This is my first post ...

Until now I have been happily and succesfully using kernel 2.4.20 installed from Knoppix 3.2 hdinstall.

I want to install ALSA which wants a kernel >=2.4.26. I apt-get installed kernel 2.6.5 image and Grub (Lilo was fine but Grub seems even better).

The kernel upgrade goes well up until it fails to find two ide 56GB HDDs: hda and hdb. Also the PS2 mouse behaves bizarrely - it needs a thorough sliding shake to wake it up.

My root, swap and boot are all on a 4GB scsi sda which is my 'boot' disk.

Grub allows me revert to 2.4.20 but ALAS no ALSA

I guess the absence of the ide hda & b may be something to do with probing modules and maybe even devfs but I am a mere struggling out of the shackles of the m$ hegemony!

i'd certainly suggest keeping ide code bult as part of the kernel, not as a module, as it's pretty core really There's always pretty little we can say about what's actually wrong though.. somethign up, but as to what.... other than something in the IDE section, can't really say.

Thanks for the Linux documentation url http://rute.2038bug.com/ - good stuff!

Also I get the point about ide is a part of the kernel. What does anyone think about devfs as being a route to a solution. Maybe not since I canboot from the scsi drive. Here is more info for those with more experience, knowledge and insight than me:

Knoppix 2.78 INIT Boot messages
This is where the problem becomes apparent although clearly it is the case that the two disks have not been detected by whatever kernel spells and incantations are meant to detect them:

fsck 1.34-WIP (21-May-2003)

fsck.ext3: No such device or address while trying to open /dev/hda1

<likewise hdb1>

fsck failed. Please repair manually
CONTROL-D will exit from this shell and continue system startup

fstab

#sda1 is boot
/dev/sda2 swap ...
/dev/sda3 / ...
/dev/hda1 /home ext3 defaults 0 2
/dev/hdb1 /mnt/hdb1 ext3 defaults 0 2


Also, re the mouse: I followed another article elsewhere which advised manually kicking the PS2 mouse into life by issuing a couple of root commands:

# modprobe psmouse
# modprobe mousedev

Although I am ashamed to admit that I really do not understand why 2.6.5 needs this whereas 2.4.20 didn't