stability of RHEL ES 4 (was: RE: trouble installing/running the Domain Name Service Configuration Tool)

[Rick Stevens]

Ed McCorduck wrote:
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: redhat-install-list-bounces at redhat.com 
>>[mailto:redhat-install-list-bounces at redhat.com] On Behalf Of 
>>Ali Erdinç Köroglu
>>Sent: Monday, July 18, 2005 6:48 AM
>>To: Getting started with Red Hat Linux
>>Subject: Re: stability of RHEL ES 4 (was: RE: trouble 
>>installing/running the Domain Name Service Configuration Tool)
>>
>>>But before I could try your solution, for the third time my Linux 
>>>system has crashed with kernel
>>>panics and file system errors that have again left me with 
>>
>>a nonbooting system, so I'll need to 
>>
>>>reinstall Linux one more time. With my limited capabilities 
>>
>>I can't tell if the problem is with 
>>
>>>my computer's hardware or with the Linux system software itself, 
>>
>>If you think that cd's has error or something before you burn 
>>ISO images you should check md5sum's from RedHat if they are 
>>fit then you'll have no media problems till you scratch the 
>>cd :)
> 
> 
> Thanks, Ali. I actually did run the "Mediacheck" program on all the CDs before doing the initial installation.

Good man.

>>This problem appears just after you finished the 
>>installation and boot the system for 1st time? 
> 
> 
> No, and this is what's strange, it takes anywhere from a few days to a week or two to crash, and that's always after having it running constantly. I do a few reboots during the period, but the problems seem to crop up outside of those (i.e. programs suddenly freezing, bizarre characters on the screen in the middle of others etc.).

Ok, this is very indicative of a power supply going bad or an
overheating CPU.  First, check the fan on the CPU's heatsink and make
sure it's spinning at a good speed.  Fans croak very often and a hot
CPU is not a happy CPU.  If the blades aren't a blur, replace the fan
and/or heatsink (don't forget to use more thermal goop if you replace
the heatsink).

If that doesn't do the trick, I'd replace the power supply.  It's hard
to catch a bad supply, as you need to track its output using something
like a recording DMM (fairly expensive for occasional use).  New
supplies are $50 U.S. in most places and it's probably cheaper to put
in a new one than trying to analyze and/or repair the old one.
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- Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens at vitalstream.com -
- VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
-                                                                    -
-         Microsoft Windows:  Proof that P.T. Barnum was right       -
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