From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Mon, 20 Aug 2001 20:36:58 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Mon, 20 Aug 2001 20:36:48 -0400 Received: from mail.scsiguy.com ([63.229.232.106]:54538 "EHLO aslan.scsiguy.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id ; Mon, 20 Aug 2001 20:36:39 -0400 Message-Id: <200108210036.f7L0amY45964@aslan.scsiguy.com> To: Cliff Albert cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: aic7xxx errors with 2.4.8-ac7 on 440gx mobo In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 21 Aug 2001 00:55:46 +0200." <20010821005546.A29315@oisec.net> Date: Mon, 20 Aug 2001 18:36:48 -0600 From: "Justin T. Gibbs" Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org >> IIRC, the problem has to do with the state of the write cache in the drive. >> The cache will be in a different state after power-on as compared to >> after some amount of activity. > >Well i still suspect the broken firmware of the disk isn't the only cause of >these errors Perhaps. One thing to keep in mind however is that, although the messages may *look* the same, they very rarely are. If you don't have verbose turned on, all transaction timeouts, regardless of the reason, look the same. It is only by analyzing the verbose output that a cause for a particular problem can be found. In the case of your system, we always timeout with the bus idle with several pending transaction, we can always abort a transaction successfully (i.e. the bus is not dead, neither is the target), its just that some transactions never complete. These are exactly the symptoms of the bogus FireBall ST firmware on your drive. Another thing to keep in mind... The newer driver defaults to using tagged queing and attempts to issue the maximum number of concurrent transactions possible to each device. The old driver, until fairly recently, defaulted to leaving tagged queuing disabled, and if enabled, only queued 8 transactions. So, the new aic7xxx driver often places a much higher load on your SCSI setup than the old one did. I think this has something to do with the large number of reports. This doesn't mean that there haven't been, or continue to be bugs. After all this is software, but I am trying to do my best to make it work. 8-) -- Justin