From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Mon May 2 14:07:46 2005 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 233A816A4D1 for ; Mon, 2 May 2005 14:07:46 +0000 (GMT) Received: from lurza.secnetix.de (lurza.secnetix.de [83.120.8.8]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 26B9A43D58 for ; Mon, 2 May 2005 14:07:45 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from olli@lurza.secnetix.de) Received: from lurza.secnetix.de (kvenmb@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by lurza.secnetix.de (8.13.1/8.13.1) with ESMTP id j42E7gtU095418 for ; Mon, 2 May 2005 16:07:42 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from oliver.fromme@secnetix.de) Received: (from olli@localhost) by lurza.secnetix.de (8.13.1/8.13.1/Submit) id j42E7gFv095417; Mon, 2 May 2005 16:07:42 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from olli) Date: Mon, 2 May 2005 16:07:42 +0200 (CEST) Message-Id: <200505021407.j42E7gFv095417@lurza.secnetix.de> From: Oliver Fromme To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG In-Reply-To: <42732577.9020100@geminix.org> X-Newsgroups: list.freebsd-stable User-Agent: tin/1.5.4-20000523 ("1959") (UNIX) (FreeBSD/4.11-RELEASE (i386)) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Subject: Re: kernel: swap_pager: indefinite wait buffer - on 5.3-RELEASE-p5 X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list Reply-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 02 May 2005 14:07:47 -0000 Uwe Doering wrote: > Oliver Fromme wrote: > > If they're really identical (i.e. the same size and same > > geometry), then you can use dd(1) for duplication, like > > this: > > > > # dd if=/dev/ad0 of=/dev/ad1 bs=64k conv=noerror,sync > > > > The "noerror,sync" part is important so the dd command will > > not stop when it hits any bad spots on the source drive and > > instead will fill the blocks with zeroes on the destination > > drive. Since it's only the swap partition, you shouldn't > > lose any data. > > I would like to point out that the conclusion you're drawing in the last > sentence is invalid IMHO. I'm afraid I don't agree. > "indefinite wait buffer" messages at > apparently random block numbers just indicate that the pager was unable > to access the swap area (in its entirety!) when it wanted to. It means > that the disk drive was either dead at that point in time or busy trying > to deal with a bad sector. > > This sector could have been anywhere on the disk. It just kept the disk > drive busy for long enough that the pager started to complain. The OP specifically said that the swap_pager messages were the only kernel messages that he got. That indicates that only the swap partition is affected, because otherwise there would have been other kernel messages indicating I/O errors from one of the filesystems on that disk. Best regards Oliver -- Oliver Fromme, secnetix GmbH & Co KG, Oettingenstr. 2, 80538 München Any opinions expressed in this message may be personal to the author and may not necessarily reflect the opinions of secnetix in any way. "C++ is to C as Lung Cancer is to Lung." -- Thomas Funke