On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 11:23 PM, Bill Nottingham <notting(a)redhat.com> wrote:
G.Wolfe Woodbury (redwolfe(a)gmail.com) said:
> > The kernel nowadays comes with built-in support for the vast majority of
> > all common storage hardware anyway, because AHCI is pretty universally
> > established. Outside of servers non-AHCI controllers practically don't
> > exist anymore.
>
> This is simply not true.
>
> There are hundreds of thousands of older desktops that are not
> technically servers that have lots of older interfaces.
>
> To say that non-AHCI controllers don't matter is to place a dignificant
> barrier to use or adoption of Linux or Fedora.
AHCI dates to before when RHEL 5 was released in 2007. We also build
in ATA_PIIX, which covers a large number of generations before that.
Does hardware exist that's not covered by this? Of course. However,
I'd also bet that those installing Fedora on that hardware are those
that are capable of rebuilding an initramfs if they move an existing
system to such hardware.
Right, the common hardware we should cover very well, even with a
host-only initramfs.
People who are able shuffle disks from one hardware to the other will
be able to create a generic initramfs, either before moving things
around, or with the rescue system on the new one.
We still do not encode any disk location/property/serial number/path
into the initramfs, and we will be able to find the disks/rootfs, even
when we move the disk(s) around.
Because people mentioned that: none of that was true for Windows,
which is very picky about any topology or driver change regarding the
disk. A simple port change or haredware reconfiguration on Windows
often rendered the disk unbootable, even on the same machine.
Kay