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KShots
Guru
Joined: 09 Oct 2003
Posts: 595
Location: Florida
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 Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 8:25 pm Post subject: N4SLI-A9 - What works, what doesn't |
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I've had a rocky start with this motherboard. Doing a google search on it via google.com/linux shows that very few people have any experience with it, so I figured I'd try and contribute something on it to at least resolve some of what people are doubtlessly running into. I'm going to skip over the setup of anything besides what's directly related to the motherboard - that would deserve another topic.
Setup:
Kernel - 2.6.15-r7 (Gentoo Sources)
CPU tested: Athlon x64 X2 4400+
RAM: 2G (probably not important - did not cross the 4G boundary)
Video: GeForce 7900 GTX (512M)
What works:
SATA-II
Ethernet
What doesn't work:
Nothing
Getting started
First off, make sure you are using a kernel at or beyond version 2.6.15-r7. Previous kernels have serious issues with SATA-2 and PCI-e on this board. In fact, using 2.6.16-r3 makes setting this board up a straight-forward process, whereas previously you had to do all sorts of arcane kernel arguments just to get the thing to boot.
You will want the following modules in your kernel config: | Code: | Device Drivers
-->ATA/ATAPI/MFM/RLL Support
<*>ATA/ATAPI/MFM/RLL Support
<*>Enhanced IDE/MFM/RLL disk/cdrom/tape/floppy support
<*>Include IDE/ATA-2 DISK support
<*>Use multi-mode by default
<*>Include IDE/ATAPI CDROM support
<*>SCSI emulation support
<*>generic/default IDE chipset support
<*>PCI IDE chipset support
<*>Generic PCI IDE Chipset Support
<*>Generic PCI bus-master DMA support
<*>Use PCI DMA by default when available
<*>AMD and nVidia IDE support
-->SCSI device support
<*>SCSI disk support
<*>SCSI generic support
-->SCSI low-level drivers
<*>Serial ATA (SATA) support
<*>NVIDIA SATA support |
I'd let you decide what else you want, but that will get your disk access working correctly.
If you want a more complete kernel example, take a look at this example from a 2.6.16-gentoo-r3 kernel.
I have tried both the forcedeth and nvnet drivers... and have not yet had problems with either. They're both straight-forward to set up, so I won't cover them. You can get the nvnet driver from nVidia's web site - download the chipset drivers for linux, and it will be part of that download. I personally have no preference for either and will not make a recommendation, other than to say that by its very name, the forcedeth driver doesn't sound very good.
If anyone else has any input on this board, don't hesitate to post. I'll put it up on this first post (to make it easy to spot) along with credit towards your post.
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Life without passion is death in disguise
Last edited by KShots on Tue May 02, 2006 6:24 am; edited 6 times in total |
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verlane24
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 18 May 2004
Posts: 75
Location: Springfield, MO
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| Posted: Fri Mar 10, 2006 3:41 am Post subject: |
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I agree, information on this board is scarce. If anyone has a problem, I have *most* things working.
Personally, I was pretty disappointed with this board 
There is very little in the way of tech docs on the board; it also apparently only has one temp sensor: cpu. No MB temp or NForce temp. The bios is kind of cruddy too, but it does have some OC support, though I haven't messed with that yet. Nvidia drivers seem to work, though my glxgears score seems low compared to what a few others have posted(around 6000fps @ 1600x1200). I also have some dmesg wierdness I can figure out:
| Code: |
PCI: Cannot allocate resource region 3 of device 0000:05:00.0
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05:00.0 is my nvidia card, I believe.
I've got sata working OK, I think. It's tons faster than my PATA drives, but it does not seem as though it's running at full SATA capability. I haven't tried the onboard audio, because support seems sketchy. Ethernet works fine with the forcedeth drivers.
But despite the some disappointment, it seems to be pretty stable. And it was a cheap 939 SLI board, so I've got lots of upgrade room.
If anyone has a working sensors.conf for this board, let me know.
Here's my setup:
Athlon64 3200+ Venice
1 GB RAM
Hitachi 160 GB SATAII
Geforce 6600 gt PCIE
gentoo-sources-2.6.15-r7
2006.0 x86_64 Install |
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KShots
Guru
Joined: 09 Oct 2003
Posts: 595
Location: Florida
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| Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 2:53 pm Post subject: |
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As of kernel version 2.6.16-gentoo-r3, most of the above problems I posted went away.
You can now safely remove the "irqpoll" argument from the kernel boot line in your bootloader. nvidia drivers now work properly without hard freezing the machine. It's become somewhat straight-forward to set this motherboard up now
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