SATA Disk Problem

moo-cow · 02-12-2007, 08:46 AM

I installed Ubuntu Edgy on a box with a single SATA hard disk and a single IDE DVD burner. Everything worked fine, the SATA disk showed up as /dev/sda and the IDE burner as /dev/hd?, where ? was a letter of the latin alphabet, I don't quite remember

Now I replaced the old DVD burner with two IDE drives (which definitely work, as I took them from another Ubuntu box), a CD burner and a DVD ROM drive, booted into Ubuntu and was happy to see that Ubuntu recognized the two drives as /dev/hd? respectively -- everything worked nicely out of the box, like I know my Ubuntu

Now the trouble starts: I partitioned and formatted my hard disk and installed a fresh Ubuntu Edgy. First strange thing I noticed was that during installation, the SATA drive showed up as /dev/sde instead of /dev/sda. When I boot the new Ubuntu, it hangs, the last kernel messages being

Code:

sd 4:0:0:0: Attached scsi removable disk sdb
sd 4:0:0:1: Attached scsi removable disk sdc
sd 4:0:0:2: Attached scsi removable disk sdd
sd 4:0:0:3: Attached scsi removable disk sde

Any idea what's the problem?
Thx!
moo-cow

moo-cow · 02-12-2007, 09:00 AM

UPDATE:
I had Ubuntu installed in text mode. I now tried the graphical live cd installer, which shows the disk correctly as /dev/sda! Here, however, I get the message "No root file system", although I definitely specified a root partition! I remember having had this problem with an Edgy install on another box, where it worked after senselessly change the partition order in the "Prepare mount points" installer dialog. This time it doesn't seem to work, though... help!?

Lord Ghost · 02-13-2007, 12:02 PM

My best advice, which may sound extreme, has always worked for me.

Remove said SATA device from the computer (ie, remove the power to it, you don't have to physically remove the device).

Install Ubuntu on said IDE you wanted to have it on.

Connect said SATA device.

When you have SATA and IDE drives together on one box, I always suggest you remove one, install, then connect the other after installation.

Cheers,
Lord Ghost

mattyoly · 02-13-2007, 02:15 PM

You didn't specify what kind of mobo you have, and what kind of SATA controller you have. One thing you can try is, to load your modules manually when you boot from install CD. And in the Odd case try updating your BIOS, might help. It helped me. Now if you have an IDE hard drive around, just install it and install Ubuntu onto that, and see if your SATA gets recognized correctly after you log in. If it doesn't then try changing your BIOS settings.

Good Luck

fragos · 02-13-2007, 09:22 PM

Most BIOS allow you to set a boot sequence. For example try CD/DVD'd first then hard disk. Even a floppy could be in thye sequence if you had one. I still use IDE disks but would ask the question what is the hard drive sequence, IDE before SATA for example. Check your BIOS setup to see if IDE or SATA can be separately selected in the boot sequence. If you watch the lights on the drives that will tell you which disk is accessed first.

moo-cow · 02-14-2007, 07:29 AM

Thanks for your help! In the end, a little work-around did the trick: In the "Prepare mount points" dialog of the graphical installer, I went back one step to the partitioner and deleted and re-created the boot partition. After that, it was recognized as the root partition. This is a known bug, I guess they'll have it fixed soon. The graphical installation succeeded, yielding a correctly recognized /dev/sda and no booting problems.
Why the text mode installer cannot handle my SATA drive is a complete mystery to me -- shouldn't it behave exactly like the graphical installer...?