randyt> Can you tell me more about your configuration?  Julian also told me
randyt> the BT445S would work, but I am finding that it doesn't, and and losing
randyt> much hair of the whole deal.  I had similar problems to the originator
randyt> this thread when trying to boot with the FreeBSD kernel.  

randyt> I have:
randyt> 	66mhz/486
randyt> 	16mb RAM
randyt> 	HP C2247 1.0G SCSI
randyt> 	Motherboard is an Orchid SuperBoard
randyt> 	I am running (try to) NetBSD-current 1-15 kernel

randyt> I have tried every possible bus speed setting for the card.
randyt> When the system boots, the controller is found, the drive information
randyt> is printed, then I hit the following printf.

randyt> cmd fail

randyt> if (sd_scsi_cmd(unit, (struct scsi_generic *)&scsi_cmd,
randyt> 	    sizeof(scsi_cmd), (u_char *)&scsi_sense, sizeof(scsi_sense),
randyt> 	    2000, flags) != 0) {
randyt> 		printf("could not mode sense (4) for unit %d\n", unit);
randyt> 		printf(" using ficticious geometry\n");
randyt> 		sectors = sd_size(unit, flags);

I notice you have an HP drive.  When using an HP97560 I found that unless I
jumpered it to auto-spinup then it refused to respond to the mode sense and
fell over at this point (although I don't recall a "cmd fail").  The SCSI
driver issues a START UNIT to the drive (and I know this works for DEC
drives) but the HP drive barfed before that point.

Are you sure your problem doesn't lie with your drive rather than your
controller?

- David B.

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cc: randyt@cse.unl.edu, dhess@CS.Stanford.EDU,
        current-users@sun-lamp.cs.berkeley.edu,
        davidb@melb.cpr.itg.telecom.com.au