Install problem w. RocketRaid 1720.

[Richard Creighton]

Erik P. Olsen wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I have installed two sata II disks via a RocketRaid 1720 controller. 
> They run Fedora 7 in a hardware raid1 configuration. I have 
> experienced certain problems wich seems to be related to kernel 
> 2.6.21-1.3194.fc7, see bugzilla issue 240982.
>
> The driver from hightech only works with this kernel and the socalled 
> open source driver compiles with errors. This is too much of a pita so 
> I would prefer to skip the proprietary driver and run software raid1 
> instead.
>
> First of all I would like to know if linux supports drivers for 
> RocketRaid 1720? Secondly, is it possible to convert the hardware 
> raid1 to software raid1 (dmraid) without touching the already running 
> OS? Or do I have to create a new system from scratch?
>
I had the same problem with a RR1740x controller with that kernel.   I 
was able to successfully compile the driver when I upgraded the kernel 
to 2.6.22.... being sure to get the correct syms.   Since then, I've 
been able to run the controller just fine.   My problems started with 
 >2.6.18.... until .22+   It is continuing to work with .17 and .25 in 
the alpha 11 of SuSE.   It is a pita, to be sure, but I am no happily 
running a 2.5TB raid5 with that controller under SuSE 10.3.  

As to conversion:   I suspect that it is a real PITA to try.   The 
formats are entirely different and you have to have a small boot 
partition in order to load the drivers for the software raid.   I tried 
and gave up on that idea, at least until RR decides to actually support 
their controllers under Linux the way they do for Microsloth.

I suspect the 172x controller will play out the same way as the 174x 
controller did as I believe they use the same chipset, the main 
difference being how they handle the physical interface, eg, number of 
ports, etc.

Once I got the RR1740x to compile under Linux with a less buggy kernel, 
I have had zero problems with the card other than lack of any real 
support, though the driver source did not need modifications once the 
kernel issues were resolved.

Richard