I posted this on forums, but no one give me a clue, so i ask for here, hoping someone can help me out. For saving your time, let me first illustrate my prob briefly. I have an ASUS K8N4-4 nForce4 mainboard, and a 160G Maxtor SATA harddisk (6V160E0). But all of the kernels (>2.6.13) couldnt recognize my harddisk, it showed the VFS: Cannot open root device "sda9" or unknown-block(0,0) error when booting. I tried gentoo-sources, genkernel, vanilla-kernel,mm-sources and even sabayon-sources, they all failed. However, the kernels <=2.6.13 work well. I know you might tell me to have a look at my kernel config, check twice that had i enabled the SATA device support, I really did it, you can take a look at my kernel config in this thread. I tried the K8N4-E keywords in this forums, i found there were many guys who use that mainboard suffering the same prob. Such as: 1. SATA drives not recognized on kernel > 2.6.11 2. Problem finding my SATA-drives 3. What does "VFS: Cannot open root device..." mean, exactly? (my former reply following a Tips & Tricks thread) in the 2nd one, someone named addeman also confirmed this weird prob, and no one really gave a solution. Recently I had a chance to try Kubuntu 7.04 feisty LiveCD, i found it could recognize my SATA harddisk with kernel-2.6.20, it makes me wondering is it a prob of the kernel itself or the gentoo system. So i downloaded Fedora 7 LiveCD (kernel-2.6.21), it can also recognize my sata device! Then i decided to have a test on Fedora 7 LiveCD's kernel by a dirty way, i copyed the vmlinuz image,the modules and the modprobe.conf setting into my gentoo system, try to boot from Fedora's kernel, it failed with the same VFS: Cannot open root device "sda9" or unknown-block(0,0) error. Okay, now let me tell you my gentoo setting. Here's my partition list. Filesystem Type Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on /dev/sda8 ext2 38M 8.4M 28M 24% /boot /dev/sda9 reiserfs 18G 5.3G 13G 30% / /dev/sda10 reiserfs 8.1G 4.9G 3.2G 61% /home my grub.conf title=Gentoo Linux 2.6.13 root (hd0,7) kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.13-gentoo-r5 root=/dev/sda9 video=vesafb:mtrr,ywrap,1440x900-32 title=Gentoo Linux 2.6.22 root (hd0,7) kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-gentoo-r6 root=/dev/sda9 video=vesafb:mtrr,ywrap,1440x900-32 the dmesg output (running on my gentoo system with kernel 2.6.13) Console: colour VGA+ 80x25 Dentry cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes) Inode-cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes) Memory: 514308k/524224k available (2893k kernel code, 9364k reserved, 1174k data, 180k init, 0k highmem) Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok. Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 3620.94 BogoMIPS (lpj=1810472) Mount-cache hash table entries: 512 CPU: After generic identify, caps: 078bfbff e3d3fbff 00000000 00000000 00000001 00000000 00000001 CPU: After vendor identify, caps: 078bfbff e3d3fbff 00000000 00000000 00000001 00000000 00000001 CPU: L1 I Cache: 64K (64 bytes/line), D cache 64K (64 bytes/line) CPU: L2 Cache: 128K (64 bytes/line) CPU: After all inits, caps: 078bfbff e3d3fbff 00000000 00000010 00000001 00000000 00000001 Intel machine check architecture supported. Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#0. mtrr: v2.0 (20020519) CPU: AMD Sempron(tm) Processor 3000+ stepping 02 Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done. Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done. Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK. ACPI: setting ELCR to 0200 (from 0828) NET: Registered protocol family 16 ACPI: bus type pci registered PCI: PCI BIOS revision 3.00 entry at 0xf1f20, last bus=5 PCI: Using configuration type 1 ACPI: Subsystem revision 20050408 ACPI: Interpreter enabled ACPI: Using PIC for interrupt routing ACPI: PCI Root Bridge [PCI0] (0000:00) PCI: Probing PCI hardware (bus 00) ACPI: Assume root bridge [\_SB_.PCI0] segment is 0 PCI: Transparent bridge - 0000:00:09.0 Boot video device is 0000:01:00.0 ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0._PRT] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.HUB0._PRT] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNK1] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNK2] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNK3] (IRQs *3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNK4] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNK5] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LUBA] (IRQs 3 4 *5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LUBB] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LMAC] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LACI] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 *11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LMCI] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LSMB] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 *11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LUB2] (IRQs *3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LIDE] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LSID] (IRQs 3 4 *5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LFID] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 *11 12 14 15) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LPCA] (IRQs 3 4 5 7 9 10 11 12 14 15) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APC1] (IRQs 16) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APC2] (IRQs 17) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APC3] (IRQs 18) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APC4] (IRQs 19) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APC5] (IRQs *16), disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCF] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCG] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCH] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCJ] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCK] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCS] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCL] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCZ] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APSI] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APSJ] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APCP] (IRQs 20 21 22 23) *0, disabled. Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay pnp: PnP ACPI init pnp: PnP ACPI: found 14 devices SCSI subsystem initialized usbcore: registered new driver usbfs usbcore: registered new driver hub PCI: Using ACPI for IRQ routing PCI: If a device doesn't work, try "pci=routeirq". If it helps, post a report pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x4000-0x407f could not be reserved pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x4080-0x40ff has been reserved pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x4400-0x447f has been reserved pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x4480-0x44ff could not be reserved pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x4800-0x487f has been reserved pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x4880-0x48ff has been reserved PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:09.0 IO window: a000-afff MEM window: d0000000-d1ffffff PREFETCH window: 20000000-200fffff PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:0b.0 IO window: disabled. MEM window: disabled. PREFETCH window: disabled. PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:0c.0 IO window: disabled. MEM window: disabled. PREFETCH window: disabled. PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:0d.0 IO window: disabled. MEM window: disabled. PREFETCH window: disabled. PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:0e.0 IO window: disabled. MEM window: c8000000-cfffffff PREFETCH window: c0000000-c7ffffff PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:09.0 to 64 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0b.0 to 64 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0c.0 to 64 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0d.0 to 64 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0e.0 to 64 Machine check exception polling timer started. audit: initializing netlink socket (disabled) audit(1189637059.259:1): initialized NTFS driver 2.1.23 [Flags: R/O]. Initializing Cryptographic API PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0b.0 to 64 pcie_portdrv_probe->Dev[005d:10de] has invalid IRQ. Check vendor BIOS assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability Allocate Port Service[pcie00] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0c.0 to 64 pcie_portdrv_probe->Dev[005d:10de] has invalid IRQ. Check vendor BIOS assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability Allocate Port Service[pcie00] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0d.0 to 64 pcie_portdrv_probe->Dev[005d:10de] has invalid IRQ. Check vendor BIOS assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability Allocate Port Service[pcie00] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0e.0 to 64 pcie_portdrv_probe->Dev[005d:10de] has invalid IRQ. Check vendor BIOS assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability Allocate Port Service[pcie00] lp: driver loaded but no devices found [drm] Initialized drm 1.0.0 20040925 vesafb: NVIDIA Corporation, nv43 Board - p216h0 , Chip Rev (OEM: NVIDIA) vesafb: VBE version: 3.0 vesafb: protected mode interface info at c000:d600 vesafb: pmi: set display start = c00cd636, set palette = c00cd6a0 vesafb: pmi: ports = 3b4 3b5 3ba 3c0 3c1 3c4 3c5 3c6 3c7 3c8 3c9 3cc 3ce 3cf 3d0 3d1 3d2 3d3 3d4 3d5 3da vesafb: hardware supports DDC2 transfers vesafb: monitor limits: vf = 76 Hz, hf = 82 kHz, clk = 140 MHz vesafb: scrolling: ywrap using protected mode interface, yres_virtual=8987 Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 175x65 vesafb: framebuffer at 0xc0000000, mapped to 0xe0880000, using 24576k, total 131072k fb0: VESA VGA frame buffer device ACPI: Power Button (FF) [PWRF] ACPI: Power Button (CM) [PWRB] ACPI: Fan [FAN] (on) ACPI: CPU0 (power states: C1[C1]) ACPI: Processor [CPU0] (supports 8 throttling states) ACPI: Thermal Zone [THRM] (40 C) PNP: PS/2 controller doesn't have AUX irq; using default 0xc PNP: PS/2 Controller [PNP0303:PS2K] at 0x60,0x64 irq 112 serio: i8042 AUX port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12 serio: i8042 KBD port at 0x60,0x64 irq 1 Serial: 8250/16550 driver $Revision: 1.90 $ 4 ports, IRQ sharing disabled ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A parport: PnPBIOS parport detected. parport0: PC-style at 0x378 (0x778), irq 7 [PCSPP(,...)] lp0: using parport0 (interrupt-driven). mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice io scheduler noop registered io scheduler anticipatory registered io scheduler deadline registered io scheduler cfq registered input: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard on isa0060/serio0 input: PS/2 Generic Mouse on isa0060/serio1 floppy0: no floppy controllers found RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 4096K size 1024 blocksize loop: loaded (max 8 devices) forcedeth.c: Reverse Engineered nForce ethernet driver. Version 0.35. PPP generic driver version 2.4.2 PPP Deflate Compression module registered PPP BSD Compression module registered NET: Registered protocol family 24 8139too Fast Ethernet driver 0.9.27 ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNK3] enabled at IRQ 3 PCI: setting IRQ 3 as level-triggered ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:05:08.0[A] -> Link [LNK3] -> GSI 3 (level, low) -> IRQ 3 eth0: RealTek RTL8139 at 0xe0802000, 00:0a:eb:4b:36:48, IRQ 3 eth0: Identified 8139 chip type 'RTL-8100B/8139D' Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00alpha2 ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx NFORCE-CK804: IDE controller at PCI slot 0000:00:06.0 NFORCE-CK804: chipset revision 242 NFORCE-CK804: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later NFORCE-CK804: 0000:00:06.0 (rev f2) UDMA133 controller ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:DMA ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdc:DMA, hdd:DMA Probing IDE interface ide0... hda: PIONEER DVD-RW DVR-110, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14 Probing IDE interface ide1... Probing IDE interface ide1... hda: ATAPI 40X DVD-ROM DVD-R-RAM CD-R/RW drive, 2000kB Cache, UDMA(66) Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20 libata version 1.12 loaded. sata_nv version 0.8 ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LSID] enabled at IRQ 5 PCI: setting IRQ 5 as level-triggered ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:07.0[A] -> Link [LSID] -> GSI 5 (level, low) -> IRQ 5 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:07.0 to 64 ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x9F0 ctl 0xBF2 bmdma 0xD400 irq 5 ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x970 ctl 0xB72 bmdma 0xD408 irq 5 ata1: no device found (phy stat 00000000) scsi0 : sata_nv ata2: no device found (phy stat 00000000) scsi1 : sata_nv ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LFID] enabled at IRQ 11 PCI: setting IRQ 11 as level-triggered ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:08.0[A] -> Link [LFID] -> GSI 11 (level, low) -> IRQ 11 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:08.0 to 64 ata3: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x9E0 ctl 0xBE2 bmdma 0xC000 irq 11 ata4: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x960 ctl 0xB62 bmdma 0xC008 irq 11 ata3: dev 0 cfg 49:2f00 82:7c6b 83:7f09 84:4773 85:7c68 86:3e01 87:4763 88:407f ata3: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 312581808 sectors: lba48 nv_sata: Primary device added nv_sata: Primary device removed nv_sata: Secondary device added nv_sata: Secondary device removed ata3: dev 0 configured for UDMA/133 scsi2 : sata_nv ata4: no device found (phy stat 00000000) scsi3 : sata_nv Vendor: ATA Model: Maxtor 6V160E0 Rev: VA11 Type: Direct-Access ANSI SCSI revision: 05 SCSI device sda: 312581808 512-byte hdwr sectors (160042 MB) SCSI device sda: drive cache: write back SCSI device sda: 312581808 512-byte hdwr sectors (160042 MB) SCSI device sda: drive cache: write back sda: sda1 sda2 < sda5 sda6 sda7 sda8 sda9 sda10 sda11 > Attached scsi disk sda at scsi2, channel 0, id 0, lun 0 Attached scsi generic sg0 at scsi2, channel 0, id 0, lun 0, type 0 ieee1394: raw1394: /dev/raw1394 device initialized ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LUB2] enabled at IRQ 3 ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:02.1[B] -> Link [LUB2] -> GSI 3 (level, low) -> IRQ 3 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:02.1 to 64 ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: nVidia Corporation CK804 USB Controller ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: debug port 1 ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1 ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: irq 3, io mem 0xd2004000 PCI: cache line size of 64 is not supported by device 0000:00:02.1 ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: park 0 ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: USB 2.0 initialized, EHCI 1.00, driver 10 Dec 2004 hub 1-0:1.0: USB hub found hub 1-0:1.0: 10 ports detected ohci_hcd: 2005 April 22 USB 1.1 'Open' Host Controller (OHCI) Driver (PCI) ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LUBA] enabled at IRQ 5 ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:02.0[A] -> Link [LUBA] -> GSI 5 (level, low) -> IRQ 5 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:02.0 to 64 ohci_hcd 0000:00:02.0: nVidia Corporation CK804 USB Controller ohci_hcd 0000:00:02.0: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 2 ohci_hcd 0000:00:02.0: irq 5, io mem 0xd2003000 hub 2-0:1.0: USB hub found hub 2-0:1.0: 10 ports detected Initializing USB Mass Storage driver... usbcore: registered new driver usb-storage USB Mass Storage support registered. usb 2-1: new low speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 2 usbcore: registered new driver hiddev input: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Microsoft Microsoft 3-Button Mouse with IntelliEye(TM)] on usb-0000:00:02.0-1 usbcore: registered new driver usbhid drivers/usb/input/hid-core.c: v2.01:USB HID core driver NET: Registered protocol family 2 IP route cache hash table entries: 8192 (order: 3, 32768 bytes) TCP established hash table entries: 32768 (order: 6, 262144 bytes) TCP bind hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes) TCP: Hash tables configured (established 32768 bind 32768) TCP reno registered ip_conntrack version 2.1 (4095 buckets, 32760 max) - 212 bytes per conntrack ip_tables: (C) 2000-2002 Netfilter core team ipt_recent v0.3.1: Stephen Frost . http://snowman.net/projects/ipt_recent/ arp_tables: (C) 2002 David S. Miller TCP bic registered NET: Registered protocol family 1 NET: Registered protocol family 17 powernow-k8: Found 1 AMD Athlon 64 / Opteron processors (version 1.50.3) powernow-k8: BIOS error - no PSB or ACPI _PSS objects Using IPI Shortcut mode ACPI wakeup devices: HUB0 XVR0 XVR1 XVR2 XVR3 USB0 USB2 MMAC MMCI UAR1 ACPI: (supports S0 S1 S3 S4 S5) ReiserFS: sda9: found reiserfs format "3.6" with standard journal ReiserFS: sda9: using ordered data mode ReiserFS: sda9: journal params: device sda9, size 8192, journal first block 18, max trans len 1024, max batch 900, max commit age 30, max trans age 30 ReiserFS: sda9: checking transaction log (sda9) ReiserFS: sda9: Using r5 hash to sort names VFS: Mounted root (reiserfs filesystem) readonly. Freeing unused kernel memory: 180k freed nvidia: module license 'NVIDIA' taints kernel. ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:01:00.0[A] -> Link [LNK3] -> GSI 3 (level, low) -> IRQ 3 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:01:00.0 to 64 NVRM: loading NVIDIA Linux x86 Kernel Module 1.0-9639 Mon Apr 16 20:20:06 PDT 2007 ReiserFS: sda10: found reiserfs format "3.6" with standard journal ReiserFS: sda10: using ordered data mode ReiserFS: sda10: journal params: device sda10, size 8192, journal first block 18, max trans len 1024, max batch 900, max commit age 30, max trans age 30 ReiserFS: sda10: checking transaction log (sda10) ReiserFS: sda10: Using r5 hash to sort names NTFS volume version 3.1. NTFS volume version 3.1. fuse init (API version 7.8) fuse distribution version: 2.7.0 Adding 1052216k swap on /dev/sda11. Priority:-1 extents:1 ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LACI] enabled at IRQ 11 ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:04.0[A] -> Link [LACI] -> GSI 11 (level, low) -> IRQ 11 PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:04.0 to 64 intel8x0_measure_ac97_clock: measured 50582 usecs intel8x0: clocking to 46841 eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0x45E1 eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0x45E1 eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0x45E1 eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0x45E1 I tried dmesg also in Gentoo LiveCD 2006.0 and Gentoo LiveCD 2007.0, couldnt find any trace of scsi device. But in Kubuntu 7.04 i got it (let me cut this down a little of bit this time, it's too long, you can get the full output from here which features the dmesg,lspci and lsmod output) [ 0.000000] Linux version 2.6.20-15-generic (root@palmer) (gcc version 4.1.2 (Ubuntu 4.1.2-0ubuntu4)) #2 SMP Sun Apr 15 07:36:31 UTC 2007 (Ubuntu 2.6.20-15.27-generic) ... [ 33.281791] SCSI subsystem initialized [ 33.286398] libata version 2.20 loaded. [ 33.289865] sata_nv 0000:00:07.0: version 3.3 [ 33.290394] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APSI] enabled at IRQ 21 [ 33.290402] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:07.0[A] -> Link [APSI] -> GSI 21 (level, low) -> IRQ 18 [ 33.290411] sata_nv 0000:00:07.0: Using ADMA mode [ 33.290423] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:07.0 to 64 [ 33.290501] ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xe0856480 ctl 0xe08564a0 bmdma 0x0001d400 irq 18 [ 33.290543] ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xe0856580 ctl 0xe08565a0 bmdma 0x0001d408 irq 18 [ 33.290554] scsi0 : sata_nv [ 33.607099] ata1: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300) [ 33.607116] scsi1 : sata_nv [ 33.846693] usb 1-1: new low speed USB device using ohci_hcd and address 2 [ 33.922566] ata2: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300) [ 33.923770] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [APSJ] enabled at IRQ 20 [ 33.923777] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:08.0[A] -> Link [APSJ] -> GSI 20 (level, low) -> IRQ 19 [ 33.923787] sata_nv 0000:00:08.0: Using ADMA mode [ 33.923800] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:08.0 to 64 [ 33.923870] ata3: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xe0862480 ctl 0xe08624a0 bmdma 0x0001c000 irq 19 [ 33.923913] ata4: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xe0862580 ctl 0xe08625a0 bmdma 0x0001c008 irq 19 [ 33.923925] scsi2 : sata_nv [ 34.052254] usb 1-1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice [ 34.066871] usbcore: registered new interface driver hiddev [ 34.072392] input: Microsoft Microsoft 3-Button Mouse with IntelliEye(TM) as /class/input/input2 [ 34.072498] input: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Microsoft Microsoft 3-Button Mouse with IntelliEye(TM)] on usb-0000:00:02.0-1 [ 34.072513] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbhid [ 34.072516] drivers/usb/input/hid-core.c: v2.6:USB HID core driver [ 34.397786] ata3: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 300) [ 34.410822] ata3.00: ata_hpa_resize 1: sectors = 312581808, hpa_sectors = 312581808 [ 34.410827] ata3.00: ATA-7: Maxtor 6V160E0, VA111630, max UDMA/133 [ 34.410830] ata3.00: 312581808 sectors, multi 1: LBA48 NCQ (depth 31/32) [ 34.422784] ata3.00: ata_hpa_resize 1: sectors = 312581808, hpa_sectors = 312581808 [ 34.422788] ata3.00: configured for UDMA/133 [ 34.422797] scsi3 : sata_nv [ 34.737207] ata4: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300) [ 34.737983] scsi 2:0:0:0: Direct-Access ATA Maxtor 6V160E0 VA11 PQ: 0 ANSI: 5 [ 34.737992] ata3: bounce limit 0xFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF, segment boundary 0xFFFFFFFF, hw segs 61 [ 34.739951] NFORCE-CK804: IDE controller at PCI slot 0000:00:06.0 [ 34.739971] NFORCE-CK804: chipset revision 242 [ 34.739973] NFORCE-CK804: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later [ 34.739979] NFORCE-CK804: 0000:00:06.0 (rev f2) UDMA133 controller [ 34.739988] ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:DMA [ 34.739996] ide1: BM-DMA at 0xf008-0xf00f, BIOS settings: hdc:DMA, hdd:DMA [ 34.740003] Probing IDE interface ide0... [ 34.758729] SCSI device sda: 312581808 512-byte hdwr sectors (160042 MB) [ 34.758742] sda: Write Protect is off [ 34.758745] sda: Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00 [ 34.758758] SCSI device sda: write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA [ 34.758807] SCSI device sda: 312581808 512-byte hdwr sectors (160042 MB) [ 34.758815] sda: Write Protect is off [ 34.758817] sda: Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00 [ 34.758830] SCSI device sda: write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA [ 34.758833] sda: sda1 sda2 < sda5 sda6 sda7 sda8 sda9 sda10 sda11 > [ 34.862086] sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi disk sda [ 34.865814] sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg0 type 0 [ 115.268000] ReiserFS: sda9: found reiserfs format "3.6" with standard journal [ 115.268000] ReiserFS: sda9: using ordered data mode [ 115.276000] ReiserFS: sda9: journal params: device sda9, size 8192, journal first block 18, max trans len 1024, max batch 900, max commit age 30, max trans age 30 [ 115.276000] ReiserFS: sda9: checking transaction log (sda9) [ 115.352000] ReiserFS: sda9: Using r5 hash to sort names ... and i confirmed it with fdisk -l /dev/sda under Kubuntu Disk /dev/sda: 160.0 GB, 160041885696 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 19457 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda1 * 1 2611 20972826 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/sda2 2612 19456 135307462+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA) /dev/sda5 2612 5222 20972826 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/sda6 5223 9138 31455238+ 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/sda7 9139 15976 54926203+ 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/sda8 15977 15981 40131 83 Linux /dev/sda9 15982 18276 18434556 83 Linux /dev/sda10 18277 19325 8426061 83 Linux /dev/sda11 19326 19456 1052226 82 Linux swap / Solaris And definitely let me show you my kernel config in gentoo-sources-2.6.22-r6(which fails with a VFS error), here's the necessary setting i enabled with built-in support for sata device, you can also check the whole kernel config here # SCSI device support # # CONFIG_RAID_ATTRS is not set CONFIG_SCSI=y # CONFIG_SCSI_TGT is not set # CONFIG_SCSI_NETLINK is not set CONFIG_SCSI_PROC_FS=y # # SCSI support type (disk, tape, CD-ROM) # CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SD=y # CONFIG_CHR_DEV_ST is not set # CONFIG_CHR_DEV_OSST is not set # CONFIG_BLK_DEV_SR is not set CONFIG_CHR_DEV_SG=y # CONFIG_CHR_DEV_SCH is not set ... CONFIG_ATA=y # CONFIG_ATA_NONSTANDARD is not set CONFIG_ATA_ACPI=y # CONFIG_SATA_AHCI is not set # CONFIG_SATA_SVW is not set # CONFIG_ATA_PIIX is not set # CONFIG_SATA_MV is not set CONFIG_SATA_NV=y ... # File systems # CONFIG_EXT2_FS=y CONFIG_EXT2_FS_XATTR=y CONFIG_EXT2_FS_POSIX_ACL=y # CONFIG_EXT2_FS_SECURITY is not set # CONFIG_EXT2_FS_XIP is not set CONFIG_EXT3_FS=y CONFIG_EXT3_FS_XATTR=y # CONFIG_EXT3_FS_POSIX_ACL is not set # CONFIG_EXT3_FS_SECURITY is not set # CONFIG_EXT4DEV_FS is not set CONFIG_JBD=y # CONFIG_JBD_DEBUG is not set CONFIG_FS_MBCACHE=y CONFIG_REISERFS_FS=y # CONFIG_REISERFS_CHECK is not set # CONFIG_REISERFS_PROC_INFO is not set # CONFIG_REISERFS_FS_XATTR is not set ... To confirm it's not the prob of kernel itself, i diffed the ata section between vanilla-kernel and ubuntu kernel, there's no special patches for ubuntu kernel, and actually Fedora 7 LiveCD's kernel is quite the same as vanilla-kernel. So its not the prob of kernel itself, in i say. IMHO, maybe its the compatibility prob between the ASUS K8N4-E mainboard and Gentoo system, forget my silly words if i were wrong, cuz at least kernels<= 2.6.13 work well in my Gentoo system please share your ideas with me and help me out of this looooooooooooong time prob. Thx for your patience and enthusiastic help.