[parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Steve.Grady]

Hi,

I want to put a large SCSI disk either 9.1G or 18.2G SCSI disk on a HP
735/125 does anyone know if this will work under PARISC-linux and will I be
able to see the whole disk?

Thanks in advance

Steve Grady

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Matthew Wilcox]

On Sun, Oct 21, 2001 at 08:05:16AM +1000, Steve.Grady@csiro.au wrote:
> I want to put a large SCSI disk either 9.1G or 18.2G SCSI disk on a HP
> 735/125 does anyone know if this will work under PARISC-linux and will I be
> able to see the whole disk?

The only thing to beware of is that palo can only access the first
2GB of the disc, so the kernel that it loads has to be in this area.
It is possible to fix palo to work for >2GB partitions, but nobody's
done that yet.

-- 
Revolutions do not require corporate support.

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[John Marvin]

> On Sun, Oct 21, 2001 at 08:05:16AM +1000, Steve.Grady@csiro.au wrote:
> > I want to put a large SCSI disk either 9.1G or 18.2G SCSI disk on a HP
> > 735/125 does anyone know if this will work under PARISC-linux and will I be
> > able to see the whole disk?
>
> The only thing to beware of is that palo can only access the first
> 2GB of the disc, so the kernel that it loads has to be in this area.
> It is possible to fix palo to work for >2GB partitions, but nobody's
> done that yet.

What this means is that you can create a small /boot partition
at the front of the disk, and then create as many other partitions
as you want. Other than the palo limit, which only affects the partition
you boot from, the partitions can be > 2Gb.

However, the other thing to be aware of is that the Fast Wide SCSI
Is not yet supported (at least last time I checked) on the 735. The
SE SCSI adapter will work though.

John Marvin
jsm@fc.hp.com

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Grant Grundler]

Steve.Grady@csiro.au wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I want to put a large SCSI disk either 9.1G or 18.2G SCSI disk on a HP
> 735/125 does anyone know if this will work under PARISC-linux and will I be
> able to see the whole disk?

large disks are not a problem.
The question is will you be able to find a 9 or 18GB disk
with either SE SCSI or HVD SCSI interface which the 735
can connect to.

grant

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[John David Anglin]

> The question is will you be able to find a 9 or 18GB disk
> with either SE SCSI or HVD SCSI interface which the 735
> can connect to.

What about a Seagate ST318417N?  It is: 18.4GB, 7200 rpm, 8.5 ms seek avg,
Ultra SCSI, suggested resale price $269.  While you can still find a HVD
drive it looks like they are rapidly going the way of the dodo bird.

Dave
-- 
J. David Anglin                                  dave.anglin@nrc.ca
National Research Council of Canada              (613) 990-0752 (FAX: 952-6605)

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Paul Bame]

> The only thing to beware of is that palo can only access the first
> 2GB of the disc, so the kernel that it loads has to be in this area.
> It is possible to fix palo to work for >2GB partitions, but nobody's
> done that yet.

The firmware call which supports >2GB access may not be available
in that box -- I'm not sure when it became available.  Linux will
have no problem accessing the whole drive however.

	-P

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Matt Taggart]

"John David Anglin" writes...

> > The question is will you be able to find a 9 or 18GB disk
> > with either SE SCSI or HVD SCSI interface which the 735
> > can connect to.
> 
> What about a Seagate ST318417N?  It is: 18.4GB, 7200 rpm, 8.5 ms seek avg,
> Ultra SCSI, suggested resale price $269.  While you can still find a HVD
> drive it looks like they are rapidly going the way of the dodo bird.

I think that should work.

Last year sometime I saw Paul Bame install an 18GB 10k RPM LVD Seagate
Cheetah drive in a 712 and install parisc-linux on it. It worked great :)

-- 
Matt Taggart        Linux Development Lab
taggart@fc.hp.com   HP Linux Systems Operation

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Grant Grundler]

Matt Taggart wrote:
> Last year sometime I saw Paul Bame install an 18GB 10k RPM LVD Seagate
> Cheetah drive in a 712 and install parisc-linux on it. It worked great :)

The LVD SCSI drives can also grok SE SCSI signal.
Not true for HVD drives.
But perhaps adding an SE SCSI interface to a 735 is possible.
(to address the original problem)

grant

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[John David Anglin]

> Matt Taggart wrote:
> > Last year sometime I saw Paul Bame install an 18GB 10k RPM LVD Seagate
> > Cheetah drive in a 712 and install parisc-linux on it. It worked great
:)
>
> The LVD SCSI drives can also grok SE SCSI signal.
> Not true for HVD drives.
> But perhaps adding an SE SCSI interface to a 735 is possible.
> (to address the original problem)

The 735 normally has a SE SCSI interface.  Integrating LVD drives into
a 735 would be a little more complicated than the SE drive that I suggested.

As far as I can tell, most LVD drives have16-bit interfaces.  Thus, a 8-16
bit adapter is needed.  Also, you need an external terminator since LVD
drives don't have any provision for internal termination.  The above implies
that LVD drives must be installed at the end of the bus.  I don't think it
would
be possible to install a LVD drive in the 735's internal hard drive bay
because
of these constraints.  It would have to be in an external case.

Dave

Re: [parisc-linux] Large SCSI disks on a 735/125

[Richard Hirst]

On Sat, Oct 20, 2001 at 11:22:31PM +0100, Matthew Wilcox wrote:
> On Sun, Oct 21, 2001 at 08:05:16AM +1000, Steve.Grady@csiro.au wrote:
> > I want to put a large SCSI disk either 9.1G or 18.2G SCSI disk on a HP
> > 735/125 does anyone know if this will work under PARISC-linux and will I be
> > able to see the whole disk?

As I think jsm added, the internal fast-wide-diff disks on a 53c720 are
not supported atm.  53c720 is supported on some systems (zalon on bluefish
card, in my B180, for example), and I had some provisional patches for
53c720 support on Outfield (735).  Turns out that they wont work though,
because 735 is not cache coherent.  The 53c720 driver is ncr53c8xx.c,
which assumes cache coherent memory is available - it bombs on 735
because pci_alloc_consistent() fails.

Not sure what to do about this yet - we might get support most easily
by adding 53c720 to the new 53c700 driver, but it would be running
the 53c720 in 53c700 mode, which is rather sub-optimal.

Given that ncr53c8xx.c is really a pci driver, I think there is a limit
to how much we can get away with changing it for non-pci, non 53c8xx
chips.

Richard