1 Topic by chaotos

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Topic: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

I am trying to migrate to Linux form Windows XP.

I am trying to boot from the GParted-live-0.3.4-8 iso CD. The boot process stops with a message to the effect:

Unlink after no-IRQ
Controller is probably using the wrong IRQ.

I just built my system using a Gigabyte GA-MA69G-S3H motherboard with the standard drivers. I have 3 hard drives. Normally I boot XP from the master SATA drive. I installed Ubuntu on the slave SATA drive. Windows reports the boot partitions as healthy but unknown, but Partition Magic shows the whole drive as "bad". I was hoping GParted would help me analyze and modify the drives as needed.

2 Reply by class413

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

Master and slave are used for ATA drives, not SATA.
ATA controllers can control 2 drives, named "master" and "slave".

Is there any issue with your CD drive?
Anyway, you can try another boot option, or another of the latest versions of GParted LiveCD (0.3.4-7 or even 0.3.4-6). There are some differencies on the boot-up and hardware detection precess.

What exactly report the "Disk Management" in XP for your drives?

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***

3 Reply by chaotos

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

Thanks for your reply.

My bios reports drives a follows:

IDE Channel 0 Master - this is my CD-ROM drive
IDE Channel 0 Slave - This is a 500 GB ATA hard drive used for data only.

IDE Channel 2 Master - ST3320620AS - This is my primary Seagate SATA2 XP boot drive which boots XP fine.
IDE Channel 2 Slave - Samsung HD501LJ - This is my second 500 GB SATA2 drive on which I have installed UBUNTU. It also boots without difficulty.

I installed UBUNTU without the other two drives connected to make sure I didn't hose my XP partition. My Motherboard has a bois boot option which allows me to boot from the XP or the Ubuntu drive on the fly. So far so good.

XP shows the Samsung drive correctly with 1 primary and 3 extended partions. The primary is the Ubuntu \ partition. One of the extended partitions is swap, the other two are NTFS. These drives do have master/slave jumpers and I had to set the second one to slave for XP to see it.

Windows reports all partitions on this second drive as healthy, but lists the first two as "unknown".

Partition Magic give me a "Partition Table error #114" on the Samsung drive and does not see any of its partitons.

I tried the gparted-live-0.3.4-6.iso CD with the same "Unlink after no-IRQ" error at which point installation stops. I have not yet tried earlier versions, nor have I tried changing the hard drive configuration. The Gigabyte motherboard has support for 4 SATA drives and 1 IDE connector.

The error message occurs after USB ports are correctly identified. The error message is cryptic. Does it mean that it is confused by the IRQ settings for the hard drive controller on the motherboard?

4 Reply by class413

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

There is not possible to have 3 extended partitions on a drive, only 1 is possible. Are they logical drives within one extended partition?
You can't see it from xp, because it doesn't understand linux, unix etc partitions at all.

There is an older Gparted version in Ubuntu, that comes with the default Ubuntu installation. Don't use it for resizing (it's very old and buggy and could cause errors), but you can run it just to see how it understands your drives and partitions. It must at least detect the drive, because it runs from that drive.

As I see, the motherboard simulates SATA drives as IDE. There must be an option in the BIOS, to not do this simulation. You can try to change it, to see if this works this manner.

Another possible issue has to do with the PCI bus management and APIC. I think there is an option about it in the BIOS setup. Can you try it, please?

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***

5 Reply by chaotos

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

Thanks for the reply again. I only have one extended partition. Prior to installing Ubuntu I had blank space and one extended with 2 logical NTFS partitions. Ubuntu enlarged the extended partition and placed SWAP there, then created a primary partition for \.

My motherboard give the options of setting up the SATA drives as Native IDE, RAID, Legacy IDE, or SATA->AHCI. I tried the last selection but Windows will not boot, so I am using "Native IDE".

The Bios allows PCI1 and PCI2 slots to be assigned specific IRQ's, or "Auto". I do not have any PCI boards installed, and would not know what values to try.

I will check the native GParted in Ubuntu. I suspect the drives are OK. It is disconcerting that Partition Magic reports an error but I think this software has not been maintained since it was purchased from PowerQuest by Symantec (which sucks, in my humble opinion).

Wayne

6 Reply by class413

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

It has to do not just with the PCI expansion slots but with the whole PCI bus, that includes roughly the entire connections between the processor and the peripherals (onboard or externals). Normally, the IRQs are assigned automatically. The actual system is capable to manage much more IRQ numbers than the 15 of the "old time" PCs.

The output from the old Ubuntu Gparted (version 0.2.5... something) would be interesting.


Let's try other tip too:
A powerful tool is "Disktest", that can detect and fix many partition problems.
Please, try it. Many people have their disk problems solved this way!

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***

7 Reply by chaotos

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

FOUND THE PROBLEM!

Stupidly, I was using my usb cordless keyboard/touchpad/mouse, with no old fashioned mouse/keyboard plugged in.

I discovered this when your suggestion of using version 0.2.5 brought up a screen which did not respond to my mouse/keyboard.

On plugging in an old keyboard and mouse all versions boot up properly. I can see all the drives and everything looks fine!

Thanks for the help.

By the way, there several Disktest utilities floating around. Could you provide a link to the one you like?

Chaotos (wayne)

8 Reply by class413

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

I mean a specific tool, named "TestDisk"
http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk
Sorry, I inversed the name by mistake smile

So, good news!
Take care, if you work with NTFS partitions go step by step (1 action at each step) and reboot to windows after each step, at least 2 or 3 times, for check.
Read the documentation. It takes longer but it's more sure wink

*** It is highly recommended to backup any important files before doing resize/move operations. ***

9 Reply by chaotos

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Re: [SOLVED]Unlink after no-IRQ error.

Much thanks again.