Re-installing Rocket Raid driver on updated SuSE 10.1 results in unbootable system.

Problem:

Re-installing Rocket Raid driver on updated SuSE 10.1 results in unbootable system.

Details:

Installing SuSE 10.1 on a Highpoint Rocket Raid controller is possible using the driver disk provided on Highpoint's web site. After performing an online update, a new kernel is installed. This requires the Rocket Raid driver to be rebuilt from source . The problem is that the kernel contains the new sata_mv driver for controllers based on the Marvell chipset. Since this includes the Highpoint Rocket Raid, SuSE Linux tries to load both sata_mv and hptmv and the system will not boot.

Solution:

Perform the following steps to build an updated Rocket Raid driver. The key step is adding sata_mv to the module blacklist. This will prevent the kernel from attempting to load it:

  1. Install SuSE 10.1 with DVD and rocketraid driver disk
  2. Perform an online updates, without rebooting
  3. Add sata_mv to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist
  4. Configure the kernel source: 
       cd /usr/src/linux
   make mrproper
   cp arch/x86_64/defconfig.smp .config
   make oldconfig
   make -j 2 bzImage
   make -j 2 modules
  5. Build the rocketraid driver: 
       cd /usr/src
   mkdir rr
   cd rr
   tar -zxf /home/mmadore/rr18xx-opensource-v1.16-0906.tgz
   make KERNELDIR=/usr/src/linux
   cp hptmv.ko /lib/modules/2.6.16.21-0.25-smp/kernel/drivers/scsi
   depmod 2.6.16.21-0.25-smp
   mkinitrd