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* [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ?
@ 2005-11-13 19:59 mathewt
  2005-11-13 21:23 ` Jose Luis Rivero (YosWinK)
                   ` (2 more replies)
  0 siblings, 3 replies; 4+ messages in thread
From: mathewt @ 2005-11-13 19:59 UTC (permalink / raw
  To: gentoo-alpha

Hello All,

I have a couple of questions regarding 2.6 kernels for Alpha
and also gcc-3.4.4-r1

I have an AS 2000 4/233 running on Gentoo, 2.4.30 SMP-kernel.
Things work fine except I cannot use all the hardware (DAC960).
any case, I was trying to move to 2.6 series kernel (vanilla
sources 2.6.12.5 as picked up by portage)

I am able to compile and boot a UP kernel, but I continuously
get these messages on screen during boot and later in the
system logs

[kernel] sd 0:0:0:0: M_REJECT to send for : 1-2-3-1.

seems to come from the SCSI SYM53C8XX_2 driver which handles the
Symbios 53c810 controller chip. I am using these settings in
the kernel config
CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_2=y
CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_DMA_ADDRESSING_MODE=0
CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_DEFAULT_TAGS=16
CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_MAX_TAGS=16
# CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_IOMAPPED is not set
(I tried using IOMAPPED and different DMA modes and number of TAGs
also, but the message still shows up)

in 2.4.30, the driver version is sym-2.1.17a and it works fine
(without any of these REJECT messages), while 2.6.12.5, the
driver version is 2.2.x I believe.

does anyone on the list know of an issue which could cause this ?
is the REJECT message a cause for concern ? (system seem to work
fine as before)

also, I have udev, though I have not disabled/removed devfs since
I was not sure if 2.6 is ready for this HW yet

BTW, SMP kernel does not boot. the system goes into a kernel panic
along with machine check and invalid FP emulation instruction etc.

Can 2.6 SMP work on gentoo alpha ? (or only on the newer models ?)

I also see that gcc-3.4.4-r1 is marked stable. can that be used for
kernel, glibc, etc. or its only for specific packages ? (I see that
its slotted)

thanks for any comments, pointers or experiences that you could share

thanks, Mathew


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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 4+ messages in thread

* Re: [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ?
  2005-11-13 19:59 [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ? mathewt
@ 2005-11-13 21:23 ` Jose Luis Rivero (YosWinK)
  2005-11-14  2:52 ` Brian C. Parkhurst
  2005-11-14  4:01 ` Jean-Sébastien Guay
  2 siblings, 0 replies; 4+ messages in thread
From: Jose Luis Rivero (YosWinK) @ 2005-11-13 21:23 UTC (permalink / raw
  To: gentoo-alpha

Hi mathew:

mathewt@lucent.com wrote:
  > I am able to compile and boot a UP kernel, but I continuously
> get these messages on screen during boot and later in the
> system logs
> 
> [kernel] sd 0:0:0:0: M_REJECT to send for : 1-2-3-1.
> 
> seems to come from the SCSI SYM53C8XX_2 driver which handles the
> Symbios 53c810 controller chip. I am using these settings in
> the kernel config
> CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_2=y
> CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_DMA_ADDRESSING_MODE=0
> CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_DEFAULT_TAGS=16
> CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_MAX_TAGS=16
> # CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_IOMAPPED is not set
> (I tried using IOMAPPED and different DMA modes and number of TAGs
> also, but the message still shows up)
> 
> in 2.4.30, the driver version is sym-2.1.17a and it works fine
> (without any of these REJECT messages), while 2.6.12.5, the
> driver version is 2.2.x I believe.
> 
> does anyone on the list know of an issue which could cause this ?
> is the REJECT message a cause for concern ? (system seem to work
> fine as before)

Ferdy and me are also suffering  a similar problem using 53c810 
controller on AS2100. On our alpha, if you try to boot the installcd 
using a 2.6 kernel you will see a lovely kernel dump.

2.6 kernel 53c810 driver seems to be completely broken for us, and 
indeed, 2.4 driver works just fine.

After some investigations, i found (on red-hat alpha mailing list) they 
patched 2.6 53c810 in some way for the next release of AlphaCore 2.0. 
After unpacked the patches from red-hat kernel, I saw a lovely 
linux-2.6.12-ncr810-alpha.patch[1] which could be what we are looking 
for. If you can give it a try and report the feedback would be c00l.

I'm installing a testing machine to work on this problem but still don't 
have time to check if it works.

> 
> also, I have udev, though I have not disabled/removed devfs since
> I was not sure if 2.6 is ready for this HW yet

I think the problem comes from the kernel driver, udev/devfs have 
nothing to do with this (imho).

> 
> BTW, SMP kernel does not boot. the system goes into a kernel panic
> along with machine check and invalid FP emulation instruction etc.
> 
> Can 2.6 SMP work on gentoo alpha ? (or only on the newer models ?)

2.6 SMP kernels are still broken on alpha. I think there are some people 
mainly from red-hat trying to fix this at the moment. May be kloeri or 
agriffis can tell us a bit more about this issue.

> 
> I also see that gcc-3.4.4-r1 is marked stable. can that be used for
> kernel, glibc, etc. or its only for specific packages ? (I see that
> its slotted)

A stable gcc should be ready to compile everything!! you can use 
3.4.4-r1 to compile all your system.

> 
> thanks for any comments, pointers or experiences that you could share
> 
> thanks, Mathew
> 

Always welcome, np

--------------------------------
[1] http://dev.gentoo.org/~yoswink/tmp/linux-2.6.12-ncr810-alpha.patch

YosWinK @ gentoo.org
Gentoo Alpha Team

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 4+ messages in thread

* Re: [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ?
  2005-11-13 19:59 [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ? mathewt
  2005-11-13 21:23 ` Jose Luis Rivero (YosWinK)
@ 2005-11-14  2:52 ` Brian C. Parkhurst
  2005-11-14  4:01 ` Jean-Sébastien Guay
  2 siblings, 0 replies; 4+ messages in thread
From: Brian C. Parkhurst @ 2005-11-14  2:52 UTC (permalink / raw
  To: gentoo-alpha

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1015 bytes --]

Quoting mathewt@lucent.com:

> Hello All,
>
> I have a couple of questions regarding 2.6 kernels for Alpha
> and also gcc-3.4.4-r1
>
> I have an AS 2000 4/233 running on Gentoo, 2.4.30 SMP-kernel.
> Things work fine except I cannot use all the hardware (DAC960).
> any case, I was trying to move to 2.6 series kernel (vanilla
> sources 2.6.12.5 as picked up by portage)
>

DAC960 issue:

Under the 2.4 kernel there is a simple fix for the DAC960.  The OEM version of
the DAC960 (Called a SWXCR) from DEC used a slightly different firmware
release.  The standard linux DAC960 driver doesn't recognize these firmware
revisions as valid and hangs.

A simple patch of the DAC960 driver corrects this problem.  I've submitted it as
a bug in the 2.4 gentoo kernels in the past and it has been patched for the
liveCD.  The 2.6 kernel revision of this driver didn't have this problem.

Brian Parkhurst
Brianp-at-spamcop.net


>
> --
> gentoo-alpha@gentoo.org mailing list
>
>


--
Brian Parkhurst
brianp-at-spamcop-dot-net

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 4+ messages in thread

* Re: [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ?
  2005-11-13 19:59 [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ? mathewt
  2005-11-13 21:23 ` Jose Luis Rivero (YosWinK)
  2005-11-14  2:52 ` Brian C. Parkhurst
@ 2005-11-14  4:01 ` Jean-Sébastien Guay
  2 siblings, 0 replies; 4+ messages in thread
From: Jean-Sébastien Guay @ 2005-11-14  4:01 UTC (permalink / raw
  To: gentoo-alpha

Hello Matthew,

>I am able to compile and boot a UP kernel, but I continuously
>get these messages on screen during boot and later in the
>system logs
>
>[kernel] sd 0:0:0:0: M_REJECT to send for : 1-2-3-1.
>
>seems to come from the SCSI SYM53C8XX_2 driver which handles the
>Symbios 53c810 controller chip. I am using these settings in
>the kernel config
>CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_2=y
>CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_DMA_ADDRESSING_MODE=0
>CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_DEFAULT_TAGS=16
>CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_MAX_TAGS=16
># CONFIG_SCSI_SYM53C8XX_IOMAPPED is not set
>(I tried using IOMAPPED and different DMA modes and number of TAGs
>also, but the message still shows up)
>
>in 2.4.30, the driver version is sym-2.1.17a and it works fine
>(without any of these REJECT messages), while 2.6.12.5, the
>driver version is 2.2.x I believe.
>
>does anyone on the list know of an issue which could cause this ?
>is the REJECT message a cause for concern ? (system seem to work
>fine as before)
>  
>
I have this problem with my SYM53C810 controller too, and the only 
solution I've found (that worked) was to manually modify the kernel's 
SCSI driver. See this page for the details :
http://lists.debian.org/debian-alpha/2005/05/msg00041.html

 From what I understand (which may well be a simplistic understanding of 
the real situation), the problem is that the drive connected to the 
controller is FAST-WIDE SCSI 2, but the controller can't do WIDE. The 
driver tries to set it to WIDE, then send some data to see if it works, 
and should fail (the second if in the code in the above page) but 
doesn't, so the controller is left in WIDE mode even though it doesn't 
support it and that's why it gives those messages. The mystery is why 
the WIDE mode transfer doesn't fail as it should.

What I've done is comment out the whole section of code (starting with 
the if right after the /* test width */ comment and ending with the 
closing curly brace for that if) and then compile the kernel. That way 
the driver never sets the controller to WIDE mode at all. Works great. 
I'd really like someone to find a more sophisticated solution that 
commenting out the whole lot, maybe fixing the test that should fail but 
doesn't? Unfortunately my knowledge of Linux kernel drivers is too 
limited to do that.

This modification affects the SCSI driver, though, which in my case 
isn't a problem since I'm only using this controller, but if your 
machine has another controller that should support WIDE mode, then this 
change will probably affect it too... Watch out for that.

I wonder also why the patch YosWinK pointed to affects a totally 
different source file... I'm not sure it's the same problem, because I'm 
on the RedHat-Alpha mailing list too and haven't heard of this specific 
problem. Perhaps it addresses another problem in the 53C810 code on Alpha.

Other than that minor problem, I've been running a 2.6 kernel for a 
couple months now on my AlphaXL 366 with a 50GB SCSI-2 drive. Runs 
great. Of course, it's a single processor machine so I can't help you 
with the other problem you're having.

Hope this helps,

J-S

-- 
___________________________________________
Jean-Sébastien Guay   jean_seb@videotron.ca
             http://whitestar02.webhop.org/

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^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 4+ messages in thread

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2005-11-13 19:59 [gentoo-alpha] 2.6 kernel on Alpha ? mathewt
2005-11-13 21:23 ` Jose Luis Rivero (YosWinK)
2005-11-14  2:52 ` Brian C. Parkhurst
2005-11-14  4:01 ` Jean-Sébastien Guay

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