baffling linux bug / hardware problem

baffling linux bug / hardware problem

[David Burrows]

Hi all,

I have a problem where my computer locks up during "Calibrating Delay
Loop..".  I have been using Linux on this same hardware for many years,
and it only started doing this 2 days ago.  It does not seem to matter
what kernel version (2.0, 2.2, 2.4.17) I use or what medium I boot from.

I'd write this off as a hardware problem but both Windows 98 and FreeBSD
4.5 seem to be able to boot and function properly.  I've tried to debug
init/main.c myself and put printks in the loop calibration function.  It
seems to go through the first while loop twice, then hang before getting
to the __delay part.

Could this be a timer interrupt problem?  How do I diagnose this?  Why do
other oses work and Linux (which previously worked fine) no longer does
no matter what version or where I boot it from.

My hardware is p166mmx, intel HX chipset.  I have also tried a memory
tester which says that the memory is fine.  I'm totally stumped.

Any feedback on this problem would be much appreciated.  (CC me direct as
I'm not subscribed to this list).

Thanks in advance,

Dave.

Re: baffling linux bug / hardware problem

[Dave Jones]

On Fri, Feb 22, 2002 at 01:53:10AM +1100, David Burrows wrote:
 > I have a problem where my computer locks up during "Calibrating Delay
 > Loop..".  I have been using Linux on this same hardware for many years,
 > and it only started doing this 2 days ago.  It does not seem to matter
 > what kernel version (2.0, 2.2, 2.4.17) I use or what medium I boot from.

 I had an old Winchip box that did this. Turned out to be a bad SIMM.
 Try running memtest86 for a while. 

-- 
| Dave Jones.        http://www.codemonkey.org.uk
| SuSE Labs

Dodgey Linus BogoMIPS code ;) (was Re: baffling linux bug)

[David Burrows]

On Thu, 21 Feb 2002, Dave Jones wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 22, 2002 at 01:53:10AM +1100, David Burrows wrote:
>  > I have a problem where my computer locks up during "Calibrating Delay
>  > Loop..".  I have been using Linux on this same hardware for many years,
>  > and it only started doing this 2 days ago.  It does not seem to matter
>  > what kernel version (2.0, 2.2, 2.4.17) I use or what medium I boot from.
>
>  I had an old Winchip box that did this. Turned out to be a bad SIMM.
>  Try running memtest86 for a while.

I have ran memtest86 all the way through, and shuffled the memory around
(moved them to different slots) and it still crashes in calibrating delay
loop.  FreeBSD and Windows still work.  If I knew how init/main.c worked,
what jiffies are and how they are updated (timer interrupt?), then I would
have some idea of what I'm doing when I step through the BogoMip
calculation code.

Is there some sort of (or can there be) a safety check which tests to see
if the timer is functioning correctly and displays an error message such
as "Timer interrupt is broken, system halted." if it is not.  I don't want
to give up on this hardware yet, ESPECIALLY considering that other
operating systems that I absolutely HATE still continue to work, and my
favourite one doesn't. :(

Thanks again for your time,

David.