules enabled so there is no need for custom kernel.

Thank you, lazlow and love. I have made my 8168 card work.

The rt73 wireless USB device also works, but I am not sure if it is stable. Before this, I installed the rt73-cvs-2009041204 package on another old machine, and found the driver is very broken (causing the machine hang for many times). I hope the new (?) firmware could help me.

Thank both of you again.