On 12/23/05, Daniel da Veiga [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
3) Check (not necessarily in this order): MOBO, Processor, memory,
video. (if you don't have the spares necessary, take it to someone you
trust and can test the hardware).
It sometimes isn't even necessary to swap out this hardware. You can
usually go into the BIOS and adjust the memory timings and CPU speeds
to identify the problem.
For example, I just built an AMD x2 system. But I have had a lot of
trouble getting the system stable. BIOS wouldn't even post with the
first 2 sticks of RAM running at their rated timings of 2-3-2-6, but
would post fine at 3-4-3-6. So I replaced those.
Then I couldn't get a compile of ghostscript to complete without
causing a kernel panic...so back into the BIOS I went. Eventually I
reduced the CPU multiplier from x11 to x10 (2.2 to 2.0 Ghz), and
everything compiled cleanly. So I exchanged that CPU, and emerge -e
world worked at 2.2Ghz.
Now I should say that the system was still unstable...getting a kernel
panic every few hours. Actually, I can cause the kernel panic by
saturating the SATA bandwidth (dd if=/dev/zero of=JUNKFILE bs=64k). So
while the replacment hardware has helped, I am currently running it
with the slow memory timings and the x10 multiplier. I haven't gotten
back to testing the hardware again yet to figure out if the CPU or
memory is still bad, or if the nvidia chipset in the shuttle XPC is
crap, (which is what I truly suspect).
5) Software is not a good way to test hardware (*IMHO*), the
exceptions are memtest and some benchmarks.
IMO memtest is almost useless today. It can tell you if you have a
bad memory cell, which is incredibly rare, but cannot identify the
more common timing or chipset problems.
emerge -e world seems to be the best way to identify faulty hardware!
-Richard
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