[linuxBIOS] IDE HDD detecting

[Edward J. Lee]

Hi guys, I'm new on the list.

I'm using my own mainboard and I'm having problems with
IDE HDD probing. the function ide_init() seems to return 0
*even* there are no HDDs attached on the system.

Anyone know what to do?

The one thing I noticed is that if there is no HDD
********************************
init_drive: sectors_per_track=[108], num_heads=[108], 
num_cylinders=[108]      
IDE1 108/108/108 cap: 006c
********************************
is printed.

[Richard Smith]

Edward J. Lee wrote:
> Hi guys, I'm new on the list.

Welcome to linuxBIOS.
> I'm using my own mainboard and I'm having problems with
> IDE HDD probing. the function ide_init() seems to return 0
> *even* there are no HDDs attached on the system.
>
> Anyone know what to do?

Well when I had issues with the native LinuxBIOS IDE code not detecting 
the CHS properly with my CF the response I received was to use the ide 
driver of Etherboot.  So I got Etherboot 5.1.8 and that fixed my issues.

I would say try etherboot and see if that works then when you know your 
hardware is correctly configured and working you can do some 
compare/contrast with etherboot and see whats wrong with LB IDE.

[Edward J. Lee]

Richard Smith wrote:
> Edward J. Lee wrote:
> > Hi guys, I'm new on the list.
>
> Welcome to linuxBIOS.
> > I'm using my own mainboard and I'm having problems with
> > IDE HDD probing. the function ide_init() seems to return 0
> > *even* there are no HDDs attached on the system.
> >
> > Anyone know what to do?
>
> Well when I had issues with the native LinuxBIOS IDE code not 
> detecting the CHS properly with my CF the response I received was to 
> use the ide driver of Etherboot.  So I got Etherboot 5.1.8 and that 
> fixed my issues.
>
> I would say try etherboot and see if that works then when you know 
> your hardware is correctly configured and working you can do some 
> compare/contrast with etherboot and see whats wrong with LB IDE.

The important issue was that linuxBIOS 'thinks' to have detected an IDE 
device even
when I didn't attach any. (of course, the disk info gets read awfully). 
When an IDE HDD
exists, everything goes just fine for me. (ide_init() works great)
I had to fix this problem by reading in a 'magic number' from the 
partition table to check
if an HDD really exists.

Thx, anywayz

Ed.