-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA256 On 2016-12-19 05:22, Marc Chamberlin wrote:
On 12/18/2016 5:39 PM, sdm wrote:
On 12/18/2016 02:37 PM, nicholas cunliffe wrote:
On 18 December 2016 at 23:11, Marc Chamberlin <marc@marcchamberlin.com> wrote:
On 12/18/2016 1:40 PM, nicholas cunliffe wrote:
this looks like the same problem, seems to occur on all linux:
https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?79205-Cannot-see-NVMe-M-2-Samsung-...
Thanks Nicholas, you did some digging! Correct me though, if I am
wrong and misunderstanding this thread... It appears that this is about how to make it possible to boot from an SSD, and the problem that is being addressed is the fact that the BIOS did not have a module for supporting AHCI, just for RAID. So the solution being presented was how to add the AHCI support to the BIOS. As I noted in my previous post, it appears that in my BIOS I do have the option to switch to AHCI, so apparently it seems this has been addressed by AMI and ASUS.
And as I also mentioned, I tried to switch to AHCI but it gave the boot loader for Windows 10 troubles and I was no longer able to boot up Windows 10. So I am not sure how to make these two OS's play nice with each other, and still looking for a workaround...
Marc... yes i did some more digging and found recent threads, confirming the bios update, and like you, cannot then boot win10 with AHCI. So this would now appear a windows/drive problem? maybe consult google again regarding nvme/ahci/raid/windows. If windows supports ahci then there will always be repair/reinstall if all else fails.
Windows doesn't boot in AHCI mode because Windows wasn't installed in AHCI mode, it was in IDE mode. If you switch, it won't boot. Instructions on how to do this are found by doing a Google search. So for testing I would take the Laptop out of RAID mode, forget about if Windows boots or not, switch to AHCI mode in the BIOS, and then see if the openSUSE installer loads.
Thanks Carlos, SDM for again responding... I did do a Google search, and am still looking for answers on this... I following one persons "cookbook" approach on how he solved this issue and ended up with an unbootable laptop! (He said to change the Storage Controller in the Device Manager from the Intel Chipset SATA Raid controller to the Microsoft Storage Spaces Controller which claims to be able to manage both RAID and AHCI.) That seemed reasonable, but it hosed the Windows 10 boot process so completely that even Microsoft's recovery/repair tools could not fix it. So now I am a bit leery... I managed to recover Windows 10 from the recovery partition but painful having to reinstall all my apps... (even the recovery disk I had made on a USB stick failed to get Windows back up an running) So my lesson is to be careful about changing Windows storage management drivers!
Oh :-(
I am confused about why ASUS is using a RAID controller setting in the BIOS for my laptop... I thought RAID was used with multiple drives to build in redundancy and recover-ability. But my laptop only has 2 drives, an SSD drive and a 7200RPM disk drive. So why is a RAID configuration being used? Is there something about SSD drives that I am missing? From my Google research it appears this is common on lots of different laptops that come with Windows pre-installed on systems with an SSD drive, but I can't find an explanation as to why....
I may have one. There is a methodology in which a fast SSD device is used in combination to a slow rotating rust hard disk, not to store part of the system, or store the system while data goes elsewhere, or any such combination, but to act as a huge read/write cache of any file or disk region that is used frequently. Ie, the OS reads something from the hard disk and stores it on the SSD, so the next time it is read faster. Similarly, writes go to the SSS first, then the system stores it on the HD when idling. I always forget the name of this technology, but it can be thought as a kind of raid. There are hard disks that are sold with an internal SSD disk, implementing this technology in firmware, transparently to the operating system. But this is not the case. If Windows is installed in this way, Linux can not make use of the hard disks at all. Maybe Linux detects the situation and bails out, I do not know. It should produce an error message that we would be able to recognize. And of course, it messes the booting. I Windows, you would see only one disk. Try to find out what Windows says about the hard disk Linux has a similar technology. I don't remember if it was dcache or mcache, searchs on wikipedia on those names do not succeed to find what I seek for. And one of those technologies on Linux appears to be abandoned. Of course, it does not work with Windows either. [...] Ah, it is bcache. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bcache bcache (abbreviated from block cache) is a cache in the Linux kernel's block layer, which is used for accessing secondary storage devices. It allows one or more fast storage devices, such as flash-based solid-state drives (SSDs), to act as a cache for one or more slower storage devices, such as hard disk drives (HDDs); this effectively creates hybrid volumes and provides performance improvements. Designed around the nature and performance characteristics of SSDs, bcache also minimizes write amplification by avoiding random writes and turning them into sequential writes instead. This merging of I/O operations is performed for both the cache and the primary storage, helping in extending the lifetime of flash-based devices used as caches, and in improving the performance of write-sensitive primary storages, such as RAID 5 sets. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashcache Flashcache is a disk cache component for the Linux kernel, initially developed by Facebook since April 2010, and released as open source in 2011. Since January 2013, there is a fork of Flashcache, named EnhanceIO and developed by sTec, Inc.[1] Flashcache works by using flash memory, a USB flash drive, SD card, CompactFlash or any kind of portable flash mass storage system as a write-back persistent cache. An internal SSD can also be used for increasing performance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dm-cache m-cache is a component (more specifically, a target) of the Linux kernel's device mapper, which is a framework for mapping block devices onto higher-level virtual block devices. It allows one or more fast storage devices, such as flash-based solid-state drives (SSDs), to act as a cache for one or more slower storage devices such as hard disk drives (HDDs); this effectively creates hybrid volumes and provides secondary storage performance improvements. The design of dm-cache requires three physical storage devices for the creation of a single hybrid volume; dm-cache uses those storage devices to separately store actual data, cache data, and required metadata. Configurable operating modes and cache policies, with the latter in the form of separate modules, determine the way data caching is actually performed. This is the one you may have, SRT: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_Response_Technology In computing, Smart Response Technology (SRT, also called SSD Caching before it was launched) is a proprietary caching mechanism introduced in 2011 by Intel for their Z68 chipset (for the Sandy Bridge–series processors), which allows a SATA solid-state drive (SSD) to function as cache for a (conventional, magnetic) hard disk drive (HDD).[1] SRT is managed by Intel Rapid Storage Technology software version 10.5 or later,[2] and implemented both in its device driver and in the Z68 motherboard's firmware (option ROM). It is available only when the (integrated) disk controller is configured in RAID mode (but not AHCI or IDE modes) by implementing a style of RAID 0 striping. The user can select write-back (so-called maximized mode) or write-through (so-called enhanced mode) caching strategy. The maximum utilizable cache size on the SSD is 64 GB. Caching is done at the logical block addressing (LBA) level, not the file level.[3] Shortly before the announcement of the new chipset, Intel also introduced the Intel 311 (Larson Creek), a 20 GB single-level cell (SLC) solid-state drive, which it markets as suitable for caching.[4][5] As of 2014, TRIM garbage collection is not supported for SRT caching devices, so the SSD's performance is solely maintained by its own firmware.[citation needed] With the release of Ivy Bridge chipsets, support for SRT was provided in a larger variety of desktop chipsets, including Z77, Q77 and H77 (but not Z75, Q75 or B75) as long as an "Intel Core Processor" is used.[6] The situation is similar for Haswell desktop chipsets, with Z87, Q87 and H87 listed as supported.[7] The Ivy Bridge-E chipset X79 did not officially support SRT at launch, but some companies like ASRock added support to their boards via BIOS updates.[8][9] The arrival of Ivy Bridge also saw SRT support added to mobile chipsets: QS77, QM77, UM77 and HM77 support SRT, while HM76 does not.[10] In 2012, Intel also introduced the 313 (Hawley Creek) caching SSD series (20 and 24 GB), advertised as also suitable for use in Ultrabooks.[11] As of 2012, SRT was limited to using at most 64 GB for caching, meaning that on larger SSDs the rest remains unused by the cache,[12] though it is available to be used for other purposes. General article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_drive In computing, a hybrid drive is a logical or physical storage device that combines a fast storage medium such as NAND flash solid-state drive (SSD) with a hard disk drive (HDD), with the intent of adding some of the speed of flash storage to the cost-effective storage capacity of traditional HDDs. The purpose of the SSD in a hybrid drive is to act as a cache for the data stored on the HDD, improving the overall performance by keeping copies of the most frequently used data on the faster SSD. There are two main configurations for implementing hybrid drives: dual-drive hybrid systems and solid-state hybrid drives. In dual-drive hybrid systems, physically separate SSD and HDD devices are installed in the same computer, having the data placement optimization performed either manually by the end user, or automatically by the operating system through the creation of a "hybrid" logical device. In solid-state hybrid drives, SSD and HDD functionalities are built into a single piece of hardware, where data placement optimization is performed either entirely by the device (self-optimized mode), or through placement "hints" supplied by the operating system (host-hinted mode). - -- Cheers / Saludos, Carlos E. R. (from 13.1 x86_64 "Bottle" (Minas Tirith)) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (GNU/Linux) iF4EAREIAAYFAlhYDaUACgkQja8UbcUWM1wYoAD+L2OyQdVLVef67tu/HCyDDyQ3 6fsP9gnK+tMmmORJJ0cA/3IwTnIgilaiJqOLPI9Ynkw7r12RepJAmlgQ18O4rBu9 =UGmX -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org To contact the owner, e-mail: opensuse+owner@opensuse.org