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Date:      Fri, 15 Oct 2004 14:33:39 +0200
From:      Andre Oppermann <andre@freebsd.org>
To:        Robert Watson <rwatson@freebsd.org>
Cc:        freebsd-current@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: 5.3-BETA7 install cd: kernel trap 12 with interrupts disabled
Message-ID:  <416FC3A3.4060206@freebsd.org>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.NEB.3.96L.1041015041209.84384g-100000@fledge.watson.org>
References:  <Pine.NEB.3.96L.1041015041209.84384g-100000@fledge.watson.org>

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Robert Watson wrote:
> On Fri, 15 Oct 2004, Guido van Rooij wrote:
> 
>>It turns out this was a memory problem. Refitting the dimms was all
>>that was needed to 'solve' the issue. The weird thing is that
>>1. The BIOS had memtesting enabled and did not complain
>>2. W2K seemed to install ok (though I never let it hit the disk)
>>3. FBSD would repeatedly crash at exactly the same spot.
>>
>>I am beginning to wonder if we should have a boot option that enables a
>>thorough memtest from within the kernel...(e.g. boot -m). 
> 
> I guess the old /dev/test_for_shoddy_workmanship driver is working :-).
> 
> It's probably just bad luck -- BIOS memory testing is generally pretty
> poor, and it could just be FreeBSD stored your root vnode pointer (or some
> other critical thing) in a memory word that Win2K was using for an icon,
> so a single bit twiddle did pretty different things.  Glad it's fixed.  I
> occasionally wonder if we shouldn't build a memory tester into the FreeBSD
> boot loader to help diagnose this sort of stuff, though.  Not to run every
> boot, but as a diagnostics option.

That would be really cool and useful!

-- 
Andre



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