Can't get Suse to see USB Zip drive

rollo · 04-16-2005, 07:36 PM

Suse 9.1 loads just about everything automatically, but my USB Zip 250 drive is invisible to it. I've googled a fair bit and tried various solutions but I'm not getting anywhere.

Firstly, I guess I have to find out where the drive is. (The system sees it, because it whirrs on startup.)

Here's the results of cat /proc/diskstats.

Code:

linux:/home/rollo # cat /proc/diskstats
   2    0 fd0 1 0 2 35064 0 0 0 0 0 35064 35064
   1    0 ram0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    1 ram1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    2 ram2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    3 ram3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    4 ram4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    5 ram5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    6 ram6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    7 ram7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    8 ram8 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1    9 ram9 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1   10 ram10 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1   11 ram11 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1   12 ram12 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1   13 ram13 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1   14 ram14 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   1   15 ram15 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    0 loop0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    1 loop1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    2 loop2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    3 loop3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    4 loop4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    5 loop5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    6 loop6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   7    7 loop7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   3    0 hda 20037 3739 651952 1302749 2940 11014 111632 465100 13 285447 17679
29
   3    1 hda1 2162 17296 9290 74320
   3    2 hda2 21418 632968 4664 37312
   9    0 md0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
   3   64 hdb 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

USB devices use the SCSI protocol, is that correct? There doesn't seem to be anything here starting 'sd', which is probably why this happens when I try mounting the drive from /dev/sda4:

Code:

linux:/home/rollo # mount -t auto /dev/sda4 /media/zip
mount: /dev/sda4 is not a valid block device

Any ideas how to solve this?

Help really appreciated.

abisko00 · 04-18-2005, 04:00 AM

Do you get any information from 'dmesg' after plugging-in the drive?

rollo · 04-19-2005, 01:08 PM

Thanks abisko for your reply - I appreciate your help.

Yes, 'dmesg' produces the following:

Code:

usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 2
spurious 8259A interrupt: IRQ7.
usb 1-1: Product: USB Zip 250
usb 1-1: Manufacturer: Iomega
usb 1-1: SerialNumber: 003247B7243A1626
Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
scsi0 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices

Does this give any clues about how to mount the drive?

rollo · 04-19-2005, 02:29 PM

The Suse page for this peripheral is here.

Its instructions involve doing a 'cat /proc/scsi/scsi' in order to find the correct order of the SCSI devices. Unfortunately I get this:

Code:

linux:/home/rollo # cat /proc/scsi/scsi
Attached devices:
linux:/home/rollo #

The most useful other page I can find is
here and it's not very reassuring...

Thanks again for help.

abisko00 · 04-20-2005, 03:29 AM

Quote:

Does this give any clues about how to mount the drive?

Unfortunately not. Does the output end there? If the usb-storage-driver works, the drive should be assigned to a device node. This is how it looks on my system (no ZIP-drive, though):

Code:

usb 3-1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 2
Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
scsi2 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
usbcore: registered new driver usb-storage
USB Mass Storage support registered.
usb-storage: device found at 2
usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
  Vendor: TwinMOS   Model: Mobile Disk       Rev: 1.11
  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 02
SCSI device sdb: 258048 512-byte hdwr sectors (132 MB)
sdb: Write Protect is off
sdb: Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
sdb: assuming drive cache: write through
SCSI device sdb: 258048 512-byte hdwr sectors (132 MB)
sdb: Write Protect is off
sdb: Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
sdb: assuming drive cache: write through
 sdb: sdb1
Attached scsi removable disk sdb at scsi2, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Attached scsi generic sg1 at scsi2, channel 0, id 0, lun 0,  type 0
usb-storage: device scan complete

From this output I can read the device to mount, but it doesn't seem to work on your system.

Code:

spurious 8259A interrupt: IRQ7

I googled this message, but I couldn't find anything that was related to USB. But the message appears to be connected to APIC. Maybe you can try different APIC boot options and see if the driver will be recognized then. http://portal.suse.com/sdb/en/2002/10/81_acpi.html

I'd also suggest to screen /var/log/boot.msg for USB related messages. Does your system recognise other USB devices?

rollo · 04-21-2005, 04:05 PM

Thanks for the latest help.

I only have one other USB device (a card reader which I haven't yet tried to make work with Linux) - 'dmesg' gives this:

Code:

usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 2
spurious 8259A interrupt: IRQ7.
usb 1-1: Product: SCM eUSB SmartMedia 
usb 1-1: Manufacturer: SCM Microsystems Inc.  
Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
scsi0 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
  Vendor: Sandisk   Model: ImageMate SDDR09  Rev: 0100
  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 02

So it looks like it's a problem with USB in general and perhaps my kernel in particular..?

/var/log/boot.msg turns up no mention of USB, except:

Code:

<notice>start services (coldplug)  
coldplug scanning input: ***done   
         scanning pci: *****.*Wdone
         scanning usb: done
         .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .done
<notice>exit status of (coldplug) is (0)

However, the system hangs at the point of the 'cron' hardware scan when the Zip drive is plugged in on boot.

Thanks for the APIC lead - although I'm getting a bit out of my depth here! There's a line at the top of the /var/log/boot.msg file which says:

Code:

<6>ACPI: local apic disabled

Any idea why 'cat /proc/scsi/scsi' returns nothing? This could be another lead...

Thanks again for your help. I'm determined to make this thing work! Apart from anything else, I have data on backup Zip disks that I need to access...

abisko00 · 04-22-2005, 03:26 AM

It really appears to be a general hardware problem. My cardreader creates device nodes for every slot. When you type 'lsmod', do you see the usb drivers loaded (usbcore, uhci-hcd, ehci-hcd, usbstorage)? And if not, can you load them with modprobe and attach the device again? There is an issue with USB2: http://portal.suse.com/sdb/en/2004/01/USB_2_0.html

You may also find other USB realted hints in this database.

rollo · 05-01-2005, 03:59 AM

Loaded the suggested modules with modprobe, but this made no difference. Will investigate the APIC suggestion.

Couple of quick questions...

Quote:

The hardware that contains the host controller and the root hub has an interface toward the programmer which is called Host Controller Device (HCD) and is defined by the hardware implementer. In practice, these are hardware registers (ports) in the computer.

At version 1.0 and 1.1 there were two competing HCD implementations. Compaq's Open Host Controller Interface (OHCI) was adopted as the standard by the USB-IF.

1. Since my computer is a Compaq manufactured before USB2.0 appeared, does that mean that it uses the OHCI module?

2. Which is the config file to modify in order to get these modules (usbcore, uhci-hcd, ehci-hcd, usb-storage) to load on boot?

Thanks again.

abisko00 · 05-01-2005, 06:54 AM

Quote:

1. Since my computer is a Compaq manufactured before USB2.0 appeared, does that mean that it uses the OHCI module?

Not sure which one is going to be used, but it is not EHCI.

Quote:

2. Which is the config file to modify in order to get these modules (usbcore, uhci-hcd, ehci-hcd, usb-storage) to load on boot?

In the normal case, the modules should be loaded by hotplug automatically. But you can force the module to be loaded on boot by modifying /etc/sysconfig/kernel (e.g. MODULES_LOADED_ON_BOOT="ohci-hcd")

rollo · 05-05-2005, 04:52 PM

Tried all the APIC kernel options - NOAPIC, NOLAPIC, APIC, LAPIC. This didn't affect the:

Code:

spurious 8259A interrupt: IRQ7

This could be unrelated in fact - Google turned up someone with the same issue on a machine with the same network card as mine. It seems to be harmless for everyone else.

Then, when I tried starting in Suse's 'failsafe' mode (lots of other kernel options), I got this:

Code:

usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 29
usb 1-1: control timeout on ep0in
usb 1-1: Product: USB Zip 250
usb 1-1: can't set config #1, error -110
hub 1-0:1.0: Cannot enable port 1.  Maybe the USB cable is bad?
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 30
usb 1-1: control timeout on ep0in
usb 1-1: can't set config #1, error -110
hub 1-0:1.0: Cannot enable port 1.  Maybe the USB cable is bad?
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 31
usb 1-1: control timeout on ep0in
usb 1-1: Product: USB Zip 250
usb 1-1: can't set config #1, error -110
hub 1-0:1.0: Cannot enable port 1.  Maybe the USB cable is bad?
usb 1-1: new full speed USB device using address 32
usb 1-1: Product: USB Zip 250
usb 1-1: Manufacturer: Iomega
usb 1-1: SerialNumber: 003247B7243A1626
scsi1 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices

This was replicated back in default kernel mode. So, looks like there is a real hardware problem as well... It's strange because the Zip drive was bought brand new and has hardly been used.

I'm going to test for the 'spurious interrupt' message with peripherals removed. Will post results.

fragos · 05-05-2005, 09:25 PM

Compac's initial implementation of USB 1.1 was pre standards and incompatible with the resulting standard. Only Compac USB devices worked with it. My Compac was a 4770 Presario and I don't know which model was the first to have a standards compliant USB. With the 4770 there is no way to disable the motherboard USB, preventing you from using an USB PCI module.

rollo · 05-06-2005, 06:06 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by fragos
Compac's initial implementation of USB 1.1 was pre standards and incompatible with the resulting standard. Only Compac USB devices worked with it. My Compac was a 4770 Presario and I don't know which model was the first to have a standards compliant USB. With the 4770 there is no way to disable the motherboard USB, preventing you from using an USB PCI module.

I was beginning to suspect as much. However, I've done a bit of searching on these two models (mine is from 1999) and come up with this post - which seems to concern my machine, kernel and problem:

Quote:

ohci problem on Compaq Armada 7400 (ZFmicro) with 2.6 kernels

No matter what device I try to plug in to this old machine the 2.6 kernels
won't work. The 2.4 works fine. The /proc/interrupt count is increasing
correctly.

Here's the pci info and log with debug from 2.6.11. If you want to see
logs with debug from 2.4.26 that show when it does work, I can provide
that too.

00:0e.2 USB Controller: Compaq Computer Corporation ZFMicro Chipset USB
(rev 11) (prog-if 10 [OHCI])
Subsystem: Compaq Computer Corporation ZFMicro Chipset USB
Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr-
Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
Status: Cap+ 66Mhz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort-
<MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
Latency: 64, cache line size 08
Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 11
Region 0: Memory at 44080000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Capabilities: [e0] Power Management version 1
Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot+,D3cold-)
Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

[plus more details at http://www.spinics.net/lists/usb/msg03202.html] ]

As a relative non-techie, does anyone have any advice on whether this could be relevant? (The issue here was solved with a kernel patch.)

Thanks to both of you again for your ideas and help.

rollo · 05-29-2005, 06:19 PM

Does anyone have any ideas on this? I still can't access my Zip drive and things are getting desperate - I have to replace my printer and it seems that new printers don't come with parallel ports...

The USB port worked fine under windows, so I don't think Fragos's comments are correct for my machine after all.

Ideas?...