Unstable gzip/gunzip

1999-07-28 Thread Dan Hugo
I am seeing some very unstable behavior which I am trying to track down,
and I would really really appreciate some input...

Here is what I am seeing on this machine:

Slink install, SMP kernel 2.0.36
Asus P2B-D MB, 2 PIII/450, 256M ram (2 PC100 128M DIMMs)
IBM 14GXP 14.6G drive, UDMA disabled (part of test...)

Stable for some time, then suddenly you name it, it crashed.  I have
also attempted to run the slink installed kernel (single processor,etc),
and see similar results.

One test I perform to see a failure is to move a file from my /home to
/tmp
gunzip file.gz; gzip file; gzip -t file.gz

I run this loop anywhere from 5 to 20 times, no problems, but
eventually, I will get a bad crc.  This tells me that I am headed for
trouble.

On some reboots, I get a mess of errors, others no problem.  Netscape
4.61 runs great, or crashes before a window is even drawn.  Lots of
segfaulting, or stable operation for a while.

I have JUST upgraded to slink, and at the same time upgraded to this new
MB with lots of memory, and a new hard drive.  SO, I am attempting to
isolate the problem.

I was suspicious that this drive (7200 RPM, UDMA) was either overheating
crammed between a floppy and a sparq drive (so I moved it in my case) or
failing due to some UDMA problems (so I disabled UDMA in bios).

I disabled MPS 1.4 support in the bios.

I installed kernel 2.2.1 from the stable slink (r2?) from a debian site
(original install from lsl cds, BTW).


I still see weird behavior.

I have noticed, though, that my aging power supply sometimes needs some
coaxing to power up from shutdown (perhaps fluxuating power supply
problems?), or it could be a marginal memory cell/row/column/chip.  I
have had the memory almost filled up with tons of stuff running, with no
problems, but who knows.


Does anyone have any experience with this sort of flakiness?  I grabbed
memtest from a link on freshmeat.net and built it, and am about to
explore that, I have a fan blowing right on the board in case it was
overheating in some way, and I am running out of other ideas...


Any input greatly appreciated!
Thanks
Dan Hugo


Found Problem (Re: Unstable gzip/gunzip)

1999-07-28 Thread Dan Hugo
Hmm, some bit errors in my memory dimms, found with memtest86. 
Cool util, I believe I will keep it...
-dh



Dan Hugo wrote:
 
 I am seeing some very unstable behavior which I am trying to track down,
 and I would really really appreciate some input...
 
 Here is what I am seeing on this machine:
 
 Slink install, SMP kernel 2.0.36
 Asus P2B-D MB, 2 PIII/450, 256M ram (2 PC100 128M DIMMs)
 IBM 14GXP 14.6G drive, UDMA disabled (part of test...)
 
 Stable for some time, then suddenly you name it, it crashed.  I have
 also attempted to run the slink installed kernel (single processor,etc),
 and see similar results.
 
 One test I perform to see a failure is to move a file from my /home to
 /tmp
 gunzip file.gz; gzip file; gzip -t file.gz
 
 I run this loop anywhere from 5 to 20 times, no problems, but
 eventually, I will get a bad crc.  This tells me that I am headed for
 trouble.
 
 On some reboots, I get a mess of errors, others no problem.  Netscape
 4.61 runs great, or crashes before a window is even drawn.  Lots of
 segfaulting, or stable operation for a while.
 
 I have JUST upgraded to slink, and at the same time upgraded to this new
 MB with lots of memory, and a new hard drive.  SO, I am attempting to
 isolate the problem.
 
 I was suspicious that this drive (7200 RPM, UDMA) was either overheating
 crammed between a floppy and a sparq drive (so I moved it in my case) or
 failing due to some UDMA problems (so I disabled UDMA in bios).
 
 I disabled MPS 1.4 support in the bios.
 
 I installed kernel 2.2.1 from the stable slink (r2?) from a debian site
 (original install from lsl cds, BTW).
 
 I still see weird behavior.
 
 I have noticed, though, that my aging power supply sometimes needs some
 coaxing to power up from shutdown (perhaps fluxuating power supply
 problems?), or it could be a marginal memory cell/row/column/chip.  I
 have had the memory almost filled up with tons of stuff running, with no
 problems, but who knows.
 
 Does anyone have any experience with this sort of flakiness?  I grabbed
 memtest from a link on freshmeat.net and built it, and am about to
 explore that, I have a fan blowing right on the board in case it was
 overheating in some way, and I am running out of other ideas...
 
 Any input greatly appreciated!
 Thanks
 Dan Hugo
 
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