# [solved] external usb hdd issue

## Jeze

Hi,

I'm trying to install Gentoo on a system that uses an external USB HDD, and I'm getting a kernel panic to do with partition not found. I've checked everything in grub, I've gone over and over the kernel config and I can't figure it out.

I've read about people having similar trouble, and saying it's something to do with the usb_storage drivers not being ready in time to access the drive. One chap claims to have edited an initrd file to introduce a ten second delay before attempting to access the partitions. It's odd because I have two other, identical usb hdd enclosures that house sata drives loaded up with Ubuntu and they both work fine, but there is a definite delay after the initial BIOS screens go blank before any disk activity takes place.

Has anyone had experience with this and if so, can you point me in the right direction to resolve it?

p.s I don't like Ubuntu very much which is why I'm trying to switch back to Gentoo.

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## Logicien

Hi.

are your sure that the usb-storage dependancy modules are compiled to in the kernel, I say scsi_mod and usbcore? In plus you need sd_mod being in the kernel. It can be better like this even with an initrd. You have severals kernel boot parameters you can use without editing the initrd:

```

rootdelay=   [KNL] Delay (in seconds) to pause before attempting to

         mount the root filesystem

rootwait   [KNL] Wait (indefinitely) for root device to show up.

         Useful for devices that are detected asynchronously

         (e.g. USB and MMC devices).

usb-storage.delay_use=

         [UMS] The delay in seconds before a new device is

         scanned for Logical Units (default 5).

```

Maybe one or more of these parameters can help if kernel configuration is fine. Others things you can do is to check the boot paramaters of Ubuntu and his /boot/config* kernel configuration.

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## Jeze

Thank you kindly, I set rootdelay=10

and it works!

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