Mepis refuses to detect SATA hard drives [SOLVED]

One thing more:- I've now noticed that during the loading of Mepis from the CD 'Waiting for /dev to be fully populated' hangs, then says 'done' but only because it times out. Significant?

Maybe 3.4.3 does not have the necessary drivers for your SATA controller. The version is of course somewhat old already.

I would recommend trying out the latest 6.5. It comes with a fully upgraded kernel, so the latest drivers should be in there. It also comes with more recent software and out of the box Beryl (if your card supports it).

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

I downloaded ver. 6.5.02, the checksum tallied, verified after burning. This CD won't install SimplyMepis at all. At 'Starting RAID devices...command 0x25' it hangs, then times-out - repeatedly.

What (or who) is Beryl?

Looks like your mobo / chipset is not supported... Details?

Beryl: google is your friend. Basically, it is a 3D window manager for Linux

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

Here are the details:-

mobo AOpen AK86-L
chipset VIA K8T800/VT8237

The mobo/chipset drivers are part of VIA's 'Hyperion Pro' package, and have been upgraded once or twice since the version shipped with the mobo.

Hmm,

from what I can find in Google that mobo should be supported. When you fire up Gparted from the CD, does it see the drives?

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

from what I can find in Google that mobo should be supported. When you fire up Gparted from the CD, does it see the drives?

I'm not sure I follow you. I can't at present get into Mepis at all. But when (using the earlier version) I could, I wasn't using Gparted - or is it Qparted? - because I'd already created partitions on my drive ready for Linux. Or am I mixing this up with something else...?

Ah, I hadn't understood... Since you said 'I cannot install MEPIS at all', that led me to believe the live CD worked.

Have you tried the minimal boot option on the CD?

BTW: I find it strange the CD doesn't boot. Have you tried it on a different machine?

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

Have you tried the minimal boot option on the CD?

BTW: I find it strange the CD doesn't boot. Have you tried it on a different machine?
I should have said "I can't run Mepis from the CD...".

Yes I did try the minimal option and it stuck in exactly the same place ('Starting RAID devices'). And yes, I have tried the CD on a different machine and it loads without any problem. So I don't think it can be the CD that's the problem.

Somo mobos have the option to set SATA to native or emulated mode or something like that. You might try that.

Have you tried loading any other distro?

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

Hmmm. I hadn't before but I have now. I have Knoppix v. 4.0 on another CD and just ran it. It wouldn't load either! It hung at 'Scanning for Harddisk partitions and creating /etc/fstab'. Might this be akin to the point at which the Mepis CD hangs? So there seems to be some problem with my hardware.

My BIOS doesn't have the option you refer to - only a binary choice to activate or deactivate 'onChip SATA'.

Maybe you have some strange partitioning scheme? Could you just erase all partitions on those disks, or only keep the ones you need and then try to fire up the live CD again? You can also download the Gparted CD and try if you can use that one to rearrange the partitions.

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

Kosketus, could you have a bad SATA cable? Do you have a spare that you could put in place of the current one and see what happens? If Knoppix is having a time, then I would start to susplect cable, and/or hard drive itself.

Jon

No computer is magic, no operating system is magic, no website is magic. They all require human interaction, thought, and responsibility to work.

I don't think it could be that because wouldn't I then have other symptoms? I have 2 SATA drives, each with own cable, and both appear to be working perfectly in normal use. But, as an experiment, next time I have the case open I'll swap the cables over and see if that makes any difference.

I dunno about that. I've seen a messed up partition table cause that kind of thing before.

I had a drive crash not long ago and used ddrescue to copy everything from the crashed drive to a new drive.

Well, the drive types were different, and apparently, something didn't like the way the the info was recorded to the new drive.

Even after removing the crashed drive, I had problems booting into Linux distros (they would hang) with the new drive, until I fixed the issue (which I used testdisk to do after finding a distro that let me get past where it was hanging). Then, all was fine.

What did you use to create those partitions you mentioned? Are they standard partition types (ext3, swap, or something that a distro would recognize)? I'd suspect the partition table is hosed in some manner.

Jim C.

What did you use to create those partitions you mentioned? Are they standard partition types (ext3, swap, or something that a distro would recognize)? I'd suspect the partition table is hosed in some manner.I used Acronis Disk Director (in Windows). The partitions I've set up are, now, a Linux swap partition and one other partition formatted as ext3.

I'd try a GParted Live CD and if it can boot OK, delete the partions, commit them, exit and reboot.

Then, I'd create your ext3 and linux swap partitions (and format them both while you're there). Commit the changes and see if SimlyMEPIS can boot OK then.

How large were they? You probably don't need a lot of swap. I've got 2GB right now. But, that's really over kill (it never uses any of it).

If that doesn't work, I'd try booting into an Ultimate Boot CD and use the Ranish Partition Manager to recreate the partition table. You'll find it under either the File System or Partition Managers menu choice on the Ultimate Boot CD (that's one way to get it).

Download the Ultimate Boot CD and burn the ISO to a CD. I'd download the Full Version (it's free):

It's got lots of good tools on it:

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

Some Download Links (scroll down and you'll see download links to the full version on the bottom half of the page):

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html

After you burn the .iso to CD, boot from the Ultimate Boot CD and select File System Tools (F3). If it's not there (and it moved around, depending on version), try the Partition Manager menus.

After Ranish loads, press F5 to toggle through your disk drives for the one you want. Make SURE you've got the right drive selected (or just remove one tempoerarily to be safer), You'll see the drive information for each drive at the top of the screen when you press F5 to toggle between the devices it sees.

After the drive is on screen, with the first row highlighted in the table (the MBR), do this act your own risk, but I'd press enter to edit it and change the Executable Code type to a Standard IPL (you'll see the choices where you can edit it near the bottom right hand side of the page). You may want to backup your MBR first.

I'd change it to Standard IPL and delete all of my partitions.

Then, I'd press F2 to write the changes and see if you can boot into GParted or SimplyMEPIS Live CD OK and create your ext3 and swap partitions and let them update the mbr.

Jim C.

I disconnected the second of the two drives, but unfortunately the process still hung at the same point (I also swapped the cables over, just in case). I still think your theory has something, though.

Then, I'd create your ext3 and linux swap partitions (and format them both while you're there). Commit the changes and see if SimlyMEPIS can boot OK then.

How large were they? You probably don't need a lot of swap. I've got 2GB right now. But, that's really over kill (it never uses any of it).

If that doesn't work, I'd try booting into an Ultimate Boot CD and use the Ranish Partition Manager to recreate the partition table. You'll find it under either the File System or Partition Managers menu choice on the Ultimate Boot CD (that's one way to get it).

Download the Ultimate Boot CD and burn the ISO to a CD. I'd download the Full Version (it's free):

It's got lots of good tools on it:

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

Some Download Links (scroll down and you'll see download links to the full version on the bottom half of the page):

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html

After you burn the .iso to CD, boot from the Ultimate Boot CD and select File System Tools (F3). If it's not there (and it moved around, depending on version), try the Partition Manager menus.

After Ranish loads, press F5 to toggle through your disk drives for the one you want. Make SURE you've got the right drive selected (or just remove one tempoerarily to be safer), You'll see the drive information for each drive at the top of the screen when you press F5 to toggle between the devices it sees.

After the drive is on screen, with the first row highlighted in the table (the MBR), do this act your own risk, but I'd press enter to edit it and change the Executable Code type to a Standard IPL (you'll see the choices where you can edit it near the bottom right hand side of the page). You may want to backup your MBR first.

I'd change it to Standard IPL and delete all of my partitions.

Then, I'd press F2 to write the changes and see if you can boot into GParted or SimplyMEPIS Live CD OK and create your ext3 and swap partitions and let them update the mbr.

Jim C.

Jim C.

I'm taking this on board, but will take some time to digest it properly. I've previously played about a bit with Ranish. But it's all a bit intimidating.

Just be careful.

I was "half asleep" a while back, and wasn't paying attention the drive I had on screen (using F5 to toggle between them). I was using it to fix some flaky CompactFlash cards that weren't being recognized anymore.

Well, by the time I was paying attention, I had already removed some partitions I did care about on my primary hard drive, created some new ones, and started formatting. LOL

I still managed to salvage it though (thanks to testdisk still being able to find the partitions I deleted). Speaking of testdisk, it's a great tool if you do accidently delete paritions (or mess up a partition table), and it's in the repositories for many popular linux distros.

http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk

I don't know if your partition table has a thing to do with your issue or not. But, if it were my PC, I'd see if I could repartition it using another tool before giving up, since I have seen Linux distros hang due to a bad partition table (or one setup in a way that they didn't recognize).

Jim C.

Clearly from the responses the behaviour I'm getting is odd - though I can't believe it can be unique. So it seems to come down to a search for clues as to why what's happening is happening. For instance, why does Mepis say it's "starting RAID devices", when I don't have any RAID arrays set up on my PC? I just have 2 SATA drives. Why can neither Mepis nor Knoppix detect these drives - what's so peculiar about them? Have other people had problems with getting the Mepis (or any other distro's) CD to detect SATA drives?

Since I currently do all my computing in Windows, I'm not willing to run the risk of tampering with a partition structure which gives me no problems in Windows - on the off-chance that it might, just possibly, be at odds with the Mepis CD (which I doubt anyway).

So it seems I'm fated not to be able to use Mepis. Pity.

It may say that about starting RAID, even if you have no RAID devices. I'd have to reboot and check.

I've had some distros using older kernels refuse to recognize my SATA drives before. But, most modern distros see them fine.

Your issue may be an unsupported chipset, and you could probably type lspci from a console and see what it is. If it's a chipset issue, you may be able to find a driver for it if you can get any distro to recognize it OK and see what driver is being used.

But, it could also be something simple like a bad partition table. I'd see if a GParted LiveCD can see it OK, and repartition it using GParted myself. Sometimes, the simplest answer is right (since most modern hardware is usually supported, I'd suspect the way Acronis partitioned it as the culprit).

That's why I suggested this:

Then, I'd create your ext3 and linux swap partitions (and format them both while you're there). Commit the changes and see if SimlyMEPIS can boot OK then.

It'a a tool more commonly used for partitioning with Linux.

I'd make sure the linux swap partition is not some strange size that could be messing it up, too. You didn't mention how large you made it. I'd probably go with around 1GB.

Then, if that didn't work, or GParted couldn't see the drives, I'd probably try the technique I mentioned using Ranish. But, I'd at least try repartitioning it with something other than a Windows based tool (like the GParted Live CD) before giving up as a first step.

Jim C.

Jim C

I did take a look at Gparted, because I was willing to try your suggestion. However, I couldn't (and still can't) see any way to run it without Linux being already installed. It's also a question of competence: I'm inexperienced - and nervous! - in the use of partitioning tools, and I have had one or two bad experiences caused by insufficient skill in using (for example) Symantec's PTedit, in DOS. So I'd be leary of trying my hand with another, entirely unfamiliar, program - even if I could work out how to load it. It only takes one mistake to trash the whole partition table (as you pointed out). That's why I use Acronis, which is fairly idiot-proof.

I think that maybe I'll experiment again with using PartitionMagic, in DOS (rather than Gparted).

BTW, Ubuntu doesn't detect my SATA drive(s) either!

I have only the shakiest understanding of what a SATA RAID controller is/does. You'll have seen that this mobo has an integrated Serial ATA controller; during installation of Windows one has to hit the F6 key in response to a message if you need to install the driver for this (off a floppy). If you have (like me) only SATA drives and fail to do so, Windows fails to find any hard disk to install to.

Perhaps the Mepis installer also needs (but lacks) a similar prompt? Perhaps the situation I'm in is equivalent to what it would be with a Windows installation if I neglected to hit F6 and/or failed to load the SATA RAID driver?

If so, is there any workaround for this? But bear in mind that all (or most) chipsets with SATA RAID controllers are required to have drivers loaded from a floppy in exactly the same way by the Windows installer, not just Aopen's/VIA's.

Here's an exchange of E-Mails with AOpen tech. support:-

Apologies for the inconvenience

Kind regards, Mit freundlichen Grüßen, S pozdravem, Met vriendelijke groet

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: Robert Horwood [mailto:robert.horwood@aland.net]
Sent: Monday, June 18, 2007 4:03 PM
To: Support (AOE)
Subject: SATA drives

I have a model K8HTB-8237 motherboard, with VIA K8T800/VT8237 chipset.

I have 2 SATA hard disks (and no ATA hard disks). I do not have a RAID array.

I have been trying to install Linux on my computer, and have so far tried 4 different distros. NONE OF THEM IS ABLE TO DETECT THE SATA HARD DRIVES. All of them support this chipset, I believe.

My BIOS is vers. 6.00 PQ, and I have installed the most recent chipset drivers from the VIA Arena website.

ARE YOU, PLEASE, ABLE TO HELP ME? What can I do to get the SATA drives to be recognised by Linux?
Is this the last word?

It wasn't (the last word). It turns out that AOpen's tech support people in the Netherlands are unaware of their own company's policy. I've been combing the VIA Arena website and found that they do in fact supply chipset drivers for a few Linux distros, including Ubuntu and Debian. Their users' forum contains some plaudits (as well as brickbats) from Linux people.

Having d'ld the Ubuntu driver image, I've spent several hours trying to carry out the accompanying instructions for loading the patch. I've failed miserably and am now giving up. It may be me, but I think it's either Ubuntu's installer or the VIA patch (or their instructions which are in pretty crappy English).

Along the way, it's been borne in on me just how widespread this problem is. I think this post in the Ubuntu forum says it all:-

So, I've basically given up on Ubuntu even though I have grown comfortable with it. I am trying some of the other big names now. Mandriva failed to detect or install drivers for it...so as I type this I am downloading Suse 10.2 which I read somewhere can handle this hardware. If Suse fails, then I will just go with Windows Fricken Media Center and deal with it until the linux community matures another generation.

I hope the Ubuntu development team gets on the ball and starts incorporating more drivers in their next distribution.I know just how this guy feels. Doesn't exactly the same criticism apply to Mepis...?

Plain and simple: NO!

Hardware Supplier Tech: 'We are developing a great new product'
Boss: GREAT! MORE MONEY. Quick, lets call Microsoft to tell them we have a great new product with even greater drivers.
HWST: OK. Uhm, what about the Linux guys
Boss: Oh, that can wait. Let them find out for themselves we have something new, and maybe we will develop a driver once and then not tell them
HWST: We could also give them specs so they could do it themselves
Boss: ARE YOU CRAZY! That would ruin our business and be an infringment on our Intellectual Property

Got it?

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

OK, this may be a fair defence. I'm predisposed to accept it because I hate M$ (doesn't everybody?). But the fact remains that it leaves me, and probably thousands of others who (like me) couldn't compile anything to save their lives, and who've never written any code, up the creek without a paddle where Linux is concerned. Like the guy I quoted, I see no alternative to "fricken Windows".

Do you?

Point me to the place where you found the driver. Maybe I can compile it for you

Newbie or not Newbie, there's always a question

That's mighty generous of you!

Here's the link http://www.viaarena.com/default.aspx?PageID=420&OSID=43&CatID=3290&SubCatID=143