From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Sep 27 21:18:31 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org 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 D6DEA16A416 for ; Wed, 27 Sep 2006 21:18:31 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from volker@vwsoft.com) Received: from frontmail.ipactive.de (frontmail.ipactive.de [85.214.39.229]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3D93743EB3 for ; Wed, 27 Sep 2006 21:15:42 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from volker@vwsoft.com) Received: from mail.vtec.ipme.de (gprs-pool-1-029.eplus-online.de [212.23.126.29]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by frontmail.ipactive.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id 2DBDE33D26; Wed, 27 Sep 2006 23:15:24 +0200 (CEST) Received: from [127.0.0.1] (cesar.sz.vwsoft.com [192.168.16.3]) by mail.vtec.ipme.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id 31FFF2E544; Wed, 27 Sep 2006 23:14:45 +0200 (CEST) Message-ID: <451AE762.9080403@vwsoft.com> Date: Wed, 27 Sep 2006 23:04:34 +0200 From: Volker User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5.0.5 (Windows/20060719) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: "Patrick M. Hausen" References: <451A1375.5080202@gneto.com> <20060927071538.GF22229@e-Gitt.NET> <451A4189.5020906@samsco.org> <20060927094509.GB75104@hugo10.ka.punkt.de> In-Reply-To: <20060927094509.GB75104@hugo10.ka.punkt.de> X-Enigmail-Version: 0.94.0.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-VWSoft-MailScanner: Found to be clean X-MailScanner-From: volker@vwsoft.com X-ipactive-MailScanner-Information: Please contact the ISP for more information X-ipactive-MailScanner: Found to be clean X-ipactive-MailScanner-From: volker@vwsoft.com Cc: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org, Oliver Brandmueller Subject: Re: 6.2 SHOWSTOPPER - em completely unusable on 6.2 X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 27 Sep 2006 21:18:31 -0000 On 37378-12-23 20:59, Patrick M. Hausen wrote: > Hello! > >> Well, the best I can say at the moment is, "Wow." =-( I guess the >> thing to do here is to figure out if the problem lies with the em >> interrupt handler not getting run, or the taskqueue not getting run. > > I helped Pyun with some debugging by providing ssh access to > a machine showing the (seemingly) same problem. > > At first he thought the interrupt handler of the em driver was > the culprit, but we applied quite a few patches and tested > afterwards - seems like the driver is not the cause. > > On -stable occasionally other people complained about very similar > looking problems with bge and other drivers. My guess is, though > I'm not a kernel developer, just an experienced admin, that > em stands out as problematic just by coincidence. Certain onboard > network components tend to come with certaiin chipsets and certain > architectures. > > So, Pyun suggested it was a problem with the taskqueue that was > introduced some time between 6.0 and 6.1. > > With my system (Tyan GT20 B5161G20) the problem shows when there > is heavy disk and cpu activity, like "make buildworld". > I made sure that the em interface doesn't share an interrupt > with the SATA controller. When the problem occurs, I get the > well known "watchdog timeout" messages and then the system's > network activity over that interface freezes completely for > a couple of minutes. > Usually the system recovers after a while without reboot or > other measures. > Strange... I've seen exactly that on a (recent) RELENG_6 box but using a dirty old USB 1.1 NIC (aue). I've seen DOWN and UP messages (mostly while rebuilding kernel + world + ports) on the console all the time (but did not care about). The machine in question is an Athlon XP-64 Socket 939, Asus A8N-VM CSM. The USB ethernet NIC is a low budget ADMtek device. My observations are probably not related to your issues but maybe a sign of not really being a driver issue or not GigE related. Greeting, Volker