eSATA drive not recognised on VT6421 card

raymov · #1 15th January 2007, 01:28 AM

Here is a summary of the error seen in /var/log/messages

Code:

Jan 12 14:02:00 web7 kernel: ata2: port is slow to respond, please be patient
Jan 12 14:02:23 web7 kernel: ata2: port failed to respond (30 secs)
Jan 12 14:02:23 web7 kernel: ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 310)
Jan 12 14:02:23 web7 kernel: ATA: abnormal status 0x80 on port 0xD887

The following hardware is being used:
IOT-SATA102 eSATA card
- uses VIA VT6421 Serial RAID controller chip.
Welland ME740J: USB2/eSATA 3.5" HDD enclosure
Seagate Barracuda ES 320 GB HDD (ST3320620NS)

The eSATA card itself is recognised by the kernel:

Code:

lspci | grep -i ide
01:00.0 RAID bus controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6421 IDE RAID Controller (rev 50)

Connection to the HDD enclosure via USB2 works fine (bypassing the eSATA card)

Code:

Jan 12 14:26:03 web7 kernel: usbcore: registered new driver usb-storage
Jan 12 14:26:03 web7 kernel: USB Mass Storage support registered.
Jan 12 14:26:08 web7 kernel: Vendor: ST332062 Model: 0NS Rev:
Jan 12 14:26:08 web7 kernel: Type: Direct-Access ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Jan 12 14:26:09 web7 kernel: scsi 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg0 type 0
Jan 12 14:26:09 web7 kernel: SCSI device sda: 625142448 512-byte hdwr sectors (320073 MB)

Latest kernel is being used:

Code:

uname -r
2.6.18-1.2869.fc6xen

Have tried this with two seperate eSATA cables & booting off the the FC6 rescue CD on a seperate system.
Any ideas how to resolve this?

tlviewer · #2 15th January 2007, 02:15 AM

hello,

This is a bootable addon card? Does it have a bios? PCI or PCI-ex?
How have you partitioned the attached drive?
What does the below return?
#dmraid -s
then what is given by
#ls -l /dev/mapper

do you see any via_xxxx objects?
if so, can you see anything with
#fdisk -l via_xxx

let us know,
Mark

raymov · #3 15th January 2007, 03:30 AM

Hi Mark

Its a PCI add on card, not sure if its bootable or has a built in BIOS; just using the eSATA drive for backups.
Not using any RAID functionaliy. This is what the partition table looks like when the drive is accessed via the USB interface:

Code:

dmraid -s
No RAID disks

fdisk -l /dev/sda

Disk /dev/sda: 320.0 GB, 320072933376 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 38913 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/sda1               1       38913   312568641   83  Linux

When using eSATA, don't see any "via" or "sda" devices.
relevant sata dmesg entries shown below.

Code:

ls -l /dev/mapper
total 0
crw------- 1 root root 10, 62 Jan 15 14:02 control

dmesg
SCSI subsystem initialized
libata version 2.00 loaded.
sata_via 0000:01:00.0: version 2.0
ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:01:00.0[A] -> GSI 21 (level, low) -> IRQ 21
sata_via 0000:01:00.0: routed to hard irq line 10
ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xDC00 ctl 0xDC0A bmdma 0xD400 irq 21
ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xD880 ctl 0xD88A bmdma 0xD408 irq 21
scsi0 : sata_via
ata1: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 310)
ATA: abnormal status 0x7F on port 0xDC07
scsi1 : sata_via
ata2: port is slow to respond, please be patient
ata2: port failed to respond (30 secs)
ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 310)
ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xD887
ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xD887
ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xD887
ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xD887
ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xD887
ATA: abnormal status 0xD0 on port 0xD887
ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xec)
ata2.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4)
ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 310)
ata2.00: ATA-7, max UDMA/133, 625142448 sectors: LBA48 NCQ (depth 0/32)
ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xec)
ata2.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4)
ata2.00: revalidation failed (errno=-5)
ata2.00: limiting speed to PIO0
ata2: failed to recover some devices, retrying in 5 secs
ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 310)
ata2.00: qc timeout (cmd 0xec)
ata2.00: failed to IDENTIFY (I/O error, err_mask=0x4)
ata2.00: revalidation failed (errno=-5)
ata2.00: disabled

Ray

raymov · #4 2nd March 2007, 02:35 AM

Dear fellow eSATA user
Has anyone got the IOT-SATA102 eSATA card working successfully with the Welland ME740J: USB2/eSATA 3.5" HDD enclosure or some other external device? Love to hear your feedback!

After doing some research, we contacted the suppliers & manufacturers, however they could not confirm if the two had been tested and have not yet supplied a HCL (Hardware Compatibiliy List) for alternative devices. Our view is that the card was either faulty or incompatible

. For testing purposes, we purchased a different card, which worked straight away without any issues

Lycom ST-113e Low Profile Serial ATA PCI Card
which uses: Silicon Image SiI3512 chipset:

Here is a basic performance comparison between USB & eSATA,
with our results showing that eSATA is significantly quicker (almost 3x):

Code:

hdparm -Tt /dev/sda1

USB:
Timing cached reads: 1396 MB in 2.00 seconds = 697.47 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 84 MB in 3.02 seconds = 27.78 MB/sec

eSATA:
Timing cached reads: 1372 MB in 2.00 seconds = 684.90 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 226 MB in 3.01 seconds = 75.11 MB/sec

eSATA also works with SmartMonTools
To display HDD status:

Code:

yum install smartmontools
smartctl -d ata -a /dev/sdb1

...
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED
...

More information:
The Welland ME740J uses the SATALink SPIF215A-HF021
(USB2.0 to SATA Host Bridge):
We chose this model, since it received the best review out of nine enclosures,
refer to the Vantec NexStar3 NST360SU:

Hope this info helps someone out there.
raymov

sej7278 · #5 3rd March 2007, 02:56 PM

but the card you got to work is only sata150, i.e. it's not really esata, just sata with and external connector (esata has a different connector, cable, power levels, and has to be sata300).

i have a sil3114 card with one of those external sata150 connectors, it works but it's not esata, it gets about 60mbps, and yes usb2 is much slower, firewire is faster than usb2 (although rated at 400mbps not 480, it's synchronous, usb2 being async should really be rated at 240mbps).

has anyone got a proper esata pci card to work, the only one i can find which should work is the Addonics ADSA3R5-E, but I can't find that for sale anywhere: http://www.addonics.com/products/hos.../adsa3r5-e.asp