Arch Linux

henrysmith

Member

From: United Kingdom

Registered: 2005-09-01

Posts: 17

Different problems on different architectures

The 64 bit installer can't see my hard drive. cfdisk gives a fatal error for any of the usual /dev/ candidates, and a quick check through /dev/ seems to suggest that none of them are there.
The normal installer has no trouble seeing or partitioning my hard drive, but it can't configure my network connection OR see the CD-ROM drive.

The hard-drive problem I already know has to do with the JMicron SATA controller and there doesn't appear to be anything anyone can do about it right now.
The other two, on the contrary, are inexplicable. There's nothing spectacular or special about my network hardware or my CD drive. No other distro has any trouble with them in either 32 or 64 bit mode.

lspci says something like this about it:

03:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. Unknown device 8168 (rev 01)
Subsystem: ABIT Computer Corp. Unknown device 1074

ifconfig (the xx are to censor what I suspect is my real MAC address)

eth0   Link encap:UNSPEC HWaddr xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-xx-00-00-00-00-00-00-00-00
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

dhcpd just dies instantly and drops back out, and the frontend in the installer reports failure

Here is the state of support for this hardware outside of Arch:
Windows XP HDD, ethernet, CD-ROM
openSUSE HDD, ethernet, CD-ROM
Ubuntu HDD, ethernet, CD-ROM
Fedora CD-ROM, ethernet
Slackware none

Long story short, I recommend steering well clear of this mobo and any like it:
http://www.abit-usa.com/products/mb/pro … &model=319

Oh, and this isn't really a support request. I accept that my stuff's not compatible yet, and I really just wanted to make this info available.

iBertus

Member

From: Greenville, NC

Registered: 2004-11-04

Posts: 2,228

Re: Different problems on different architectures

If you can determine which patches SuSE is using to make it work you could perhaps sweet talk tpowa into adding them to the Arch kernel build.

F

Member

Registered: 2006-10-09

Posts: 322

Re: Different problems on different architectures

Here is the state of support for this hardware outside of Arch:
Windows XP HDD, ethernet, CD-ROM
openSUSE HDD, ethernet, CD-ROM
Ubuntu HDD, ethernet, CD-ROM
Fedora CD-ROM, ethernet
Slackware none

What kernel was openSUSE, Ubuntu, and Fedora using to have that sort of hardware detection.

Realize that slackware still, by default, gets shipped out with the 2.4 kernel tree, with 2.6 still being in extra or testing (or some such nonsense like that).

Note: different distributions are not different operating systems.

henrysmith

Member

From: United Kingdom

Registered: 2005-09-01

Posts: 17

Re: Different problems on different architectures

Maybe I ought to make clear that my main intention here was just to point out that Arch hardware support seems to differ between the different CPU architecture CDs.
All the other stuff about command output and distro comparison is intended to help pinpoint what, if anything, is weird about this.

I'm really not bitching about Arch having 'worse' hardware support than Ubuntu, given Ubuntu's million custom kernel patches. Nor am I dumping on Slackware, given its old kernel. And I'm pretty sure that I didn't think that different distributions were different operating systems either.

iphitus

Forum Fellow

From: Melbourne, Australia

Registered: 2004-10-09

Posts: 4,927

Re: Different problems on different architectures

Please use the newer 0.8 ISO's: ftp://ftp.archlinux.org/other/0.8

These will have JMicron support. As for your network card, that's supported and loaded fine there, you must have misconfigured it.

James