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List:       aic7xxx
Subject:    Re: SCSI - IDE RAID experience????
From:       Bernhard Burgermeister <bbu () burgermeister ! de>
Date:       2003-08-20 8:09:46
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Hello,

I don't have your RAID-Types, but I have some experience with EasyRaid II
IDE to SCSI-RAIDs. Here my report:

We have 3 EasyRAID II, bought 1-3 years ago, about 6 months between each
buy. All are connected to different Adaptec 29160.

the first one has a U2W-SCSI (80MB) Host-Channel, working fine with all 
kernels I tested (several 2.4.x from 2.4.2 to 2.4.18, RedHat or Stock 
kernels)

the second has a U160 Host-Channel, wich made several Problems in 
LVD-mode. The usual error messages are like you reported:

> 3. The aic7xxx driver reporting:
>    'parity error detected in Data-in phase',
>    'CRC Value Mismatch'
>    'Unexpected busfree in Message-out phase'
>    and other variations.

Access to the drive was possible, but sometimes there was a quite long
delay. Changing the SCSI-Controller, Cable, Terminator, internal Cable of
the RAID controller or complete computer didn't help. After some testing I
found out that the drive works well in Ultra-SCSI mode. I used an old
(non-LVD) terminator to force the bus to single-ended scsi, and the drive
is working fine for over 1 year now without problems. As it is the only
device at the scsi-controller, and the server is connected to 100MBit
Ethernet it is no problem for us to reduce the speed to 40MB/sek. Changing
speed to 80 or 40MB LVD didn't help. I don't have a real U2W-Controller to 
test real 80MB/s-Mode.

The third has U160-Host too, but newer firmware and controller-revision 
than above and works fine with redhat 2.4.18 in LVD-Mode. 

The newer firmware can not be installed on the older controller, so I
can't tell if the second device is broken or just the firmware is broken
and has problems with LVD-mode.
I got a hint that one of the data-lines wich is used in LVD-mode, but not 
in SE-Mode may be broken. But as we had very much data on the RAID we 
didn't send it in for service, as we can live with this problem quite 
well.


Regards,
Bernhard B.

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