IDE DMA errors [was: Some ext2 errors]

[Mike Fedyk]

On Sun, Oct 07, 2001 at 03:15:33PM +0200, David G?mez wrote:
> On Sun, 7 Oct 2001, Riley Williams wrote:
> 
> > I see this regularly on one of my systems, and hdparm has never even
> > been insatalled on that system. If I put the drive in a different
> > system, the drive reports clean, but whatever drive I put in here
> > regularly reports that problem.
> 
> Yes, i also have seen this error also when not using hdparm, so it's not
> the cause of this ext2 errors.
>

Oh, sorry, I blamed before I had facts... my bad.

> >
> > As far as I can tell, it's a problem with the PSU in the computer in
> > question, as I can swap ANYTHING else in there, motherboard included,
> > without the problem going away on that drive, but as soon as I swap
> > the PSU, the problems vanish - even if I put a PSU with a lower rating
> > in its place.
> 
> If i see this error show more times i'll try to replace the PSU. First i
> think is has some relation with my VIA chipset, but if you tell me you
> have changed even your motherboard... ;)
>

It may not be your MB or drive, but an interaction between them.

I.E. Your bios could've told the linux driver to use a higher dma level than
the drive likes.

Try running "hdparm -d0 /dev/hda" (since your drive is hda in this case...)

And see if the problem goes away.  If it does, then try Multimode dma, if
(-X34)
you get errors, try single mode (probably -X31), if you get no errors there,
try UDMA mode 2 (-X66, also make sure you have a 80 line ide cable) and see
if any of the problems come back. 

> >  > Yeah.  If you can't figure out hdparm, leave it alone.
> >
> > Who says hdparm has anything to do with it?
> 
> He says, it seems he has very deep knowledge of hdparm 'secrets'.
> 

Again, sorry for being presumptuous.  I've only been able to cause this with
hdparm.  Maybe I'm just not using new enough hardware...

Mike