Slack 13 - no target disk - Acer Aspire one 11.6

egrep · 08-29-2009, 04:38 PM

Loaded slack 13 fine on a Sony Viao la top and an HP mini netbook. Slack 12.2 and now 13 still fail to find an install destination (tried /dev/hda, hdb, ... and /dev/sda, b, c etc. Install will find the 4 GB SD mem card, but obviously, I do not wan to choose that. Centos, fedora and ubuntu all see the disk as /dev/hda. I am stumped. Try booting into the bare.i or other kernels?

disturbed1 · 08-30-2009, 12:52 AM

Once you boot the installation disc, and log in as root you can -
cat /proc/partitions
To see what the kernel sees.

Check the bios and toggle between PATA/IDE and AHCI mode.

Try passing some commands at the boot prompt -
boot: hugesmp.s hda=noprobe
or one of these
acpi=off
noapic
noioapic
nolapic
nomsi

For Slackware64 it would be -
boot: huge.s hda=noprobe

There's a few threads in the installation section that discuss this problem Here's one http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ini-12-735104/

Quote:

Centos, fedora and ubuntu all see the disk as /dev/hda.

This is quite strange, as Ubuntu hacks their kernel to make almost all devices use /dev/sd$ - unless it's a generic PATA device that no model is available for. They literally hack lib.ata to force it to be used, even for devices that lib.ata does not support. Been this way since pre Gusty. Which is why I suggested to check the BIOS for AHCI settings.

egrep · 08-30-2009, 09:52 AM

Good points to try. Did not think of cat'ing /proc/partitions - thx!

Also, now that I see what you wrote, it seemd ubuntu _did_ see /dev/sd$ - had not noticed except where it confused me...

/egrep -> steve = sorry I strayed from slack for a bit on laptops... ;-]

egrep · 08-30-2009, 11:09 AM

Ok, contents of /proc/partitions = nada/zip. lol

Very primitive bios. Only option is display setup and pick disks to boot off of.
hugesmp.s noprobe - still no partitions.
hugesmp.s acpi=off - no go...

wadsworth · 08-30-2009, 11:23 AM

Not sure if its the same option as "nomsi",
but try appending "pci=nomsi" at boot.

egrep · 08-31-2009, 06:37 PM

pci=nomsi did not product any partitions that the system saw. Not sure what to try next. I guess I could try loading fedora and then try to load slack over that, But I think even then, slack does not see a disk.

This is weird. Still researching. Maybe worth using RH or fedora to build a system and then find all the drivers etc the system uses? Would that help?

-egrep

disturbed1 · 08-31-2009, 09:23 PM

What might help out is knowing which kernel drivers other systems that work are using for your hardware.

lspci -k
00:1f.2 SATA controller: Intel Corporation 82801JI (ICH10 Family) SATA AHCI Controller
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology GA-EP45-DS5 Motherboard
Kernel driver in use: ahci

Considering the installer does see your 4GB SD card, is there any change if you boot without a card in that device?

Maybe check out this thread ( http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...-setup-743129/ ). Alien Bob recommended using huge.s noudev Or hugesmp.s for 32bit.

egrep · 11-09-2009, 11:02 PM

I got around the install problem with help from this armedslack mailing list response:

Quote:

I installed Slackware 13 on a fit-pc 2 (Intel Atom Z530) and I had the
same problem, it couldn't see the ide hard drive.

Like you I tried without success to pass "ide generic" options to the kernel...

I sorted out the problem by recompiling the kernels (both the kernel
used by the Slack installer 2.6.29.6 and afterwards my "daily" kernel
using 2.6.30.5) and adding pata_sch support (CONFIG_PATA_SCH=y in the
.config file).

Basically the pata_sch support has to be either built into your
kernel (or into the initrd...I don't use initrd would that work ??
would that be a simpler way of adding pata_sch support on boot ??)
otherwise the kernel won't be able to access your root partition when
you boot.

As he hinted at, I get a scsi error at boot time. Any way to tell the kernel to use the pata_sch module when it tries to boot? [I know, chicken and the egg... ;-]

Going to give it another shot tonight.. Try the noudev option also.

--steve

egrep · 11-09-2009, 11:07 PM

Oops... Command used to set things up:
Boot as usual, but before running setup, type:

Code:

installpkg /mnt/cdrom/slackware/a/kernel-modules-smp-2.6.29_6-smp-i686-2.txz
modprobe pata_sch

fdisk or cfdisk. They both see the disk. Maybe noudev does essentially the same thing. Now, off to fix the boot problem. Has to be related.

--steve

onebuck · 11-10-2009, 08:15 AM

Hi,

Both 'generic-2.6.29.6' & 'huge-2.6.29.6' have the 'CONFIG_PATA_SCH=m'. You could create a initrd or do the modprobe.

egrep · 11-10-2009, 09:02 AM

Thanks onebuck. That was what I was thinking. As an experiment this morning, I hit tab at lilo prompt and entered
[code]
boot> Linux append="noudev"

error is still:

Code:

VFS: Cannot open root device "801" or unknown-block(8.1)
Please append a correct "root=" boot option; here are the available partitions:
kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs unknown-block(8,1)

Requires a power cycle. Now, just to find the right combination to get it to boot and then I can edit lilo with the correct parameters. Essentially, it sounds like I need to enable the

Never messed with making an initrd, so I will search that in the forums. If I can modprobe or include that module in a new kernel it should work. initrd might be better... Thanks!

onebuck · 11-10-2009, 12:47 PM

Hi,

Just look at '/boot/README.initrd.

egrep · 11-10-2009, 11:11 PM

onebuck - eggcellent info, and I grok it now. Almost worked even. Let me list out what I did to try this out, and ya'll tear it to shreds. Right idea, wrong implementation on my part. Will post and then try new things while I wait for the flames ;-]

o boot off slack 13 dvd iso.
o when ready to run setup, but needing to "see" the disk, I installpkg the kernel modules etc and modprobe pata_sch

Code:

mkdir /mnt/cdrom
mount /dev/sr0 /mnt/cdrom
installpkg /mnt/cdrom/slackware/a/kernel-modules-smp-2.6.29.6_smp-i686-2.txz
modprobe pata_sch

o [system now sees /dev/sda1 which has the freshly installed slack 13 system]
I figure to mkinitrd and to edit/run lilo, I need to be chroot'd into /dev/sda1

Code:

mkdir /dev/dora [dora is the name of the machine]
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/dora
chroot /mnt/dora
modprobe pata_sch [tried with inatlling all the kernel stuff in the readme]
mkinitrd -c -k 2.6.29.6 -m pata_sch
vi lilo.conf [make edits adding the initrd line after the kernel image name]
lilo [to recreate lilo]

o this is where I figure I am screwing things up, because I end up with a "you should never end up here, trouble ahead" shell, with the following errors:

Code:

Freeing unused kernel momory: 364k freed
No kernel modules found for Linux 2.6.29.6-smp
mount: no /etc/mtab
ERROR: No /sbin/init found on rootdev (or not mounted). Trouble ahead.
You can try and fix it. Type 'exit' when things are done.

o I am thinking this cannot be accomplished in a chroot'd environment, because mkinitrd complained that /proc/something [cannot remember the /proc device] was not there to read for disk partitions.

What I am confused about is how to run mkinitrd when the system cannot see the disk drive at boot time. I think I am confused about initrd ;-]

Comments? Questions? Flames? ;-]

egrep · 11-11-2009, 12:02 AM

I should not that after editing lilo etc, I exit the installation, and reboot. Then I get the "trouble ahead" error - during boot.

egrep · 11-12-2009, 12:51 AM

Ok, getting closer. I took the advice in other replies to other threads and _searched_ a bit ;-] I was only chroot'ing into the mounted disk, I was not mounting critical partitions. I found this [thx rworkman]:

Code:

chroot /wherever
mount /proc
mount /sys
mkinitrd ...

I can mount /proc ok, but /sys is not in fstab. Could be because of my lazy installs /, /home and swap ;-]
I get further, now it sees the disk and lists the partitions. The panic into rescue shell is new, and makes more sense:

Code:

mounting /dev/sda1 on /mnt failed: No such device [I think this is the key - should not be mounting on /mnt]
ERROR: No /sbin/init found on rootdev (or not mounted)

As soon as I find the missing mount point and get it working, I will update all. Thanks for all the help so far... I am sure I am going to need more later...

--steve