Debian Squeeze Installation on HP Gen8 Servers

Update: Thanks to an anonymous commenter I can confirm that with the release of Debian Squeeze 6.0.7, released 2013-02-27, the Debian Installer package uses a back ported version of hpsa to detect controllers not supported by cciss.  The remainder of this post is left for historical reference.

TL;DR Build the hpsa Driver From Source and Deploy in D-I

Symptom:
Can't Detect CD-ROM and/or RAID Disks on HP Gen8 Hardware

My team was attempting to install Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.5 (squeeze) on a brand new HP DL360 Gen8 server with a P420 RAID controller and much to our chagrin it couldn't even detect the CD-ROM drive let alone the RAID sets.

Solution:
Build hpsa.ko From Source

Point your favorite browser over here and grab the 3.0.0-8 (or newer YMMV) release and make sure you have bzip2 installed with ye olde apt-get install bzip2.  You'll need that for the next step.  I've assumed you downloaded the driver into the ~/Downloads directory.

I prepare the directory:
 $ mkdir ~/src
 $ cd ~/src
 $ tar -xjf ~/Downloads/hpsa-3.0.0-8.tar.bz2
 $ cd hpsa/drivers/scsi

To build the hpsa driver you need to edit the hpsa_kernel_compat.h file and remove the comment block corresponding to the OS you wish to build the driver for.  There's just one little problem; there's no block for Debian GNU/Linux.  Fear NOT!  The kernel that ships with Debian 6 is a 2.6.32 kernel.  This is the same basic kernel as shipped with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP1.  So just uncomment the following line:
 #define SLES11sp1

If you've got gcc installed and the linux-headers package you can just save the hpsa_kernel_compat.h file and type make.  This will build the hpsa.ko file that you so desperately need.  Now copy that file onto some removable media and go attach it to your Gen8 server.

Installing hpsa.ko During Installation

Now go ahead and boot any of the Debian 6 installation media(netinst.iso, businesscard.iso, cd1.iso or dvd1.iso).  Once d-i is loaded you will be greeted by the message that the CD-ROM device couldn't be detected.  This is where the new driver comes into play.

Switch over to the second console with ALT+F2, press enter and now insert your removable media if you haven't already.  I'm going to use the device name of usbdevice in place of the likely /dev/sda1 or /dev/sdb1 that your removable disk will be recognized as.

Perform the following incantation:

 $ mkdir /mnt/usb
 $ mount /dev/usbdevice /mnt/usb
 $ cp /mnt/usb/hpsa.ko /lib/modules/$(uname -r)/kernel/drivers/scsi
 $ depmod -a
 $ modprobe hpsa

To confirm you see the disks, simply use the dmesg command.  You should now have access to all the devices connected to your HP Gen8 server.  This has only been tested with the P420 controller.  It's possible that your Gen8 may have a different controller.  If so these instructions are worth a shot if you need to access the controller using the hpsa driver.


Switch back over to the d-i terminal, ALT+F1, and detect the CD-ROM drive again.  If all went well you can begin installing Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.X (squeeze) on your shiny new server.

Happy Hacking!