1The Linux SYM-2 driver documentation file 2 3Written by Gerard Roudier <groudier@free.fr> 421 Rue Carnot 595170 DEUIL LA BARRE - FRANCE 6 7Decembre 28 2000 8=============================================================================== 9 101. Introduction 112. Supported chips and SCSI features 123. Advantages of this driver for newer chips. 13 3.1 Optimized SCSI SCRIPTS 14 3.2 New features appeared with the SYM53C896 154. Memory mapped I/O versus normal I/O 165. Tagged command queueing 176. Parity checking 187. Profiling information 198. Control commands 20 8.1 Set minimum synchronous period 21 8.2 Set wide size 22 8.3 Set maximum number of concurrent tagged commands 23 8.4 Set debug mode 24 8.5 Set flag (no_disc) 25 8.6 Set verbose level 26 8.7 Reset all logical units of a target 27 8.8 Abort all tasks of all logical units of a target 289. Configuration parameters 2910. Boot setup commands 30 10.1 Syntax 31 10.2 Available arguments 32 10.2.1 Master parity checking 33 10.2.2 Scsi parity checking 34 10.2.3 Default number of tagged commands 35 10.2.4 Default synchronous period factor 36 10.2.5 Verbosity level 37 10.2.6 Debug mode 38 10.2.7 Burst max 39 10.2.8 LED support 40 10.2.9 Max wide 41 10.2.10 Differential mode 42 10.2.11 IRQ mode 43 10.2.12 Reverse probe 44 10.2.13 Fix up PCI configuration space 45 10.2.14 Serial NVRAM 46 10.2.15 Check SCSI BUS 47 10.2.16 Exclude a host from being attached 48 10.2.17 Suggest a default SCSI id for hosts 49 10.3 PCI configuration fix-up boot option 50 10.4 Serial NVRAM support boot option 51 10.5 SCSI BUS checking boot option 5211. SCSI problem troubleshooting 53 15.1 Problem tracking 54 15.2 Understanding hardware error reports 5512. Serial NVRAM support (by Richard Waltham) 56 17.1 Features 57 17.2 Symbios NVRAM layout 58 17.3 Tekram NVRAM layout 59 60=============================================================================== 61 621. Introduction 63 64This driver supports the whole SYM53C8XX family of PCI-SCSI controllers. 65It also support the subset of LSI53C10XX PCI-SCSI controllers that are based 66on the SYM53C8XX SCRIPTS language. 67 68It replaces the sym53c8xx+ncr53c8xx driver bundle and shares its core code 69with the FreeBSD SYM-2 driver. The `glue' that allows this driver to work 70under Linux is contained in 2 files named sym_glue.h and sym_glue.c. 71Other drivers files are intended not to depend on the Operating System 72on which the driver is used. 73 74The history of this driver can be summerized as follows: 75 761993: ncr driver written for 386bsd and FreeBSD by: 77 Wolfgang Stanglmeier <wolf@cologne.de> 78 Stefan Esser <se@mi.Uni-Koeln.de> 79 801996: port of the ncr driver to Linux-1.2.13 and rename it ncr53c8xx. 81 Gerard Roudier 82 831998: new sym53c8xx driver for Linux based on LOAD/STORE instruction and that 84 adds full support for the 896 but drops support for early NCR devices. 85 Gerard Roudier 86 871999: port of the sym53c8xx driver to FreeBSD and support for the LSI53C1010 88 33 MHz and 66MHz Ultra-3 controllers. The new driver is named `sym'. 89 Gerard Roudier 90 912000: Add support for early NCR devices to FreeBSD `sym' driver. 92 Break the driver into several sources and separate the OS glue 93 code from the core code that can be shared among different O/Ses. 94 Write a glue code for Linux. 95 Gerard Roudier 96 97This README file addresses the Linux version of the driver. Under FreeBSD, 98the driver documentation is the sym.8 man page. 99 100Information about new chips is available at LSILOGIC web server: 101 102 http://www.lsilogic.com/ 103 104SCSI standard documentations are available at T10 site: 105 106 http://www.t10.org/ 107 108Useful SCSI tools written by Eric Youngdale are part of most Linux 109distributions: 110 scsiinfo: command line tool 111 scsi-config: TCL/Tk tool using scsiinfo 112 1132. Supported chips and SCSI features 114 115The following features are supported for all chips: 116 117 Synchronous negotiation 118 Disconnection 119 Tagged command queuing 120 SCSI parity checking 121 PCI Master parity checking 122 123Other features depends on chip capabilities. 124The driver notably uses optimized SCRIPTS for devices that support 125LOAD/STORE and handles PHASE MISMATCH from SCRIPTS for devices that 126support the corresponding feature. 127 128The following table shows some characteristics of the chip family. 129 130 On board LOAD/STORE HARDWARE 131Chip SDMS BIOS Wide SCSI std. Max. sync SCRIPTS PHASE MISMATCH 132---- --------- ---- --------- ---------- ---------- -------------- 133810 N N FAST10 10 MB/s N N 134810A N N FAST10 10 MB/s Y N 135815 Y N FAST10 10 MB/s N N 136825 Y Y FAST10 20 MB/s N N 137825A Y Y FAST10 20 MB/s Y N 138860 N N FAST20 20 MB/s Y N 139875 Y Y FAST20 40 MB/s Y N 140875A Y Y FAST20 40 MB/s Y Y 141876 Y Y FAST20 40 MB/s Y N 142895 Y Y FAST40 80 MB/s Y N 143895A Y Y FAST40 80 MB/s Y Y 144896 Y Y FAST40 80 MB/s Y Y 145897 Y Y FAST40 80 MB/s Y Y 1461510D Y Y FAST40 80 MB/s Y Y 1471010 Y Y FAST80 160 MB/s Y Y 1481010_66* Y Y FAST80 160 MB/s Y Y 149 150* Chip supports 33MHz and 66MHz PCI bus clock. 151 152 153Summary of other supported features: 154 155Module: allow to load the driver 156Memory mapped I/O: increases performance 157Control commands: write operations to the proc SCSI file system 158Debugging information: written to syslog (expert only) 159Scatter / gather 160Shared interrupt 161Boot setup commands 162Serial NVRAM: Symbios and Tekram formats 163 164 1653. Advantages of this driver for newer chips. 166 1673.1 Optimized SCSI SCRIPTS. 168 169All chips except the 810, 815 and 825, support new SCSI SCRIPTS instructions 170named LOAD and STORE that allow to move up to 1 DWORD from/to an IO register 171to/from memory much faster that the MOVE MEMORY instruction that is supported 172by the 53c7xx and 53c8xx family. 173 174The LOAD/STORE instructions support absolute and DSA relative addressing 175modes. The SCSI SCRIPTS had been entirely rewritten using LOAD/STORE instead 176of MOVE MEMORY instructions. 177 178Due to the lack of LOAD/STORE SCRIPTS instructions by earlier chips, this 179driver also incorporates a different SCRIPTS set based on MEMORY MOVE, in 180order to provide support for the entire SYM53C8XX chips family. 181 1823.2 New features appeared with the SYM53C896 183 184Newer chips (see above) allows handling of the phase mismatch context from 185SCRIPTS (avoids the phase mismatch interrupt that stops the SCSI processor 186until the C code has saved the context of the transfer). 187 188The 896 and 1010 chips support 64 bit PCI transactions and addressing, 189while the 895A supports 32 bit PCI transactions and 64 bit addressing. 190The SCRIPTS processor of these chips is not true 64 bit, but uses segment 191registers for bit 32-63. Another interesting feature is that LOAD/STORE 192instructions that address the on-chip RAM (8k) remain internal to the chip. 193 1944. Memory mapped I/O versus normal I/O 195 196Memory mapped I/O has less latency than normal I/O and is the recommended 197way for doing IO with PCI devices. Memory mapped I/O seems to work fine on 198most hardware configurations, but some poorly designed chipsets may break 199this feature. A configuration option is provided for normal I/O to be 200used but the driver defaults to MMIO. 201 2025. Tagged command queueing 203 204Queuing more than 1 command at a time to a device allows it to perform 205optimizations based on actual head positions and its mechanical 206characteristics. This feature may also reduce average command latency. 207In order to really gain advantage of this feature, devices must have 208a reasonnable cache size (No miracle is to be expected for a low-end 209hard disk with 128 KB or less). 210Some kown old SCSI devices do not properly support tagged command queuing. 211Generally, firmware revisions that fix this kind of problems are available 212at respective vendor web/ftp sites. 213All I can say is that I never have had problem with tagged queuing using 214this driver and its predecessors. Hard disks that behaved correctly for 215me using tagged commands are the following: 216 217- IBM S12 0662 218- Conner 1080S 219- Quantum Atlas I 220- Quantum Atlas II 221- Seagate Cheetah I 222- Quantum Viking II 223- IBM DRVS 224- Quantum Atlas IV 225- Seagate Cheetah II 226 227If your controller has NVRAM, you can configure this feature per target 228from the user setup tool. The Tekram Setup program allows to tune the 229maximum number of queued commands up to 32. The Symbios Setup only allows 230to enable or disable this feature. 231 232The maximum number of simultaneous tagged commands queued to a device 233is currently set to 16 by default. This value is suitable for most SCSI 234disks. With large SCSI disks (>= 2GB, cache >= 512KB, average seek time 235<= 10 ms), using a larger value may give better performances. 236 237This driver supports up to 255 commands per device, and but using more than 23864 is generally not worth-while, unless you are using a very large disk or 239disk arrays. It is noticeable that most of recent hard disks seem not to 240accept more than 64 simultaneous commands. So, using more than 64 queued 241commands is probably just resource wasting. 242 243If your controller does not have NVRAM or if it is managed by the SDMS 244BIOS/SETUP, you can configure tagged queueing feature and device queue 245depths from the boot command-line. For example: 246 247 sym53c8xx=tags:4/t2t3q15-t4q7/t1u0q32 248 249will set tagged commands queue depths as follow: 250 251- target 2 all luns on controller 0 --> 15 252- target 3 all luns on controller 0 --> 15 253- target 4 all luns on controller 0 --> 7 254- target 1 lun 0 on controller 1 --> 32 255- all other target/lun --> 4 256 257In some special conditions, some SCSI disk firmwares may return a 258QUEUE FULL status for a SCSI command. This behaviour is managed by the 259driver using the following heuristic: 260 261- Each time a QUEUE FULL status is returned, tagged queue depth is reduced 262 to the actual number of disconnected commands. 263 264- Every 200 successfully completed SCSI commands, if allowed by the 265 current limit, the maximum number of queueable commands is incremented. 266 267Since QUEUE FULL status reception and handling is resource wasting, the 268driver notifies by default this problem to user by indicating the actual 269number of commands used and their status, as well as its decision on the 270device queue depth change. 271The heuristic used by the driver in handling QUEUE FULL ensures that the 272impact on performances is not too bad. You can get rid of the messages by 273setting verbose level to zero, as follow: 274 2751st method: boot your system using 'sym53c8xx=verb:0' option. 2762nd method: apply "setverbose 0" control command to the proc fs entry 277 corresponding to your controller after boot-up. 278 2796. Parity checking 280 281The driver supports SCSI parity checking and PCI bus master parity 282checking. These features must be enabled in order to ensure safe data 283transfers. However, some flawed devices or mother boards will have 284problems with parity. You can disable either PCI parity or SCSI parity 285checking by entering appropriate options from the boot command line. 286(See 10: Boot setup commands). 287 2887. Profiling information 289 290This driver does not provide profiling informations as did its predecessors. 291This feature was not this useful and added complexity to the code. 292As the driver code got more complex, I have decided to remove everything 293that didn't seem actually useful. 294 2958. Control commands 296 297Control commands can be sent to the driver with write operations to 298the proc SCSI file system. The generic command syntax is the 299following: 300 301 echo "<verb> <parameters>" >/proc/scsi/sym53c8xx/0 302 (assumes controller number is 0) 303 304Using "all" for "<target>" parameter with the commands below will 305apply to all targets of the SCSI chain (except the controller). 306 307Available commands: 308 3098.1 Set minimum synchronous period factor 310 311 setsync <target> <period factor> 312 313 target: target number 314 period: minimum synchronous period. 315 Maximum speed = 1000/(4*period factor) except for special 316 cases below. 317 318 Specify a period of 0, to force asynchronous transfer mode. 319 320 9 means 12.5 nano-seconds synchronous period 321 10 means 25 nano-seconds synchronous period 322 11 means 30 nano-seconds synchronous period 323 12 means 50 nano-seconds synchronous period 324 3258.2 Set wide size 326 327 setwide <target> <size> 328 329 target: target number 330 size: 0=8 bits, 1=16bits 331 3328.3 Set maximum number of concurrent tagged commands 333 334 settags <target> <tags> 335 336 target: target number 337 tags: number of concurrent tagged commands 338 must not be greater than configured (default: 16) 339 3408.4 Set debug mode 341 342 setdebug <list of debug flags> 343 344 Available debug flags: 345 alloc: print info about memory allocations (ccb, lcb) 346 queue: print info about insertions into the command start queue 347 result: print sense data on CHECK CONDITION status 348 scatter: print info about the scatter process 349 scripts: print info about the script binding process 350 tiny: print minimal debugging information 351 timing: print timing information of the NCR chip 352 nego: print information about SCSI negotiations 353 phase: print information on script interruptions 354 355 Use "setdebug" with no argument to reset debug flags. 356 357 3588.5 Set flag (no_disc) 359 360 setflag <target> <flag> 361 362 target: target number 363 364 For the moment, only one flag is available: 365 366 no_disc: not allow target to disconnect. 367 368 Do not specify any flag in order to reset the flag. For example: 369 - setflag 4 370 will reset no_disc flag for target 4, so will allow it disconnections. 371 - setflag all 372 will allow disconnection for all devices on the SCSI bus. 373 374 3758.6 Set verbose level 376 377 setverbose #level 378 379 The driver default verbose level is 1. This command allows to change 380 th driver verbose level after boot-up. 381 3828.7 Reset all logical units of a target 383 384 resetdev <target> 385 386 target: target number 387 The driver will try to send a BUS DEVICE RESET message to the target. 388 3898.8 Abort all tasks of all logical units of a target 390 391 cleardev <target> 392 393 target: target number 394 The driver will try to send a ABORT message to all the logical units 395 of the target. 396 397 3989. Configuration parameters 399 400Under kernel configuration tools (make menuconfig, for example), it is 401possible to change some default driver configuration parameters. 402If the firmware of all your devices is perfect enough, all the 403features supported by the driver can be enabled at start-up. However, 404if only one has a flaw for some SCSI feature, you can disable the 405support by the driver of this feature at linux start-up and enable 406this feature after boot-up only for devices that support it safely. 407 408Configuration parameters: 409 410Use normal IO (default answer: n) 411 Answer "y" if you suspect your mother board to not allow memory mapped I/O. 412 May slow down performance a little. 413 414Default tagged command queue depth (default answer: 16) 415 Entering 0 defaults to tagged commands not being used. 416 This parameter can be specified from the boot command line. 417 418Maximum number of queued commands (default answer: 32) 419 This option allows you to specify the maximum number of tagged commands 420 that can be queued to a device. The maximum supported value is 255. 421 422Synchronous transfers frequency (default answer: 80) 423 This option allows you to specify the frequency in MHz the driver 424 will use at boot time for synchronous data transfer negotiations. 425 0 means "asynchronous data transfers". 426 42710. Boot setup commands 428 42910.1 Syntax 430 431Setup commands can be passed to the driver either at boot time or as a 432string variable using 'insmod'. 433 434A boot setup command for this driver begins with the driver name "sym53c8xx=". 435The kernel syntax parser then expects an optionnal list of integers separated 436with comma followed by an optional list of comma-separated strings. 437 438Example of boot setup command under lilo prompt: 439 440lilo: linux root=/dev/sda2 sym53c8xx=tags:4,sync:10,debug:0x200 441 442- enable tagged commands, up to 4 tagged commands queued. 443- set synchronous negotiation speed to 10 Mega-transfers / second. 444- set DEBUG_NEGO flag. 445 446Since comma seems not to be allowed when defining a string variable using 447'insmod', the driver also accepts <space> as option separator. 448The following command will install driver module with the same options as 449above. 450 451 insmod sym53c8xx.o sym53c8xx="tags:4 sync:10 debug:0x200" 452 453The integer list of arguments is discarded by the driver. 454 455Each string argument must be specified as "keyword:value". Only lower-case 456characters and digits are allowed. 457 45810.2 Available arguments 459 46010.2.1 Master parity checking 461 mpar:y enabled 462 mpar:n disabled 463 46410.2.2 Scsi parity checking 465 spar:y enabled 466 spar:n disabled 467 46810.2.3 Default number of tagged commands 469 tags:0 (or tags:1 ) tagged command queuing disabled 470 tags:#tags (#tags > 1) tagged command queuing enabled 471 #tags will be truncated to the max queued commands configuration parameter. 472 This option also allows to specify a command queue depth for each device 473 that support tagged command queueing. 474 Example: 475 sym53c8xx=tags:10/t2t3q16-t5q24/t1u2q32 476 will set devices queue depth as follow: 477 - controller #0 target #2 and target #3 -> 16 commands, 478 - controller #0 target #5 -> 24 commands, 479 - controller #1 target #1 logical unit #2 -> 32 commands, 480 - all other logical units (all targets, all controllers) -> 10 commands. 481 48210.2.4 Default synchronous period factor 483 sync:255 disabled (asynchronous transfer mode) 484 sync:#factor 485 #factor = 9 Ultra-3 SCSI 80 Mega-transfers / second (Wide only) 486 #factor = 10 Ultra-2 SCSI 40 Mega-transfers / second 487 #factor = 11 Ultra-2 SCSI 33 Mega-transfers / second 488 #factor < 25 Ultra SCSI 20 Mega-transfers / second 489 #factor < 50 Fast SCSI-2 490 491 In all cases, the driver will use the minimum transfer period supported by 492 controllers according to SYM53C8XX chip type. 493 49410.2.5 Verbosity level 495 verb:0 minimal 496 verb:1 normal 497 verb:2 too much 498 49910.2.6 Debug mode 500 debug:0 clear debug flags 501 debug:#x set debug flags 502 #x is an integer value combining the following power-of-2 values: 503 DEBUG_ALLOC 0x1 504 DEBUG_PHASE 0x2 505 DEBUG_POLL 0x4 506 DEBUG_QUEUE 0x8 507 DEBUG_RESULT 0x10 508 DEBUG_SCATTER 0x20 509 DEBUG_SCRIPT 0x40 510 DEBUG_TINY 0x80 511 DEBUG_TIMING 0x100 512 DEBUG_NEGO 0x200 513 DEBUG_TAGS 0x400 514 DEBUG_FREEZE 0x800 515 DEBUG_RESTART 0x1000 516 517 You can play safely with DEBUG_NEGO. However, some of these flags may 518 generate bunches of syslog messages. 519 52010.2.7 Burst max 521 burst:0 burst disabled 522 burst:255 get burst length from initial IO register settings. 523 burst:#x burst enabled (1<<#x burst transfers max) 524 #x is an integer value which is log base 2 of the burst transfers max. 525 By default the driver uses the maximum value supported by the chip. 526 52710.2.8 LED support 528 led:1 enable LED support 529 led:0 disable LED support 530 Donnot enable LED support if your scsi board does not use SDMS BIOS. 531 (See 'Configuration parameters') 532 53310.2.9 Max wide 534 wide:1 wide scsi enabled 535 wide:0 wide scsi disabled 536 Some scsi boards use a 875 (ultra wide) and only supply narrow connectors. 537 If you have connected a wide device with a 50 pins to 68 pins cable 538 converter, any accepted wide negotiation will break further data transfers. 539 In such a case, using "wide:0" in the bootup command will be helpfull. 540 54110.2.10 Differential mode 542 diff:0 never set up diff mode 543 diff:1 set up diff mode if BIOS set it 544 diff:2 always set up diff mode 545 diff:3 set diff mode if GPIO3 is not set 546 54710.2.11 IRQ mode 548 irqm:0 always open drain 549 irqm:1 same as initial settings (assumed BIOS settings) 550 irqm:2 always totem pole 551 55210.2.12 Reverse probe 553 revprob:n probe chip ids from the PCI configuration in this order: 554 810, 815, 825, 860, 875, 885, 875A, 895, 896, 895A, 555 1510D, 1010-33, 1010-66. 556 revprob:y probe chip ids in the reverse order. 557 55810.2.13 Fix up PCI configuration space 559 pcifix:<option bits> 560 561 Available option bits: 562 0x0: No attempt to fix PCI configuration space registers values. 563 0x1: Set PCI cache-line size register if not set. 564 0x2: Set write and invalidate bit in PCI command register. 565 56610.2.14 Serial NVRAM 567 nvram:n do not look for serial NVRAM 568 nvram:y test controllers for onboard serial NVRAM 569 (alternate binary form) 570 mvram=<bits options> 571 0x01 look for NVRAM (equivalent to nvram=y) 572 0x02 ignore NVRAM "Synchronous negotiation" parameters for all devices 573 0x04 ignore NVRAM "Wide negotiation" parameter for all devices 574 0x08 ignore NVRAM "Scan at boot time" parameter for all devices 575 0x80 also attach controllers set to OFF in the NVRAM (sym53c8xx only) 576 57710.2.15 Check SCSI BUS 578 buschk:<option bits> 579 580 Available option bits: 581 0x0: No check. 582 0x1: Check and donnot attach the controller on error. 583 0x2: Check and just warn on error. 584 58510.2.16 Exclude a host from being attached 586 excl=<io_address> 587 588 Prevent host at a given io address from being attached. 589 For example 'sym53c8xx=excl:0xb400,excl:0xc000' indicate to the 590 driver not to attach hosts at address 0xb400 and 0xc000. 591 59210.2.17 Suggest a default SCSI id for hosts 593 hostid:255 no id suggested. 594 hostid:#x (0 < x < 7) x suggested for hosts SCSI id. 595 596 If a host SCSI id is available from the NVRAM, the driver will ignore 597 any value suggested as boot option. Otherwise, if a suggested value 598 different from 255 has been supplied, it will use it. Otherwise, it will 599 try to deduce the value previously set in the hardware and use value 600 7 if the hardware value is zero. 601 60210.3 PCI configuration fix-up boot option 603 604pcifix:<option bits> 605 606Available option bits: 607 0x1: Set PCI cache-line size register if not set. 608 0x2: Set write and invalidate bit in PCI command register. 609 610Use 'pcifix:3' in order to allow the driver to fix both PCI features. 611 612Recent SYMBIOS 53C8XX scsi processors are able to use PCI read multiple 613and PCI write and invalidate commands. These features require the 614cache line size register to be properly set in the PCI configuration 615space of the chips. On the other hand, chips will use PCI write and 616invalidate commands only if the corresponding bit is set to 1 in the 617PCI command register. 618 619Not all PCI bioses set the PCI cache line register and the PCI write and 620invalidate bit in the PCI configuration space of 53C8XX chips. 621Optimized PCI accesses may be broken for some PCI/memory controllers or 622make problems with some PCI boards. 623 62410.4 Serial NVRAM support boot option 625 626nvram:n do not look for serial NVRAM 627nvram:y test controllers for onboard serial NVRAM 628 629This option can also been entered as an hexadecimal value that allows 630to control what information the driver will get from the NVRAM and what 631information it will ignore. 632For details see '17. Serial NVRAM support'. 633 634When this option is enabled, the driver tries to detect all boards using 635a Serial NVRAM. This memory is used to hold user set up parameters. 636 637The parameters the driver is able to get from the NVRAM depend on the 638data format used, as follow: 639 640 Tekram format Symbios format 641General and host parameters 642 Boot order N Y 643 Host SCSI ID Y Y 644 SCSI parity checking Y Y 645 Verbose boot messages N Y 646SCSI devices parameters 647 Synchronous transfer speed Y Y 648 Wide 16 / Narrow Y Y 649 Tagged Command Queuing enabled Y Y 650 Disconnections enabled Y Y 651 Scan at boot time N Y 652 653In order to speed up the system boot, for each device configured without 654the "scan at boot time" option, the driver forces an error on the 655first TEST UNIT READY command received for this device. 656 657Some SDMS BIOS revisions seem to be unable to boot cleanly with very fast 658hard disks. In such a situation you cannot configure the NVRAM with 659optimized parameters value. 660 661The 'nvram' boot option can be entered in hexadecimal form in order 662to ignore some options configured in the NVRAM, as follow: 663 664mvram=<bits options> 665 0x01 look for NVRAM (equivalent to nvram=y) 666 0x02 ignore NVRAM "Synchronous negotiation" parameters for all devices 667 0x04 ignore NVRAM "Wide negotiation" parameter for all devices 668 0x08 ignore NVRAM "Scan at boot time" parameter for all devices 669 0x80 also attach controllers set to OFF in the NVRAM (sym53c8xx only) 670 671Option 0x80 is disabled by default. 672Result is that, by default (option not set), the sym53c8xx driver will not 673attach controllers set to OFF in the NVRAM. 674 67510.5 SCSI BUS checking boot option. 676 677When this option is set to a non-zero value, the driver checks SCSI lines 678logic state, 100 micro-seconds after having asserted the SCSI RESET line. 679The driver just reads SCSI lines and checks all lines read FALSE except RESET. 680Since SCSI devices shall release the BUS at most 800 nano-seconds after SCSI 681RESET has been asserted, any signal to TRUE may indicate a SCSI BUS problem. 682Unfortunately, the following common SCSI BUS problems are not detected: 683- Only 1 terminator installed. 684- Misplaced terminators. 685- Bad quality terminators. 686On the other hand, either bad cabling, broken devices, not conformant 687devices, ... may cause a SCSI signal to be wrong when te driver reads it. 688 68915. SCSI problem troubleshooting 690 69115.1 Problem tracking 692 693Most SCSI problems are due to a non conformant SCSI bus or too buggy 694devices. If infortunately you have SCSI problems, you can check the 695following things: 696 697- SCSI bus cables 698- terminations at both end of the SCSI chain 699- linux syslog messages (some of them may help you) 700 701If you donnot find the source of problems, you can configure the 702driver or devices in the NVRAM with minimal features. 703 704- only asynchronous data transfers 705- tagged commands disabled 706- disconnections not allowed 707 708Now, if your SCSI bus is ok, your system has every chance to work 709with this safe configuration but performances will not be optimal. 710 711If it still fails, then you can send your problem description to 712appropriate mailing lists or news-groups. Send me a copy in order to 713be sure I will receive it. Obviously, a bug in the driver code is 714possible. 715 716 My cyrrent email address: Gerard Roudier <groudier@free.fr> 717 718Allowing disconnections is important if you use several devices on 719your SCSI bus but often causes problems with buggy devices. 720Synchronous data transfers increases throughput of fast devices like 721hard disks. Good SCSI hard disks with a large cache gain advantage of 722tagged commands queuing. 723 72415.2 Understanding hardware error reports 725 726When the driver detects an unexpected error condition, it may display a 727message of the following pattern. 728 729sym0:1: ERROR (0:48) (1-21-65) (f/95/0) @ (script 7c0:19000000). 730sym0: script cmd = 19000000 731sym0: regdump: da 10 80 95 47 0f 01 07 75 01 81 21 80 01 09 00. 732 733Some fields in such a message may help you understand the cause of the 734problem, as follows: 735 736sym0:1: ERROR (0:48) (1-21-65) (f/95/0) @ (script 7c0:19000000). 737.....A.........B.C....D.E..F....G.H..I.......J.....K...L....... 738 739Field A : target number. 740 SCSI ID of the device the controller was talking with at the moment the 741 error occurs. 742 743Field B : DSTAT io register (DMA STATUS) 744 Bit 0x40 : MDPE Master Data Parity Error 745 Data parity error detected on the PCI BUS. 746 Bit 0x20 : BF Bus Fault 747 PCI bus fault condition detected 748 Bit 0x01 : IID Illegal Instruction Detected 749 Set by the chip when it detects an Illegal Instruction format 750 on some condition that makes an instruction illegal. 751 Bit 0x80 : DFE Dma Fifo Empty 752 Pure status bit that does not indicate an error. 753 If the reported DSTAT value contains a combination of MDPE (0x40), 754 BF (0x20), then the cause may be likely due to a PCI BUS problem. 755 756Field C : SIST io register (SCSI Interrupt Status) 757 Bit 0x08 : SGE SCSI GROSS ERROR 758 Indicates that the chip detected a severe error condition 759 on the SCSI BUS that prevents the SCSI protocol from functionning 760 properly. 761 Bit 0x04 : UDC Undexpected Disconnection 762 Indicates that the device released the SCSI BUS when the chip 763 was not expecting this to happen. A device may behave so to 764 indicate the SCSI initiator that an error condition not reportable using the SCSI protocol has occured. 765 Bit 0x02 : RST SCSI BUS Reset 766 Generally SCSI targets donnot reset the SCSI BUS, although any 767 device on the BUS can reset it at any time. 768 Bit 0x01 : PAR Parity 769 SCSI parity error detected. 770 On a faulty SCSI BUS, any error condition among SGE (0x08), UDC (0x04) and 771 PAR (0x01) may be detected by the chip. If your SCSI system sometimes 772 encounters such error conditions, especially SCSI GROSS ERROR, then a SCSI 773 BUS problem is likely the cause of these errors. 774 775For fields D,E,F,G and H, you may look into the sym53c8xx_defs.h file 776that contains some minimal comments on IO register bits. 777Field D : SOCL Scsi Output Control Latch 778 This register reflects the state of the SCSI control lines the 779 chip want to drive or compare against. 780Field E : SBCL Scsi Bus Control Lines 781 Actual value of control lines on the SCSI BUS. 782Field F : SBDL Scsi Bus Data Lines 783 Actual value of data lines on the SCSI BUS. 784Field G : SXFER SCSI Transfer 785 Contains the setting of the Synchronous Period for output and 786 the current Synchronous offset (offset 0 means asynchronous). 787Field H : SCNTL3 Scsi Control Register 3 788 Contains the setting of timing values for both asynchronous and 789 synchronous data transfers. 790Field I : SCNTL4 Scsi Control Register 4 791 Only meaninful for 53C1010 Ultra3 controllers. 792 793Understanding Fields J, K, L and dumps requires to have good knowledge of 794SCSI standards, chip cores functionnals and internal driver data structures. 795You are not required to decode and understand them, unless you want to help 796maintain the driver code. 797 79817. Serial NVRAM (added by Richard Waltham: dormouse@farsrobt.demon.co.uk) 799 80017.1 Features 801 802Enabling serial NVRAM support enables detection of the serial NVRAM included 803on Symbios and some Symbios compatible host adaptors, and Tekram boards. The 804serial NVRAM is used by Symbios and Tekram to hold set up parameters for the 805host adaptor and it's attached drives. 806 807The Symbios NVRAM also holds data on the boot order of host adaptors in a 808system with more than one host adaptor. This enables the order of scanning 809the cards for drives to be changed from the default used during host adaptor 810detection. 811 812This can be done to a limited extent at the moment using "reverse probe" but 813this only changes the order of detection of different types of cards. The 814NVRAM boot order settings can do this as well as change the order the same 815types of cards are scanned in, something "reverse probe" cannot do. 816 817Tekram boards using Symbios chips, DC390W/F/U, which have NVRAM are detected 818and this is used to distinguish between Symbios compatible and Tekram host 819adaptors. This is used to disable the Symbios compatible "diff" setting 820incorrectly set on Tekram boards if the CONFIG_SCSI_53C8XX_SYMBIOS_COMPAT 821configuration parameter is set enabling both Symbios and Tekram boards to be 822used together with the Symbios cards using all their features, including 823"diff" support. ("led pin" support for Symbios compatible cards can remain 824enabled when using Tekram cards. It does nothing useful for Tekram host 825adaptors but does not cause problems either.) 826 827 82817.2 Symbios NVRAM layout 829 830typical data at NVRAM address 0x100 (53c810a NVRAM) 831----------------------------------------------------------- 83200 00 83364 01 8348e 0b 835 83600 30 00 00 00 00 07 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 07 04 10 04 00 00 837 83804 00 0f 00 00 10 00 50 00 00 01 00 00 62 83904 00 03 00 00 10 00 58 00 00 01 00 00 63 84004 00 01 00 00 10 00 48 00 00 01 00 00 61 84100 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 842 8430f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8440f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8450f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8460f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8470f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8480f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8490f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8500f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 851 8520f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8530f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8540f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8550f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8560f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8570f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8580f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 8590f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 860 86100 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86200 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86300 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86400 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86500 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86600 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86700 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 86800 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 869 87000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87100 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87200 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87300 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87400 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87500 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87600 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 87700 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 878 87900 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 88000 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 88100 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 882 883fe fe 88400 00 88500 00 886----------------------------------------------------------- 887NVRAM layout details 888 889NVRAM Address 0x000-0x0ff not used 890 0x100-0x26f initialised data 891 0x270-0x7ff not used 892 893general layout 894 895 header - 6 bytes, 896 data - 356 bytes (checksum is byte sum of this data) 897 trailer - 6 bytes 898 --- 899 total 368 bytes 900 901data area layout 902 903 controller set up - 20 bytes 904 boot configuration - 56 bytes (4x14 bytes) 905 device set up - 128 bytes (16x8 bytes) 906 unused (spare?) - 152 bytes (19x8 bytes) 907 --- 908 total 356 bytes 909 910----------------------------------------------------------- 911header 912 91300 00 - ?? start marker 91464 01 - byte count (lsb/msb excludes header/trailer) 9158e 0b - checksum (lsb/msb excludes header/trailer) 916----------------------------------------------------------- 917controller set up 918 91900 30 00 00 00 00 07 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 07 04 10 04 00 00 920 | | | | 921 | | | -- host ID 922 | | | 923 | | --Removable Media Support 924 | | 0x00 = none 925 | | 0x01 = Bootable Device 926 | | 0x02 = All with Media 927 | | 928 | --flag bits 2 929 | 0x00000001= scan order hi->low 930 | (default 0x00 - scan low->hi) 931 --flag bits 1 932 0x00000001 scam enable 933 0x00000010 parity enable 934 0x00000100 verbose boot msgs 935 936remaining bytes unknown - they do not appear to change in my 937current set up for any of the controllers. 938 939default set up is identical for 53c810a and 53c875 NVRAM 940(Removable Media added Symbios BIOS version 4.09) 941----------------------------------------------------------- 942boot configuration 943 944boot order set by order of the devices in this table 945 94604 00 0f 00 00 10 00 50 00 00 01 00 00 62 -- 1st controller 94704 00 03 00 00 10 00 58 00 00 01 00 00 63 2nd controller 94804 00 01 00 00 10 00 48 00 00 01 00 00 61 3rd controller 94900 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 4th controller 950 | | | | | | | | 951 | | | | | | ---- PCI io port adr 952 | | | | | --0x01 init/scan at boot time 953 | | | | --PCI device/function number (0xdddddfff) 954 | | ----- ?? PCI vendor ID (lsb/msb) 955 ----PCI device ID (lsb/msb) 956 957?? use of this data is a guess but seems reasonable 958 959remaining bytes unknown - they do not appear to change in my 960current set up 961 962default set up is identical for 53c810a and 53c875 NVRAM 963----------------------------------------------------------- 964device set up (up to 16 devices - includes controller) 965 9660f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 - id 0 9670f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9680f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9690f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9700f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9710f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9720f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9730f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 974 9750f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9760f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9770f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9780f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9790f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9800f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9810f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 9820f 00 08 08 64 00 0a 00 - id 15 983 | | | | | | 984 | | | | ----timeout (lsb/msb) 985 | | | --synch period (0x?? 40 Mtrans/sec- fast 40) (probably 0x28) 986 | | | (0x30 20 Mtrans/sec- fast 20) 987 | | | (0x64 10 Mtrans/sec- fast ) 988 | | | (0xc8 5 Mtrans/sec) 989 | | | (0x00 asynchronous) 990 | | -- ?? max sync offset (0x08 in NVRAM on 53c810a) 991 | | (0x10 in NVRAM on 53c875) 992 | --device bus width (0x08 narrow) 993 | (0x10 16 bit wide) 994 --flag bits 995 0x00000001 - disconnect enabled 996 0x00000010 - scan at boot time 997 0x00000100 - scan luns 998 0x00001000 - queue tags enabled 999 1000remaining bytes unknown - they do not appear to change in my 1001current set up 1002 1003?? use of this data is a guess but seems reasonable 1004(but it could be max bus width) 1005 1006default set up for 53c810a NVRAM 1007default set up for 53c875 NVRAM - bus width - 0x10 1008 - sync offset ? - 0x10 1009 - sync period - 0x30 1010----------------------------------------------------------- 1011?? spare device space (32 bit bus ??) 1012 101300 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 (19x8bytes) 1014. 1015. 101600 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1017 1018default set up is identical for 53c810a and 53c875 NVRAM 1019----------------------------------------------------------- 1020trailer 1021 1022fe fe - ? end marker ? 102300 00 102400 00 1025 1026default set up is identical for 53c810a and 53c875 NVRAM 1027----------------------------------------------------------- 1028 1029 1030 103117.3 Tekram NVRAM layout 1032 1033nvram 64x16 (1024 bit) 1034 1035Drive settings 1036 1037Drive ID 0-15 (addr 0x0yyyy0 = device setup, yyyy = ID) 1038 (addr 0x0yyyy1 = 0x0000) 1039 1040 x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x 1041 | | | | | | | | | 1042 | | | | | | | | ----- parity check 0 - off 1043 | | | | | | | | 1 - on 1044 | | | | | | | | 1045 | | | | | | | ------- sync neg 0 - off 1046 | | | | | | | 1 - on 1047 | | | | | | | 1048 | | | | | | --------- disconnect 0 - off 1049 | | | | | | 1 - on 1050 | | | | | | 1051 | | | | | ----------- start cmd 0 - off 1052 | | | | | 1 - on 1053 | | | | | 1054 | | | | -------------- tagged cmds 0 - off 1055 | | | | 1 - on 1056 | | | | 1057 | | | ---------------- wide neg 0 - off 1058 | | | 1 - on 1059 | | | 1060 --------------------------- sync rate 0 - 10.0 Mtrans/sec 1061 1 - 8.0 1062 2 - 6.6 1063 3 - 5.7 1064 4 - 5.0 1065 5 - 4.0 1066 6 - 3.0 1067 7 - 2.0 1068 7 - 2.0 1069 8 - 20.0 1070 9 - 16.7 1071 a - 13.9 1072 b - 11.9 1073 1074Global settings 1075 1076Host flags 0 (addr 0x100000, 32) 1077 1078 x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x 1079 | | | | | | | | | | | | 1080 | | | | | | | | ----------- host ID 0x00 - 0x0f 1081 | | | | | | | | 1082 | | | | | | | ----------------------- support for 0 - off 1083 | | | | | | | > 2 drives 1 - on 1084 | | | | | | | 1085 | | | | | | ------------------------- support drives 0 - off 1086 | | | | | | > 1Gbytes 1 - on 1087 | | | | | | 1088 | | | | | --------------------------- bus reset on 0 - off 1089 | | | | | power on 1 - on 1090 | | | | | 1091 | | | | ----------------------------- active neg 0 - off 1092 | | | | 1 - on 1093 | | | | 1094 | | | -------------------------------- imm seek 0 - off 1095 | | | 1 - on 1096 | | | 1097 | | ---------------------------------- scan luns 0 - off 1098 | | 1 - on 1099 | | 1100 -------------------------------------- removable 0 - disable 1101 as BIOS dev 1 - boot device 1102 2 - all 1103 1104Host flags 1 (addr 0x100001, 33) 1105 1106 x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x 1107 | | | | | | 1108 | | | --------- boot delay 0 - 3 sec 1109 | | | 1 - 5 1110 | | | 2 - 10 1111 | | | 3 - 20 1112 | | | 4 - 30 1113 | | | 5 - 60 1114 | | | 6 - 120 1115 | | | 1116 --------------------------- max tag cmds 0 - 2 1117 1 - 4 1118 2 - 8 1119 3 - 16 1120 4 - 32 1121 1122Host flags 2 (addr 0x100010, 34) 1123 1124 x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x 1125 | 1126 ----- F2/F6 enable 0 - off ??? 1127 1 - on ??? 1128 1129checksum (addr 0x111111) 1130 1131checksum = 0x1234 - (sum addr 0-63) 1132 1133---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1134 1135default nvram data: 1136 11370x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 11380x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 11390x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 11400x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 0x0037 0x0000 1141 11420x0f07 0x0400 0x0001 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 11430x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 11440x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 11450x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0x0000 0xfbbc 1146 1147 1148=============================================================================== 1149End of Linux SYM-2 driver documentation file 1150