PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

A forum for Classic Amiga specific support issues.
fitzsteve
Posts: 21
Joined: Sat Jun 25, 2011 5:44 pm

PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by fitzsteve »

Hi!

Sorry my first post is to report an issue :oops:

I recently purchased OS4.1 Classic for my A1200T, my system is as follows:

A1200 Rev1D4 with Timing Fixes
Blizzard PPC 330mhz +256mb Ram
Mediator 1200SX
FastATA MkII (only used as scsi.device)
Voodoo 3 3000
Realtek 8029AS
Subway USB
2x DVDRW's

(Unused for OS4.1 but in system SB128 for my OS3.9 partition and RealTek 8139D)

Not important for this issue but its housed in an EZ Z4 Tower & powered by a 300w ATX PSU.

I've installed OS4.1 to a 20gb IDE HDD and the OS is working fine, since my FastATA is not supported by the ATA3 driver I thought about adding a SATA drive to my system.

I purchased 2 supported SATA Cards with chipsets sii3512 (2port) and sii3114 (4port)

Both exhibit the same problem in my system, I can see the device in MediaToolBox and can read the drive and make partitions however when I try to save changes the MediaToolBox locks up and the changes are not saved :(

I tried partitioning a drive under WinUAE and when OS4.1 boots the partitions appear on the Workbench but before loading of the OS is finished the system locks up.

I have a 2nd Mediator here, an LT4 so I also tried with this and it does exactly the same thing.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has SATA working on an A1200/Mediator setup or if anyone has any suggestions.

I also tried to comment out the two spare un-needed SATA drivers but this did not help.

I have tested with just the bare minimum connected, i.e just the Blizzy, Mediator, VGA Card, SATA Card & DVDRW(On 4WayIDE) Booting from Live CD, of course, I still had the same issue :|

Thanks in advance.

Steve.
User avatar
DarrenHD
Beta Tester
Beta Tester
Posts: 636
Joined: Mon Dec 20, 2010 3:38 pm
Location: London, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by DarrenHD »

fitzsteve wrote:Hi!

Sorry my first post is to report an issue :oops:

I recently purchased OS4.1 Classic for my A1200T, my system is as follows:

A1200 Rev1D4 with Timing Fixes
Blizzard PPC 330mhz +256mb Ram
Mediator 1200SX
FastATA MkII (only used as scsi.device)
Voodoo 3 3000
Realtek 8029AS
Subway USB
2x DVDRW's

(Unused for OS4.1 but in system SB128 for my OS3.9 partition and RealTek 8139D)

Not important for this issue but its housed in an EZ Z4 Tower & powered by a 300w ATX PSU.

I've installed OS4.1 to a 20gb IDE HDD and the OS is working fine, since my FastATA is not supported by the ATA3 driver I thought about adding a SATA drive to my system.

I purchased 2 supported SATA Cards with chipsets sii3512 (2port) and sii3114 (4port)

Both exhibit the same problem in my system, I can see the device in MediaToolBox and can read the drive and make partitions however when I try to save changes the MediaToolBox locks up and the changes are not saved :(

I tried partitioning a drive under WinUAE and when OS4.1 boots the partitions appear on the Workbench but before loading of the OS is finished the system locks up.

I have a 2nd Mediator here, an LT4 so I also tried with this and it does exactly the same thing.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has SATA working on an A1200/Mediator setup or if anyone has any suggestions.

I also tried to comment out the two spare un-needed SATA drivers but this did not help.

I have tested with just the bare minimum connected, i.e just the Blizzy, Mediator, VGA Card, SATA Card & DVDRW(On 4WayIDE) Booting from Live CD, of course, I still had the same issue :|

Thanks in advance.

Steve.
Hi Steve, we're looking into this for Update 3. Stay tuned :)

Thats the latest info I have.
AmigaOS 4.x Beta Tester - Classic Amiga enthusiast - http://www.hd-zone.com is my Amiga Blog, check it out!
User avatar
JurassicC
Beta Tester
Beta Tester
Posts: 465
Joined: Wed Apr 20, 2011 12:21 pm
Location: UK

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by JurassicC »

fitzsteve wrote:Hi!

Thanks in advance.

Steve.
Firstly, sata works flawlessly here in my A1200T's

One like yours is a uprated 330Mhz Model.

In the LT4 I'm using sii3512 and in the TX I'm using sii3112

One simple check i need you to do is check the jumper settings on the mediator, specifically the wait jumper it must be closed, ie the jumper over both pins.
AT A1200T 66MHz 060 330MHz 603e Mediator TX OS 4.1 Beta
X1000 OS4.1 Beta, X5020 OS4.1 Beta, A1XE OS4.1 Beta
AT A1200 68030 ACA1232, C= A1200 Typhoon MK2 68030
CD32 TF330 / CDTV 3.1 SCSI2SD 8MB FAST RAM / CD32 FMV
fitzsteve
Posts: 21
Joined: Sat Jun 25, 2011 5:44 pm

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by fitzsteve »

OMG, it was that simple, wait jumper closed :shock:

Thanks, I now have SATA working :D
User avatar
DarrenHD
Beta Tester
Beta Tester
Posts: 636
Joined: Mon Dec 20, 2010 3:38 pm
Location: London, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by DarrenHD »

fitzsteve wrote:OMG, it was that simple, wait jumper closed :shock:

Thanks, I now have SATA working :D
Excellent :) The jumpers are causing some problems for people...I just double checked the FAQ and it is correct...so we'll have to make sure users check the FAQ ;-)

Have a nice weekend!

Darren
AmigaOS 4.x Beta Tester - Classic Amiga enthusiast - http://www.hd-zone.com is my Amiga Blog, check it out!
fitzsteve
Posts: 21
Joined: Sat Jun 25, 2011 5:44 pm

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by fitzsteve »

Thanks Darren, of course when I had SATA issues I was checking the SATA area of the FAQ for idea's, I didn't even think OS4.1 would boot with incorrect jumpers hence why I overlooked that.

Might be worth adding to the FAQ somthing along the lines of:

Q: MediaToolBox locks up when I try to save changes to a SATA drive connected to my PCI SATA card, what could be the problem?

A: Check that you have closed the 'WAIT' Jumper :geek:

Thanks for the support guys.

Steve.
User avatar
DarrenHD
Beta Tester
Beta Tester
Posts: 636
Joined: Mon Dec 20, 2010 3:38 pm
Location: London, Ontario, Canada
Contact:

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by DarrenHD »

fitzsteve wrote:Thanks Darren, of course when I had SATA issues I was checking the SATA area of the FAQ for idea's, I didn't even think OS4.1 would boot with incorrect jumpers hence why I overlooked that.

Might be worth adding to the FAQ somthing along the lines of:

Q: MediaToolBox locks up when I try to save changes to a SATA drive connected to my PCI SATA card, what could be the problem?

A: Check that you have closed the 'WAIT' Jumper :geek:

Thanks for the support guys.

Steve.
Updated FAQ is now in the FAQ thread :) I added your question. Thnx :)
AmigaOS 4.x Beta Tester - Classic Amiga enthusiast - http://www.hd-zone.com is my Amiga Blog, check it out!
User avatar
JurassicC
Beta Tester
Beta Tester
Posts: 465
Joined: Wed Apr 20, 2011 12:21 pm
Location: UK

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by JurassicC »

@FitzSteve

Its also possible to increase the PIO performance by turning off interrupts.
This can be acheived by using IDETOOL in c:
Regards
AT A1200T 66MHz 060 330MHz 603e Mediator TX OS 4.1 Beta
X1000 OS4.1 Beta, X5020 OS4.1 Beta, A1XE OS4.1 Beta
AT A1200 68030 ACA1232, C= A1200 Typhoon MK2 68030
CD32 TF330 / CDTV 3.1 SCSI2SD 8MB FAST RAM / CD32 FMV
fitzsteve
Posts: 21
Joined: Sat Jun 25, 2011 5:44 pm

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by fitzsteve »

Hey All,

Following a guide Jurassic wrote over at Amibay I setup my OS4.1 Classic so that it loads the Kickstart files off the Native IDE and then continues to boot from the SATA HDD attached to me SATA Raid Card :)

So anyway I thought I'd share this with ya'll :geek:

Its hard to demonstrate the SATA with Photo's lol but anyway you'll get the idea ;)

So first up here's OS4.1 loaded up from the Live CD, luckily I had a backup of my SYS in .lha on my Work Partition so no need to reinstall...

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1853.jpg

(Click links below thumbnails for full size images)

I followed Jurassic's instructions with regards to Kicklayout and file structure on the BOOT Partition, only difference is my SATA drive was SDH0. After copying the files and adjusting the Kicklayout files I switched off and gave her a cold start.

YAY!! \o/

Booted first time :D

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1854.jpg

As you can see I have a few drives there, BOOT is hidden, OS41Work/Games are the old IDE drives. I just need to transfer the files to SATA1/2 which are my new SATA Partitions. OS41SYS is the SDH0 from the SATA drive.

As you can also see I have a few PCI Cards installed. Keropi at Amibay kindly donated an ESS SOLO 1 Soundcard to me and I'm pleased to report its working perfect with OS4.1 Classic.

Here's a couple of shots from Ranger with my System Specs/Info:

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1855.jpg

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1856.jpg

Here's the partition info, its a little quick and dirty but all works - I'll probably do away with the IDE drive and just use a small CF to start the booting 8-)

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1858.jpg

I did have a SWAP Partition at the end but I deleted as my System was locking up before, I've not had any lockups since so I'm guessing I done something wrong there and will go back and RTFM before creating another one :P

Here's the Partitions with BOOT hidden:

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1859.jpg

And some more partition details:

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1860.jpg

Image

http://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm10 ... G_1861.jpg

Big thanks again to Jurassic, your awesome little guide was easy to follow, so easy even I could get it working first time!

And here is Jurassics guide for anyone else who wants to have a try:
What you need to do is the following:-

Install OS4.1 on to a small HD or compact flash from the CD.
A SFS/00 partition, 512MB Bootable called BOOT: under the first 4GB for example will do and keep it on the native IDE.

Add your SATA Controller (sii 3512 is the better 2 port card or sii3114 for 4 port) connect up your sata harddrive / sata cdrom and power up.

Mediatoolbox will now show scsi.device and sii3xxxide.device

Select the sii3xxxide.device and read the drive config.
Create a FFS2 DOS7 or SFS/00 DH0: partition, 512MB, bootable will do in mediatoolbox.
Create a 255MB SWAP: partition as per the FAQ and move it to the end of the sata disk, leave the rest in the middle blank for now.

Reboot

Quick format DH0: on the sata drive, but don't try to format SWAP

From the shell

CD BOOT:
Copy #? all clone DH0:

This will copy your OS4.1 install to your sata drive partition DH0:

You can now delete everything off boot: except for the following drawers

Kickstart
C
S

In C: and S: on boot: all you need is s:startup-sequence and c:bootloader & C:ata3.driver


Now create a text file called bootdevice with just the text 'DH0', nothing else and save it as BOOT:kickstart/bootdevice

Open BOOT:kickstart/kicklayout-A1200 in notepad

Uncomment the bootdevice line at the bottom of the kicklayout file by removing the ';'

Open a shell and type:-
Reboot sync

This will close all filesystems down gracefully and perform a cold clean reboot

Your kickstart will now boot from BOOT: using the native IDE, similar to powering on the A1200 under 3.9 and setpatch adding the AmigaOS ROM Update. Once the kickstart modules have been loaded it will soft reboot.

Workbench will now boot from DH0: on the sata drive instead of BOOT:

*Open a shell and type fc-cache -fv to rebuild the font cache if you accidently didn't use the clone option when copying from one partition to the other, you might need to do this twice on SFS/00 partitions.


Things you can experiment with now are:-

Remove your native IDE CD-Rom drive and put your old 3.5" hardrive on there instead as slave.
Prep the unused space in the middle of the sata drive, I recommend JXF/04 but if you want it visible from 3.9 use SFS/00 and copy over your data.

You can delete the kickstart drawer from DH0: as it not needed in this setup now.

AmigaOS 4.1 will now use its memory pager when physical memory gets low as you have a swap partition available.

If you don't want the native IDE available under OS 4.1 you can comment the following line out of boot:kickstart/kicklayout-a1200

Module kickstart/A1200/scsi.device

From now on you will have a pure SATA system under OS 4.1, with only the native IDE used to boot the 4.1 ROM
Hope you enjoyed that and it helps some others get a little more out of OS4.1 Classic.

PS. I had some issues with SFS/00 and A1200 IDE so you might be safer with FFS for the little BOOT Partition...

Steve. :ugeek:
User avatar
JurassicC
Beta Tester
Beta Tester
Posts: 465
Joined: Wed Apr 20, 2011 12:21 pm
Location: UK

Re: PCI SATA Raid Cards on A1200/Mediator

Post by JurassicC »

Cool...

Might be a good idea to copy back the kickstart drawer from your native IDE disk to your sata sys: partition.
I say this as update 3 will no doubt install new kickstart modules to sys:kickstart

Once update 3 is installed you'll need to copy the contents of sys:kickstart to your native ide disk kickstart drawer.

Also if any other files on your native ide partition are superseeded by newer versions in update 3 then they will also require updating too eg:- startup-sequence bootloader etc.
AT A1200T 66MHz 060 330MHz 603e Mediator TX OS 4.1 Beta
X1000 OS4.1 Beta, X5020 OS4.1 Beta, A1XE OS4.1 Beta
AT A1200 68030 ACA1232, C= A1200 Typhoon MK2 68030
CD32 TF330 / CDTV 3.1 SCSI2SD 8MB FAST RAM / CD32 FMV
Post Reply