Ok audioluv, I can work with this :D

I am focusing on two things in dmseg that catch my attention here. First is that you mention that you have an ATA66 controller card, and second that the kernel is using devfs, which is Ok, but if we don't get a resolution with HDD settings, we may want to look at devfs.

<snip> # this is what I am looking at in dmesg and why I am suggesting the solution below.

ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
PIIX4: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 39
PIIX4: chipset revision 1
PIIX4: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
ide0: BM-DMA at 0xffa0-0xffa7, BIOS settings: hda:pio, hdb:pio
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xffa8-0xffaf, BIOS settings: hdc:DMA, hdd:pio
HPT366: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 90
PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 00:12.0
PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 00:12.1
HPT366: chipset revision 1
HPT366: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
ide2: BM-DMA at 0xe000-0xe007, BIOS settings: hde:pio, hdf:pio
HPT366: IDE controller on PCI bus 00 dev 91
PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 00:12.1
PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 00:12.0
HPT366: chipset revision 1
HPT366: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
ide3: BM-DMA at 0xe800-0xe807, BIOS settings: hdg:pio, hdh:pio
hd1: C/H/S=0/0/0 from BIOS ignored
hda: SAMSUNG SV0432D, ATA DISK drive
hdc: SAMSUNG CD-ROM SC-140, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
hdh: PCRW804, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
ide1 at 0x170-0x177,0x376 on irq 15
ide3 at 0xeff0-0xeff7,0xefe6 on irq 11
hda: 8421840 sectors (4312 MB) w/480KiB Cache, CHS=8912/15/63, UDMA(33)
hdc: ATAPI 40X CD-ROM drive, 128kB Cache, DMA
Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.12
ide-floppy driver 0.97
Partition check:
/dev/ide/host0/bus0/target0/lun0: [PTBL] [524/255/63] p1 p2 < p5 p6 >

Let's start with your HDD configuration. We could probably improve on what we have going on here. Using the `hdparm' command, here is a suggestion that may (hopefully) resolve your problem.

From `dmesg' I can see that you have one HDD and it is named hda ( the default first hdd device name). It is currently running in UDMA 33 and we have some room for improvement there.

Open a teminal emulator and su to root. Now, we want to get some info about your hard drive, so using the hdparm command with the -I option...

example:
[root@yourbox:~]# hdparm -I /dev/hda

The output will look something like this.

/dev/hda:

Model=CI530L04VARE700- , FwRev=REO44AA4, SerialNo= S PXXTT07329
Config={ HardSect NotMFM HdSw>15uSec Fixed DTR>10Mbs }
RawCHS=16383/16/63, TrkSize=0, SectSize=0, ECCbytes=40
BuffType=DualPortCache, BuffSize=1916kB, MaxMultSect=16, MultSect=16
CurCHS=16383/16/63, CurSects=-66060037, LBA=yes, LBAsects=80418240
IORDY=on/off, tPIO={min:240,w/IORDY:120}, tDMA={min:120,rec:120}
PIO modes: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4
DMA modes: mdma0 mdma1 *mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 udma5
AdvancedPM=yes: disabled (255)
Drive Supports : ATA/ATAPI-5 T13 1321D revision 1 : ATA-2 ATA-3 ATA-4 ATA-5

Next, go ahead and see what your HDD speed is currently.

Example:

[root@yourbox: ~]# hdparm -t /dev/hda

example output:

Timing buffered disk reads: 64 MB in 5.85 seconds = 11.2 MB/sec



Your HDD is currently running in 16 bit and unmask is 0 (off) so we want to optimize these to what they should be.

[root@yourbox: ~]# hdparm -c3 -m16 /dev/hda

Now run `hdparm -t /dev/hda' again see what it says, any improvement?

Lets enable DMA, and DMA2

[root@yourbox: ~]# hdparm -d1 -X34 /dev/hda

Now we want to set the unmask bit to "on"

[root@yourbox: ~]# hdparm -u1 /dev/hda

Computer still running? :D Ok, now we just need to read the output of `hdparm -I /dev/hda' on the line "PIO Modes:" and see what the highest PIO mode is that we can set to. In my example above it was pio4, my guess is that yours will be pio3, but check it to make sure.

Using pio3 as an example, we need to set the pio mode on the drive.

[root@yourbox: ~]# hdparm -p3 /dev/hda

These settings will not be around the next time you boot, so we need to put them in a place that initd will find and set them for us on every boot. We are going to add a line to rc.local to accomplish this.

so....

[root@yourbox: ~]# cd /etc/rc.d && vi rc.local

We add the following line to whatever is in this file.

hdparm -c3 -m16 -d1 -X34 -u1 -p3 /dev/hda


Then save and exit and you are all done.


I hope this helps you out, if it does not, I am happy to keep helping you, just let me know a few more details about what is happening, what you are doing at the time etc.

And hopefully.. after we get your Linux install working the way it *should be* you will have a lot of fun with it and learn some nifty stuff. :D

Happy New Year everyone!!!!