SATA Hard Drive not supported?

Yes, I know, there are tons of topics about this around - and I've searched, I'm usually not one to just post and ask if the answers are lying around, but googling nor searching in the forum has helped me out on this one.

The problem is the one most people have on this subject - my SATA drive is not detected. Not by Fedora Core 6, nor by Ubuntu 6.10. I have a WDC WD1600JS(-00NCB1), and a google on that hasn't helped me either.

Of course it's not the distro being too old, for Core 6 is the latest Fedora and 6.10 is the latest stable (non-Alpha) Ubuntu the moment I type this.

I have tried searching my bios for "Legacy ATA" or "PATA" or anything that looks like it, but I couldn't find anything that could solve this.

I would really like some help on getting this working, so no "Just plug in an IDE drive".
Thanks in advance guys.

It is not your hard drive that is the problem but which sata interface on the motherboard is the problem. Please try again posting again this time provide the details of your system (make and model) or your motherboard (make and model) for example.

http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Essays/smart-questions.html

I checked that URL, but yeah.

Err, I have a FOXCONN 6627MA Mainboard. I don't know the difference between the make and model, so .. yeah.

Edit
lspci -vvv got me this:

00:05.0 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SATA Controller / IDE mode (rev 02) (prog-if 85 [Master SecO PriO])
	Subsystem: Foxconn International, Inc. Unknown device 0c98
	Control: I/O+ Mem- BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
	Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B- ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
	Latency: 0
	Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 11
	Region 0: I/O ports at fd00 [size=8]
	Region 1: I/O ports at fc00 [size=4]
	Region 2: I/O ports at fb00 [size=8]
	Region 3: I/O ports at fa00 [size=4]
	Region 4: I/O ports at f900 [size=16]
	Region 5: I/O ports at f800 [size=128]
	Capabilities: [58] Power Management version 2
		Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold+)
		Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

Hope that helps.

(Right now I have an IDE drive plugged in, but it's only 40 Gigs and slow/old as fuck. So I want my 160Gig SATA drive working :P)

It looks like all FOXCONN 6627MA motherboards use the Sis662 Intergated chipset. As a suggestion try booting the system from one of the Live CD's for Fedora Core 6 or Ubuntu as I'm not finding much info on the Si662 chipset support in Linux.

Yeah, they don't detect the drives either. Tried it.

Looks like nobody has support of the chipset yet, a search of the latest pci-ids shows nothing for the interface;

http://pciids.sourceforge.net/

So basically I'm screwed right now?

Maybe not,

I have a test case which you can try if you desire here, you will need the kernel development packages or a kernel source installed to try;

http://www.centos.org/modules/newbb/...=6726&forum=29

The instructions are in the README file once you unzip the file. I used the SiS driver package from; http://www.sis.com/download/agreemen...url=/download/ as the base. And edited the sata_sis.c file from the 2.6.20-rc5 kernel source for the new chips but should build with any 2.6.19 or better kernel, hope this resolves the problem.

Edit(1-20-2007 11:00AM local time):

Try the second round driver (my second post at the link above) just remember this driver is experimental.

.

Actually, I have the exact same issue on another PC which uses the SiS 5513 chipset, I think. :/

If you do have a PC which uses the SiS 5513 chipset then you should not have a problem if the kernel(s) have the support built-in for the chipset.

00:02.5 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5513 [IDE] (prog-if 80 [Master])
        Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Unknown device 0083
        Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 128, IRQ 16
        [virtual] Memory at 000001f0 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [disabled] [size=8]
        [virtual] Memory at 000003f0 (type 3, non-prefetchable) [disabled] [size=1]
        [virtual] Memory at 00000170 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [disabled] [size=8]
        [virtual] Memory at 00000370 (type 3, non-prefetchable) [disabled] [size=1]
        I/O ports at 2000 [size=16]

$ sudo hdparm -tT /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
Timing cached reads: 796 MB in 2.00 seconds = 397.31 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 86 MB in 3.07 seconds = 28.03 MB/sec

$ cat /proc/modules | grep pata_sis
pata_sis 12308 2 - Live 0xffffffff88048000
libata 91040 2 pata_sis,ata_generic, Live 0xffffffff8802d000

I'm running the 2.6.20-rc5 kernel with PATA support and no IDE support. Before I did this with the 2.6.20-rc5 kernel I did have to specify the IDE/ATA/ATAPI SIS support in the kernels I built.

Yeah, my lspci says that as well.
But my Fedora setup still doesn't detect it..

Well I guess it's end of the road for Fedora then, since it doesn't allow me to build my own kernel or something either.

If I may ask, what's your distro (I see it in your profile and all, but what the hell is RHEL5, Red Hat?) and how did you specify the SiS support in the kernel? Thanks in advance.

Edit
I can pass parameters to the kernel at setup, any specific parameters I should use to enable the SiS IDE/ATA/ATAPI support specifically or what?

Edit Edit
This page says some stuff about SiS, including stuff about "South bridge", which is a name I've also come across in my bios. So I think I have that. It says it's been supported since 2004 and kernel 2.6.9 and all, and Fedora definitely has that. My drive is still not detected though.

Edit Edit Edit
I loaded Ubuntu 6.10 Live CD, and guess what I found?

00:02.5 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5513 [IDE] (rev 01) (prog-if 80 [Master])
        Subsystem: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS5513 EIDE Controller (A,B step)
        Control: I/O+ Mem- BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B- ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
        Latency: 128
        Region 0: I/O ports at <unassigned>
        Region 1: I/O ports at <unassigned>
        Region 2: I/O ports at <unassigned>
        Region 3: I/O ports at <unassigned>
        Region 4: I/O ports at fff0 [size=16]
        Capabilities: <access denied>

And even this to be existing:
/rofs/lib/modules/2.6.17-10-generic/kernel/drivers/scsi/sata_sis.ko

Anything you can do with this? Thanks.

With FC6 you have to build support for the SiS5513 in. As a suggestion you can install the development kernel and mkinitrd packages instead. This will make some changes (all you IDE/ATA/ATAPI devices become PATA devices, hda becomes sda and so on), the pata_sis driver does work for the SiS5513 chipset.

The 2.6.17 sata_sis kernel module does not have support for the newer SiS662/966/966L chipsets hence the experimental sata_sis2 (2nd try version) driver at the CentOS link I provided. It may build for the 2.6.17 and FC6 kernels, but only you can answer this for sure. Just download the sata_sis2.zip file, expand and run 'make' from the expanded directory, if it builds then you can try it out (if you want) if it does not build let me know (either way).

Right, but is there are way I could load this at setup ? o_O

Yes, first build the experimental sata_sis driver and save it to a floppy or other media you can access during the installation process (hard drive, second CD/DVD device). Then use the 'linux dd' installation, you will be asked to supply the driver(s) and from where, specify the location and the experimental sata_sis driver.

If you have a working installation (your first post) then try building the driver on this installation and see if the OS see if your 160-GB hard drive is known or not on re-boot. If it is then you can transfer (or use) the experimental sata_sis kernel module during installation.

That PC has been replaced with this new one with the 5513. The PC in the original post is.. gone.