RE: [rhn-users] Dell lock-up problem with Red Hat

["Ed Cooley" <ecooley strategy5 com>]

Nick,
It wasn't a BIOS problem at all, the Dell 2650 is a fantastic machine, it
appears to be simply a bad driver and perhaps a power-save incompatibility.
Unfortunately, Dell tech support knows nothing about this they have replaced
motherboards and spent hours on the phone with our customers frustrating
them without knowing what to do.
RedHat knowledge base supposedly has some notes about this and an updated
kernel is reported to be available without the problem but I have not been
able to get the search working on the web site.  RedHat Network just came
out with an updated kernel for 8.0 that fixes the problem, but since I have
fixed all of our machines I think I'll let them run for a while before
trying the new kernel as the users are a little testy right now.
We had this exact problem on six or eight machines.  The fix was pretty
simple and we have not had a crash in the last 10 days of heavy use.  (Not
sure which one of the two tweaks did the trick or if it is a combination of
both but the problem is definitely gone and the 100 users on the largest
machine have been banging away for a almost two weeks)
1. set the noapic option in the grub config, here is an example:
default=0
timeout=10
splashimage=(hd0,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
title Red Hat Linux (2.4.18-24.8.0smp)
        root (hd0,0)
        kernel /vmlinuz-2.4.18-24.8.0smp ro root=LABEL=/ noapic
        initrd /initrd-2.4.18-24.8.0smp.img
2. Install the 6.1 driver for the broadcom card.  It is as simply as
installing the RPM and rebooting. It can be downloaded from this dell site
and here is the link:
http://support.dell.com/FileLib/Format.aspx?ReleaseID=R55748
BTW: RedHat 7.3 had the same problem as 8.0.

I still love the newer Dell servers especially the 2600 series; they are
amazing machines especially with RedHat 8.0 notwithstanding this fiasco.  I
hope they keep up the good work.

Hope this helps anyone else with this problem.

Ed

-----Original Message-----
From: rhn-users-admin redhat com [mailto:rhn-users-admin redhat com]On
Behalf Of Nick Nobbe
Sent: Friday, March 07, 2003 11:28 AM
To: rhn-users redhat com
Subject: Re: [rhn-users] Dell lock-up problem with Red Hat

Ed,

This sounded more like a Bios and Dell hardware problem. Usually it's the
devices malfunctioning or not functioning that cause the lockups. Can you
share the problem and the solution with us? Or is this the wrong place?

Yours,
   Nick

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ed Cooley" <ecooley strategy5 com>
To: <rhn-users redhat com>
Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2003 11:42 PM
Subject: RE: [rhn-users] Dell lock-up problem with Red Hat


> I have to tell you when you stake your reputation on redhat and dell who
are
> supposed to be working together with 8.0 installed on the machine.  When
you
> are sitting their with 80 users staring at you it blatently doesn't work
you
> put it on whatever list you please.  :)
>
> BTW: the answer came from a RHN user and I had the 80 users back in
> production within an hour or so.  Try that with a closed source OS.
>
> Cheers to the Redhat users!  Without them, we would be in trouble.
>
> Ed
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: rhn-users-admin redhat com [mailto:rhn-users-admin redhat com]On
> Behalf Of Todd Warner
> Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2003 8:13 PM
> To: rhn-users redhat com
> Cc: ecooley strategy5 com
> Subject: RE: [rhn-users] Dell lock-up problem with Red Hat
>
> In the future, hit the main redhat list or your distro's list or the
> current distro's list with this. Red Hat uses a bunch of 2650's so...
> :)
>
> Glad to know you are on the trail to fixing the problem.
>
> On Thu, 27 Feb 2003, Ed Cooley wrote:
>
> > I have gotten a few contacts already, which are much appreciated.
> >
> > It seems there is a problem with the broadcom NIC card and the power
save
> > features in the 2xxx and 4xxx with a gigabit card.  I have not been able
> to
> > test it yet, but you have to install a new nic driver, turn off power
> > management in grub or lilo to correct the problem.  Supposedly DELL and
> > RedHat have a new driver on their sites but they are not the same so I
> guess
> > I will do some testing.
> >
> >
> > Edward J Cooley - President
> > Strategic Concepts, Inc.
> > 479-271-7400 - Fax: 271-7401
> > ecooley strategy5 com
> > www.strategy5.com
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: rhn-users-admin redhat com [mailto:rhn-users-admin redhat com]On
> > Behalf Of jmarkuna
> > Sent: Thursday, February 27, 2003 8:54 AM
> > To: rhn-users redhat com
> > Subject: RE: [rhn-users] Dell lock-up problem with Red Hat
> >
> > HI
> >
> >         I have seen the lock up on Dells running RH V7.1. I would watch
> the
> > output of top and all of the memory was consumed. I upgraded the Kernel
> via
> > up2date and the no more lock-ups.
> >
> > Sincerely
> > John Markunas
> > System Administrator
> > Williams College
> > 413-597-3567(D)
> > 413-822-2928(C)
> > 413-597-4276(F)
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: rhn-users-admin redhat com [mailto:rhn-users-admin redhat com] On
> > Behalf Of Ed Cooley
> > Sent: Thursday, February 27, 2003 9:34 AM
> > To: Red Hat Mailing List
> > Cc: RHN User List
> > Subject: [rhn-users] Dell lock-up problem with Red Hat
> >
> > Sorry for the duplicate list posting but this might be turning into a
big
> > problem for us with 100 systems installed.
> >
> > It seems a large number of the Dell servers we have recently put in
server
> > have a problem where they intermittently lock-up hard, no keyboard, no
> > reboot, and require a power-down.  Sometimes they will run for a week or
> two
> > but when they lock up, it is all over.   I installed a 2650 last night
and
> > it locked up within 45 minutes.
> >
> > Dell seems to think it has something to do with the power save feature
but
> > can't come up with a way to turn it off.
> >
> > Is anyone else having these kinds of difficulties with Dell or other
> > servers?  In your experiences do the Dell servers have a higher
occurrence
> > of problems like this than IBM or HP servers running Linux?
> >
> > We never had problems with Dell in the past and have had their machines
> run
> > for over a year under heavy loads (some with almost 100 users on telnet)
> > without even a reboot being required.  This seems to have just cropped
up
> in
> > the last 2 or 3 months with probably 50% of the new servers we have
> > installed and most of them are 2650s.
> >
> > Any comments would be appreciated.
> >
> > Ed
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > rhn-users mailing list
> > rhn-users redhat com
> > https://listman.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/rhn-users
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> >
> >
> >
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> >
>
> --
> ____________
>  /odd Warner                                    <taw {redhat,pobox}.com>
>           Bit Twiddler - Operation Cheetah Flip - Red Hat Inc.
> ---------------------gpg info in the message headers--------------------
> "It's not having what you want; it's wanting what you've got"
>     -Sheryl Crow
>
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