Re: Linux 2.6.25-rc4

[Mark Lord]

Alan Cox wrote:
> On Sun, 16 Mar 2008 12:39:43 -0700 (PDT)
> Linus Torvalds <torvalds@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> > On Sun, 16 Mar 2008, Alan Cox wrote:
> > > No it doesn't. DRQ simply means "drive has more data for the controller
> > > if you want it". Interrupts are controlled via IEN and the interrupt line.
> > A _lot_ of chips require you to clear the DRQ by taking the data they 
> > have.
>
> Almost none and mostly very old ones. I'm not saying we shouldn't do it
> (except where it hangs the hardware - hence the FIFO flag) but for the
> traces presented and hardware reported it appears to be a bit of a red
> herring.
>
> > > If the drive wants to give us data and we end the transaction that is
> > > fine. In practice a tiny few devices crap themselves if we don't.
> > More than a few tiny devices from what I remember. It tends to be the 
> > other way around - most devices do *not* want to get new commands until 
> > you've finished the previous one by draining the queues.
>
> Not in my experience having maintained a lot of ATA drivers for a very
> long time. In fact the changes for draining the DRQ went into libata only
> very recently because it was only when we had a distro sized userbase
> with PATA devices that it became apparent that a few corner case problems
> remained.
..

Err.. I have a fairly modern PATA drive (160GB seagate 2.5")
that gets pissed if we leave DRQ hanging.  So it's not just
something for old/obsolete drives.

Or maybe it's the also-modern-ish ICH chipset that gets stuck.  Whatever.

-ml
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