Arch Linux

ratcheer

Member

Registered: 2011-10-09

Posts: 912

[Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Over the past few weeks, I have been having more and more trouble booting my Arch system. Occasionally, it boots right up. Sometimes, I have to reset the machine several times before it will boot, successfully. Today, it took about ten attempts. In all cases, once the PC finally does boot up to Arch, everything seems perfectly normal.

As an aside, if I boot the PC to openSUSE, it also hangs for about 30 seconds, but then it always finishes booting, successfully.

Here is what I see in my journal from where I finally booted up, a few minutes ago:

Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2: lost interrupt (Status 0x50)
Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: exception Emask 0x50 SAct 0x0 SErr 0x40d0802 action 0xe frozen
Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: SError: { RecovComm HostInt PHYRdyChg CommWake 10B8B DevExch }
Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: failed command: READ DMA EXT
Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: cmd 25/00:08:38:18:80/00:00:12:00:00/e0 tag 0 dma 4096 in
                                              res 40/00:02:00:08:00/00:00:00:00:00/b0 Emask 0x54 (ATA bus error)
Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: status: { DRDY }
Apr 07 12:15:31 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: hard resetting link
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.01: hard resetting link
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: SATA link up 6.0 Gbps (SStatus 133 SControl 300)
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.01: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 300)
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: configured for UDMA/133
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.01: configured for UDMA/100
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2.00: device reported invalid CHS sector 0
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: ata2: EH complete
Apr 07 12:15:32 tim-arch-ssd kernel: Adding 8388604k swap on /dev/sdb5.  Priority:-1 extents:1 across:8388604k FS

The / and /home filesystems are on SSD /dev/sdc2. A /mydata filesystem is a btrfs RAID on on hdd /dev/sda4 and /dev/sdb4. My swap partition is on HDD /dev/sdb5. It looks to me like something to do with /dev/sda (is that ata2.00?) is what is causing the problem. Maybe.

After this bootup completed, I ran btrfs scrub on all mounted filesystems (SSD and HDD). No errors were found.

Any idea what is wrong?

Tim

Last edited by ratcheer (2015-04-08 18:29:10)

2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,645

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Have you run a web search on any of these errors? Some of the results I see suggest a loose SATA cable; others indicate hardware failure. Seems like it could be worth disconnecting, cleaning, and reconnecting (or replacing) a cable or two.

(edit) have you run any hardware tests on the drive you think might be the problem?

Last edited by 2ManyDogs (2015-04-07 17:58:32)

ratcheer

Member

Registered: 2011-10-09

Posts: 912

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Yes, I am searching, now. I have found a suggestion to try kernel parameter "libata.noacpi=1".

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour … bug/285892 But the thread is long and very involved. Just as in my case, some people say it affected some distros, but not others. And, it apparently didn't affect Windows.

Tim

2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,645

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Try cleaning the SATA cable (or at least disconnecting and reconnecting a few times). Humor me; I am curious. If it doesn't work you haven't lost much. An intermittent failure sounds more like hardware to me.

http://superuser.com/questions/453372/r … rking-fine

Last edited by 2ManyDogs (2015-04-07 18:14:58)

ratcheer

Member

Registered: 2011-10-09

Posts: 912

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Well, adding that kernel parameter was successful (one time, anyway) and I just got my all-time fastest bootup:

Startup finished in 3.612s (kernel) + 1.002s (userspace) = 4.614s

So, it must have something to do with the recent kernels. I am now on 3.19.3-1

Tim

2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,645

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Yeah, good luck with that. Happy to help.

ratcheer

Member

Registered: 2011-10-09

Posts: 912

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

I have found info stating that this problem will be resolved in Linux kernels 3.19.4 and 4.0. Time will tell.

Tim

ratcheer

Member

Registered: 2011-10-09

Posts: 912

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Yay! It is fixed in kernel 3.19.3-3, which was added since a few hours ago.

Tim

hakova

Member

Registered: 2009-11-11

Posts: 9

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

I have this exact problem with Manjaro Linux, kernel 3.19.4, and the behaviour doesn't seem to change with the "libata.noacpi=1" boot option. Any pointers will be greatly appreciated.

Hakan

jasonwryan

Anarchist

From: .nz

Registered: 2009-05-09

Posts: 30,424

Website

Re: [Solved] Difficult to boot; may be HDD problem

Please ask on the Manjaro boards, we only support Arch
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fo … pport_ONLY

Closing

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