[lug] Trouble installing Debian

[J. Wayde Allen]

On Wed, 11 Oct 2000, Glenn Murray wrote:

> Weirdness.  I took the case apart.  The hard drive is a Western Digital
> IDE drive connected to a Promise Technology Ultra66 PCI card.

I don't know anything about this card.  Looks like you will need to do
some research or find someone how knows.

> Nothing is plugged into the motherboard's primary ide controller,
> which explains why setup doesn't see it.

If the setup program sees the controller on the motherboard and not the
controller being used I suppose that is true.  You'd kind of hope that
the setup would detect both controlers.

>  Besides the information below, Win2K also
> reports that there is a SCSI controller:

That is the info you provided earlier.  I don't suppose that you have a
SCSI CDROM or something similar and that is what you are seeing as the
SCSI controller?

> Promise Technology Inc Ultra 66 IDE controller (IRQ 09)

OK, if that is what your disk is connected to, that is particullarly
useful information.

> While it is true that I have what appears to be a Western Digital SCSI
> controller (not listed in the Hardware How-To as either supported or
> unsupported) it is also true that I do not have a SCSI hard drive.

OK, I was only basing my guesses on the info you had provided
earlier.  Debian usually autodetects the Western Digital SCSI controllers
too.

> I had to set an aic7xxx option on an older Dell box with an actual SCSI
> drive. It makes no difference if I don't set it.

If you don't have this hardware it doesn't make sense to set it.  My
concern was that by setting it you might have bypass the autodetect
sequence.  It doesn't sound like leaving it out fixed anything though.

> > Can the system autodect your SCSI controller?  
> 
> I have no idea.  How would I know?

Usually there is some indication when the system initially boots.

> And do I care anymore?

If you don't have a SCSI hard drive probably not.

> > into the driver.  In that case, you simply need to specify the correct IRQ
> > as a driver option.
> 
> Maybe this is it.  But, uh, how do I do that last simple bit when starting
> the install?

You have to figure out what software you need to talk to the disk
controller you actually have.  That will probably require some web
searching.  I'd try a boolean web search with your controller card's name
and Linux.  Hopefully that might net you a few clues.  Once you figure out
what module you need to use, you need to determine the options that need
to be set.  This is usually done during installation when you are asked
what special modules to load.  You will also be asked if there are any
special options to set.  Here you would probably type irq=09 or something
similar.

- Wayde
  (wallen at its.bldrdoc.gov)