Re: SATA problem

[Bill Hacker <wbh@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jaime Andrés Ballesteros wrote:

> Hi all.
> I want to begin in DragonFlyBSD but my experience in FreeBSD 5.3 with
> my 120 GB SATA is not good. FreeBSD gives me the error FAILURE -
> WRITE_DMA. Today, i modifies de ata-lowlevel.c in the 48bit section
> and  i hope tha this will work. Anyway, i need to know if in DragonFly
> this problem is solved.
>
> If anyone knows about that, i will appreciate this.
>
> Thank you.
>
> jab

You haven't specified *which* SATA chipset, but so far,
DragonFly has recognized and worked OK with ITE PATA,
HPT 370, 372, PATA, and HPT 372 SATA (including
RocketRaid 1520) as well as Sil 3120, 3140 for me.

Promise Fastrak TX2-150 + (2 SATA + 1x2 dev PATA)
has been problematic. Not even detected on some MB.

On-MB SATA has been problematic - apparently BIOS issues,
as same maker's SATA will work as a PCI-bus resident add-on.

FreeBSD 4.X and 5.X either do not recognize (4.X) or do not
reliably utilize (5.X, 6.X) the same cards in the same MB I
tested, though OS/2, Linux, and Aos DO, and OpenBSD 3.X
or NetBSD 2.0 may also, generally as 'ordinary' ATA, not
necessarily as RAID.

JMNSHO, but it appears that as of today, DragonFly is
'as good as it gets' in *BSD-land w/r SATA adaptors.

To be fair, at least some of the Linux distro's may be
better still w/r SATA drivers, as major vendors have
released more drivers for Linux than *BSD.

Won't take you long to try it - you can tell at boot
and first step of install if the controller and drives
are recognized well before you actually alter anything.

HTH,

Bill Hacker