On Mon, Sep 25, 2006 at 09:36:47AM +0100, Wayne Stallwood wrote:

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I think I have found the answer myself, see:-

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Core_2_Duo_Support

So - does any Linux distribution install "out of the box" on an Intel 965 chip based system yet?

But that article suggests that the problem is using a PATA CD Rom on a chipset that is only directly aware of SATA drives.

In fact one of the workarounds suggested is to use a PATA-SATA converter to get in to exactly the same position you are in now (all SATA drives)

To be honest I'm not exactly sure what my CD/DVD drive is, I'll have to check.

One workaround may be to put an IDE CD drive in the system, I have some old[er] drives and the motherboard does have an IDE interface.

This is a sort of related problem, but it's not the problem you are having.

What is relevant is the stuff at the end of that page..where the guy is talking about different ports connecting to different controllers.

The motherboard has no less than ten SATA interfaces and I think they're of two (possibly three) types. It's an Abit AB9 Pro.

On Mon, Sep 25, 2006 at 09:31:31AM +0100, Wayne Stallwood wrote:

On Mon, 2006-09-25 at 08:55 +0100, cl@isbd.net wrote:

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I am trying to install ubuntu 6.06 server on my new hardware. The system is intel core 2 duo based with all SATA drives (including the CD/DVD drive).

Hm interesting, I wondered when all SATA systems would start to appear (given that there is next to no difference in the cost on optical drives now) Was this a self build, brandname or OEM built machine ?

It's a Komplett 'custom' system. You specify the bits you want and they assemble it for you. They have a set of "know to work together" options for you to choose from (which I did) or you can click on an alternative (larger) selection of options where you are more on your own regarding compatibility.

...

So, how do I get this to actually install? I guess that the floppies with the SATA drivers for windows aren't going to help much, or will the ubuntu install recognise windows drivers?

The Windows drivers won't help much.

I thought not.

In your BIOS there may be an option to put the SATA interfaces into a legacy emulation mode...In this mode they should simply be a SATA interface on what looks to the OS to be a standard IDE channel.

Depending on your mainboard, this option (if it exists in your BIOS) may reduce the number of available SATA ports.

However my thinking is that if you can get a minimal system installed and updated it may be easier to get it working with the correct mass storage drivers from there rather than trying to fix it during installation.

The other thing you could try is booting Ubuntu up to a net installation from the floppy images. However I fear that if it can't see the CD-Rom then it is unlikely to see the Hard Disk(s) either.

Yes, a number of people seem to have managed to get Linux installed on this sort of system using alternative ways of installing, e.g. from a USB memory stick or from the LAN. I have an existing Slackware system running on the LAN so can go down this sort of route if necessary.

One more thing worth checking, a lot of newer boards come with multiple ATA chipsets which are presented on different groups of SATA (and PATA) headers. I must say that the only compatibility issues I have ever seen with SATA-Linux have been with the RAID chipsets.

On Mon, Sep 25, 2006 at 10:02:58AM +0100, Chris Glover wrote:

On Mon, 2006-09-25 at 08:55 +0100, cl@isbd.net wrote:

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I am trying to install ubuntu 6.06 server on my new hardware. The system is intel core 2 duo based with all SATA drives (including the CD/DVD drive).

The installation CD boots OK (presumably because at this stage it's using the BIOS to access the drives) but after starting the Linux kernel and setting the language I get a message "No common CD-ROM detected" (or something like that anyway). I.e. there aren't drivers for a SATA CD/DVD drive. It then asks me to either select one of the old non-IDE drivers for the CD-ROM or to install a floppy with the drivers on it.

Hi Chris,

In the BIOS, set all the SATA interfaces to AHCI mode. Your install disk should recognise these as SCSI controllers, and all the devices should appear. Your CD-ROM will appear as /dev/sr0. This Works for Fedora Core 5 and Gentoo, so I'd expect it to work for Ubuntu as well.

Thanks, I'll try that.

I'm using a NEC DVD-writer with a SATA->PATA adaptor on the back. As my motherboard has a JMicron IDE controller, it was a pain to install from CD. Once I got the adaptor everything went smoothly

My motherboard has:- * 6 x SATA 3Gb/s offer by Intel? ICH8R support Intel? Matrix Storage Tech(AHCI & RAID0/1/5/10) * 2 x SATA 3Gb/s offer by JMicron? JMB363 support up to 0,1,0+1,JBOD RAID function * 1 x SATA 3Gb/s offer by Silicon Image 3132

...and an IDE interface:- * 1 x Ultra DMA 100/66/33 IDE connector

I have a feeling the IDE may be JMicron like yours, is this a problem if I add an IDE CD drive?

I'm using an Asus P5B Deluxe, but your board should use the same SATA controller.

HTH

Chris

Chris

E Mail: chris@glovercc.plus.com SIP: 84411389@voiptalk.org IAXTEL: 17003366726

On Mon, Sep 25, 2006 at 10:20:34AM +0100, Chris Glover wrote:

On Mon, 2006-09-25 at 10:11 +0100, cl@isbd.net wrote:

...

...

I'm using a NEC DVD-writer with a SATA->PATA adaptor on the back. As my motherboard has a JMicron IDE controller, it was a pain to install from CD. Once I got the adaptor everything went smoothly

My motherboard has:- * 6 x SATA 3Gb/s offer by Intel? ICH8R support Intel? Matrix Storage Tech(AHCI & RAID0/1/5/10) * 2 x SATA 3Gb/s offer by JMicron? JMB363 support up to 0,1,0+1,JBOD RAID function * 1 x SATA 3Gb/s offer by Silicon Image 3132

...and an IDE interface:- * 1 x Ultra DMA 100/66/33 IDE connector

I have a feeling the IDE may be JMicron like yours, is this a problem if I add an IDE CD drive?

If you want to use the IDE interface part of the JMicron, give the kernel options

all-generic-ide irqpoll

Ah, there's an odd message myabe relating to this when I boot from the CD, I'll try adding the above anyway.

I was wrong about my CD/DVD drive, it is actually an IDE drive so it may well be that the above will get it to work.

and that should allow it to work. Alledegly 2.6.18 supports the IDE part of the JMicron. The SATA part will be handled by the AHCI driver, so long as it's set to this mode in the BIOS.

Yes, 2.6.18 does seem to be the possible answer, is it stable yet?

I'm only using the Intel interfaces, but the JMicron sockets on my board are detected.

Also, if you motherboard has a Marvell Yukon PCIE Gigabit NIC, you may need to modify sky2.c in the kernel source to add the PCI ID of the latest version of chip.

{ PCI_DEVICE(PCI_VENDOR_ID_MARVELL, 0x4364) },

No, my board has Realtek RTL8111B LAN.

Thanks for all the help and ideas so far, I'll report back when I've tried all the ideas this evening.