SD card reader does not work in 2.6.27-eeepc

B.T.W. My eeepc is 701 with 4GB flash hard disk.

A couple of things. The example fdisk was run against the wrong drive. It was run against sda (which is the main hard drive) as opposed to sdb (which is the sd reader). Second, have you tried multiple sd cards? Those errors initially make me suspect the media.

For what it's worth, I'm running 2.6.27-8-eeepc on the eeepc 1000HD and the sd reader works just fine. It presents as a usb mass media drive on sdb just like yours is trying to.

I agree with sungo.

Another component to look at is eeepc-laptop's cardreader setting located at /sys/devices/platform/eeepc/cardr

Try flicking that off then on again by echoing 0 and 1 to that file. But not before trying new media :)

OK, here is the situation:

I use "fdisk -l" instead of "fdisk -l /dev/sda", so the output should include both sda and sdb, but when the fdisk scan sdb, it just halts...

now I use 2.6.24-eeepc kernel in hardy, which works fine, so I guess it should not be the media problem...

Thanks for both your replies :-)

I tried a fat16 SD card of 2G, but fdisk still halted on scanning sdb

when I am using 2.6.24-21-eeepc , I do find some sd card IO error, but it does not cause reading halt, any hints?
Is it just a format error or physical media error?

marvel@marvel-epc:~$ uname -a
Linux marvel-epc 2.6.24-21-eeepc #1 SMP Thu Aug 7 22:18:05 MDT 2008 i686 GNU/Linux
marvel@marvel-epc:~$ dmesg |grep sd
[ 17.566487] Driver 'sd' needs updating - please use bus_type methods
[ 17.572117] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] 7815024 512-byte hardware sectors (4001 MB)
[ 17.572153] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[ 17.572160] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 17.572202] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: disabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 17.572318] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] 7815024 512-byte hardware sectors (4001 MB)
[ 17.572342] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[ 17.572349] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 17.572387] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: disabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 17.572398] sda: sda1 sda2 <<6>Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
[ 17.588625] sda5 >
[ 17.588867] sd 1:0:0:0: [sda] Attached SCSI disk
[ 17.605273] sd 1:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg0 type 0
[ 22.422550] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] 16015360 512-byte hardware sectors (8200 MB)
[ 22.425541] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 22.425551] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
[ 22.425558] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[ 22.437571] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] 16015360 512-byte hardware sectors (8200 MB)
[ 22.440550] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 22.440560] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
[ 22.440567] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[ 22.440577] sdb: sdb1
[ 22.447733] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 22.447844] sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0
[ 30.801372] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 30.801389] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense Key : Hardware Error [current]
[ 30.801399] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Add. Sense: Unrecovered read error
[ 30.801412] end_request: I/O error, dev sdb, sector 16015344
[ 30.801423] Buffer I/O error on device sdb, logical block 2001918
[ 30.866367] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 30.866383] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense Key : Hardware Error [current]
[ 30.866393] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Add. Sense: Unrecovered read error
[ 30.866406] end_request: I/O error, dev sdb, sector 16015344
[ 30.866416] Buffer I/O error on device sdb, logical block 2001918
[ 30.983360] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 30.983374] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense Key : Hardware Error [current]
[ 30.983384] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Add. Sense: Unrecovered read error
[ 30.983396] end_request: I/O error, dev sdb, sector 16015344
[ 30.983407] Buffer I/O error on device sdb, logical block 2001918
[ 31.049355] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 31.049370] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense Key : Hardware Error [current]
[ 31.049380] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Add. Sense: Unrecovered read error
[ 31.049393] end_request: I/O...

One last thing to test is try using 2.6.27-8-generic with your card reader.

If you still have problems on the generic kernel then it might be an error in the card reader itself and not the eeepc kernel. You may need to RMA your eeepc :T

If you were to call Asus tech support and send them your logs I'm certain that they can do a warranty replace. I've heard good things from their customer service dept.

Good luck!

+1 on this using all three of:
2.6.27-9-generic
2.6.27-8-eeepc
2.6.27-8-eeepc-lean
and even with Ubuntu Intrepid Live image (2.6.27-7-generic).

I am using a basic system installed from debootstrap intrepid + ubuntu-standard + gdm + gnome-core and I have exactly the same problem.

dmesg shows the following at boot time:
[ 12.840068] scsi 2:0:0:0: Direct-Access USB2.0 CardReader SD0 0100 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
[ 12.846362] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 12.846945] sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0

And on insertion of the card:
[ 164.529603] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] 7959552 512-byte hardware sectors (4075 MB)
[ 164.533603] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 164.533617] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
[ 164.533625] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[ 164.541598] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] 7959552 512-byte hardware sectors (4075 MB)
[ 164.545599] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 164.545613] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
[ 164.545621] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
[ 164.549165] sdb: sdb1.

/dev/sdb always exists. After inserting the card, /dev/sdb1 does not appear and fdisk freezes half way through an fdisk -l

The media and reader work fine under Hardy and I have also tried repartitioning and reformatting (ext3 / vfat) the media.

>and even with Ubuntu Intrepid Live image (2.6.27-7-generic).
For the sake of clarity, this means the problem still occurs when booted from Live CD (which uses this kernel image).

Also, setting unsetting /sys/devices/platform/eeepc/cardr makes no difference.

I've an EeePC 901go and a similar problem running 2.6.27-8-eeepc-lean

here the syslog log (look also at the times)

Dec 28 00:36:33 netbook kernel: [29970.292076] usb 5-5: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
Dec 28 00:36:33 netbook kernel: [29970.436551] usb 5-5: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
Dec 28 00:36:33 netbook kernel: [29970.445054] scsi5 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
Dec 28 00:36:33 netbook kernel: [29970.447155] usb-storage: device found at 3
Dec 28 00:36:33 netbook kernel: [29970.447173] usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
Dec 28 00:36:38 netbook kernel: [29975.446832] usb-storage: device scan complete
Dec 28 00:36:38 netbook kernel: [29975.447482] scsi 5:0:0:0: Direct-Access Single Flash Reader 1.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
Dec 28 00:37:09 netbook kernel: [30005.561147] usb 5-5: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
Dec 28 00:37:19 netbook kernel: [30015.812093] usb 5-5: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
Dec 28 00:37:35 netbook kernel: [30032.064110] usb 5-5: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
Dec 28 00:37:35 netbook kernel: [30032.333281] usb 5-5: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.584105] usb 5-5: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 3
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723338] sd 5:0:0:0: Device offlined - not ready after error recovery
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723428] sd 5:0:0:0: rejecting I/O to offline device
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723461] sd 5:0:0:0: rejecting I/O to offline device
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723485] sd 5:0:0:0: rejecting I/O to offline device
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723499] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] READ CAPACITY failed
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723506] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Result: hostbyte=DID_NO_CONNECT driverbyte=DRIVER_OK,SUGGEST_OK
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723518] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Sense not available.
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723535] sd 5:0:0:0: rejecting I/O to offline device
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723551] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723559] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 00 00 00 00
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723566] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Assuming drive cache: write through
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.723871] sd 5:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI removable disk
Dec 28 00:37:46 netbook kernel: [30042.724338] sd 5:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0

# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 16.1 GB, 16139354112 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1962 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: xxxxxxxxxxx

   Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 1 122 979933+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda2 * 123 851 5855692+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda3 852 1962 8924107+ 83 Linux

the sd card worked on the pre installed xandros, which was running until 2 days ago.

Yes, exactly the same problem as CheShA wrote on 2008-12-17 here, too ...

This "bug" can be closed and possibly deleted. The problem was with the os installation option in bios. I turned the option to finished before from. No it works without problems, I hope, that simple solution works for all of you ;-)

As Jan said, it is not a bug: just change the OS Installation option in the BIOS to "Finished" and your SD reader will work fine.