Page 1 of 1

Using Sata PCI-e card in T420

Posted: Tue Dec 03, 2013 3:38 pm
by dmdsoftware
I bought one of these -> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6816124059

I was hoping to essentially add some extra ports to allow for additional drives connected over sata/esata. I know about exprescard esata cards, and I'm currently using one for this purpose on this machine. But I was hoping on using this card instead, so I don't have an ugly dongle hanging off the system.

I installed the card and booted up, but it doesn't seem to be recognized at all.

I'm using Debian. Tried kernels 3.10, 3.11, 3.7. I checked the kernel source code, and these kernels are supposed to load the appropriate driver for the ASM1061 chipset (I can see this in the code). However, I don't see anything under dmesg with regard to detecting any additional achi or sata devices.

So now I have to wonder. Will this card work in the T420? Or is the issue a "linux" thing. I can't see to find much about the particular card with regard to linux, but the desktop version of the card has many documented success stories.

I know the SATA II connection works in my WWAN slot. I normally have a SSD plugged into it that I boot from. I was going to relocate that to the 2.5" HD slot.

Re: Using Sata PCI-e card in T420

Posted: Wed Dec 04, 2013 9:51 am
by axur-delmeria
Have you checked the output of lspci?

If it's not detected, then the pcie slot might be turned off in the BIOS config.

If it still doesn't work, it may be a BIOS problem (BIOS doesn't recognize card and refuse to initialize it). or a hardware error (defective card).