Slackware 10.2 on Dimension e520

Question

I've been having issues trying to get Slackware 10.2 installed on a Dimension e520 that I just bought. No matter what kernel I select, the hard drives are not visible. When I choose the test26.s kernel, the keyboard ceases to function before the keymap selection. What I was able to do is to make a USB stick bootable with Slackware 11, boot off of it, pick the test26.s kernel (the only kernel under 10.2 or 11.0 that the HDs show up under), and install from the 10.2 CDs. However, when I reboot and try to boot off the hard drive, nothing happens. (I'm guessing it's because the driver for the SATA controller is not in the sata.i kernel under 10.2, but that's only a guess.) How do I go about getting 10.2 to recognize the SATA hard drives in this machine? (Yes, I know that Slackware 12.0 is out. I developed an application system that this machine is intended to house and that was developed under 10.2. I'd rather not go through the work of installing, configuring, etc and then find out that something in my application doesn't work because of either the different packages or the 2.6 kernel instead of 2.4.) Message Edited by Ruler2112 on 07-20-2007 02:38 PM

Ruler2112 · Answer

I should add that I've tried all of the kernels under 10.2 with the SATA controller set to both RAID mode and RAID AutoDetect / ATA mode.

sdrrds · Answer

EDIT: didn't read the whole message :) sorry no idea.. You could try 11.0, not too many changes from 10.2 to 11.0 Message Edited by sdrrds on 07-21-2007 01:13 AM

Ruler2112 · Answer

I'd thought about trying 11.0, but I'd still have to go with a 2.6 kernel. Nobody has ever tried to install a 2.4.x kernel on a machine with this SATA controller before?!????

Ruler2112 · Answer

Just tried updating the BIOS using a Windoze LiveCD built with BartPE. I'm now running 2.4.0 version of the BIOS, but still nothing when I boot from the 10.2 slackware CD. :(

Ruler2112 · Answer

Got it figured out. I found this posted yesterday about the newest 2.4.x kernel: http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/7/22/160 Armed with this information, I was able to get it working. Here's how:

I booted from test26.s off a USB drive, partitioned the hard drive, then started the setup program and installed from the 10.2 CDs. I picked bare.i, knowing that it wouldn't work. After installation, I rebooted, again booting from the usb drive with 'test26.s root=/dev/sda2 noinitrd ro' as the boot string. (This loaded the 2.6 kernel that recognized the SATA controller and told it that the root file system exists on /dev/sda2.)

I got a prompt and extracted the 2.4.34 kernel to /usr/src. I then applied the patch to take the kernel to 204.35-rc1. Compiled the kernel, installed it, rebooted, and all was well.

A few more steps and I now have this system running software RAID-1 for the boot, root, and swap partitions. (I was going to try to use the Dell RAID function built into the BIOS, but even after I created the RAID-1 drive via the BIOS, all I was presented with was the two individual SATA drives.)

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