*BSD News Article 88332


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From: ajudge@maths.tcd.ie (Alan Judge)
Newsgroups: comp.periphs.scsi,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Bizarre SCSI problem (3 disks work, 4 don't) (2940UW/Quantum Atlas II)
Date: 4 Feb 1997 10:11:13 -0000
Organization: Dept. of Maths, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland.
Lines: 38
Sender: mathnews@gosset.maths.tcd.ie
Message-ID: <5d7201$qa@gosset.maths.tcd.ie>
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Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.periphs.scsi:69702 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:35040

I have a really odd (in my experience, at least) SCSI problem.  The setup is
a PC (running FreeBSD 2.2-BETA) containing an Adaptec 2940UW.  No internal
disks.  The external 68-pin connector is connected to a case containing 4 
Quantum Atlas II disks.  Inside the case, the 4 disks are chained together
on a ribbon cable.  The case is terminated with an external active 
terminator, and the 2940 termination is set to automatic.

The 4 disks are numbers 0..3.  When *any* three disks are connected to
the ribbon cable, everything works fine;  I can access and use the
disks.  When all four are connected, the SCSI system fails quite
quickly.  The usual symptoms are a lockup where one of the disk
activity lights will remain on.  Eventually FreeBSD times out and
things unlock and an error is generated.  This problem can occur as
early as the initial probing of the disks.

The only change that I make between a working 3 disk setup and a broken
4 disk one is to disconnect the ribbon connector from the back of the
drive that I decide to remove.  I leave the power connected, in case
it's a power supply problem.  Removing any of the four disks results in
a working system.

I'm stumped.  Any ideas?


In case they help, the sort of errors that FreeBSD sees include:
Feb  3 16:32:56 siobhra /kernel: sd3(ahc1:2:0): timed out in datain phase, SCSISIGI == 0x44
Feb  3 16:32:56 siobhra /kernel: SEQADDR == 0x59
Feb  3 16:32:56 siobhra /kernel: Ordered Tag queued
Feb  3 16:33:01 siobhra /kernel: sd3(ahc1:2:0): timed out in datain phase, SCSISIGI == 0x44
Feb  3 16:33:01 siobhra /kernel: SEQADDR == 0x59
Feb  3 16:33:01 siobhra /kernel: sd3(ahc1:2:0): abort message in message buffer
Feb  3 16:33:03 siobhra /kernel: sd3(ahc1:2:0): timed out in datain phase, SCSISIGI == 0x54
Feb  3 16:33:03 siobhra /kernel: SEQADDR == 0x59
Feb  3 16:33:03 siobhra /kernel: ahc1: Issued Channel A Bus Reset. 1 SCBs aborted
-- 
Alan Judge <A HREF="http://www.dsg.cs.tcd.ie/dsg_people/amjudge">Magic!</A>

"I have an 8 user poetic license" -                    terry@icarus.weber.edu