Hi
tried a different approach... built a different array of two raid 0 disks on the nvidia controller of my motherboard. the installation process goes fine.. , the system is installed on the /dev/mapper/nvidia_ device.

At next boot the grub screen shows up, meaning the system di recognize the raid array.. the mandriva startup screen shows up , but freezes.

if booted in failsafe mode, it shows a bunch of errors in mounting the array volume ending in a kernel panic.. the install process did not ask for any driver, the raid controller was simply detected at the partitioning stage, but obviously something is missing..

any idea of how to gewt around this problem?
thanks

Which mandriva version?
What nvidia controller for the asus 8nsli deluxe

>>built a different array of two raid 0
What do you mean exactly

I tried with mandriva 2006 free edition, and the problem arises with both the built in controllers of the a8nsli deluxe mobo, the nvidia and the silicon image 3114.

it seems that the controller is properly handled at installation time, but something is missing in the installation and no /dev/mapper device is created.. at least this is my clue..

the grub screen shows up and the boot begins, but it fails to mount the raid partition ending in a kernel panic

in thi spost you can see exactly what happens :-)

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=430559

I mean that at first i had my system with two disks with windows xp on board, configured in raid 0 via the silicon image 3114 controller. added a third disk and installed linux mandriva 2006 on it. works fine, but fails to mount the raid disk cause after installation the /dev/mapper/sil_xxx device does not exist. So i tried adding a fourth disk, resulting in two raid0 sets, one connected to the silicon image controoler, the other to the nvidia controller. repeated the installation process on the second raid set (the one not containing XP) and worked just fine until reboot.. once you reboot you get the kernel panic shown in the post i linked on the previous message. seems like mandriva has the modules to handle the raid but it "forgets" to install something which is needed.

:-) do you have any idea?

Thinking for now. You know, you are not the first one with raid installation problem. I wonder if this is a Mandriva issue or not.
First of all, I strongly suggest you install the OS on a separate IDE HD.
No messing with the raid0 boot, which is a bad idea in principle to have the OS there.
Plus the speed advantage is little for the OS bootup
I had a raid0 and it went spare, no losses because it was designed in case this was to happen (onboard sil 3112a)

Further to this did you select the right (raid) partition type during partinioning?
Did you try an install on 1 HD, then make the raid (a possible procedure for raid 1), but you want 0...

I have 2 other suggestions, without digging into the hardware, in this order
- Try mandriva 2005 LE (dvd)
- Use a live distribution and create the linux raid partitions before the install, then
go ahead and do the whole install
BTW is your swap partition on the raid 0? Once more if the partition was on another HD
the performance increase might be enough rather than a full OS on raid 0
- Try 2006 from the CD isos, not the 2006 live cd/dvd whatever that might be
In desperation the previous person with a similarish raid problem on LQ went with FC5 (or FC4)

What is the nvidia chipset?
please see http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Hardware/sata.html

All I could think for now

thank you for your answer... the chipset should be nforce 4 sli.. the hard drives were clean before installing and everything went just smooth during the installation.. the fact that linux starts should be a proof that the problem doesn not reside in "seeing" the raid, but in some kind of installation error.

i had all the partitions on the raid 0 array, all made by diskdrake during the installation..

i will try the le version

the same problem arises installing linux on a separate disk..

well.. not the SAME problem of course.. linux starts and runs perfectly.. during the installation phase sees the raid , allows you to partition the raid, specify whether or not mount the partition at boot time and so on.. you can see the hard disk icon on the desktop as well.. BUT when you try to mount it.. it tells u that the special device /dev/mapper/nv_XXXX (or, for the other controller, /dev/mapper/sil_xxxx) does not exist.. and it's true.. ..in fact there is no /mapper folder under /dev.

i agree with you that for booting purposes there is no such advantage in using a raid array, and i was kind of surprised not to find problems during the installation.. but as the same thing happens also in the other setup.. well i just thought it would might be the case of asking someone smarter for help :-))!!!

thank you for now

Well i am downloading fedora core 5 right now :-) well worth a try i think