[Solved] Weird Kernel Panic Errors

[alphaace]

Hi Everyone,

I have PCLOS installed on my lab computer (Dell Optiplex GX620). It's fully patched pclos 2011.6 as of last Friday. For the last few months I've been getting strange kernel panic errors during bootup. I would then reboot (sometimes twice) and it will boot in just fine and work for the rest of the day perfectly. Some days it doesn't happen at all. When there is a kernel panic, it usually ends up just showing me the processor stack so I'm thinking it's something fairly low level?

Thanks!

[T6]

please open konsole and write uname -r

copy and paste the results

if you can, let us know the specs of that dell machine, the more info you can provide to us, the easier is to us to try to help you

[alphaace]

Hi,

The result is: [greg@Ares ~]$ uname -r
2.6.33.7-pclos6.bfs


As for the machine:
CPU: Intel Pentium D CPU 3.2GH
GPU: ATI Technologies Inc RV380 Radeon X600 (PCIE)
Ram: 3.5 Gigs (free -m gives me 3547 as the total).

Not sure what other specs you might want? It has the standard power supply. Here's the output from df:

Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda1              12G  4.7G  6.6G  42% /
/dev/sda6             214G  9.6G  204G   5% /home

As always, thanks for everyone's time and help.

[Old-Polack]

alphaace:

Install one of the 2.6.38.8 kernels through Synaptic.

[alphaace]

Ok, installed. I'll report back if I see the problem again during my boot ups for the rest of the week. I was under the impression the kernels get updated automatically too, good to know that they are not. Thanks!

Now in Grub i have several entries. I'd upload a snapshot but I can't quite figure out how to do that via the forum. Can I delete the old ones (eg clean it up)? If so, which ones specifically?

My current grub list is:
2.6.38.8-pclos1(/boot/vmlinuz/2.6.38.8-pclos1)
linux(/boot/vmlinux)
linux-nonfb(/boot/vmlinuz)
failsafe(/boot/vmlinuz)
2.6.33.7-pclos6.bfs(/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.33.7-pclos6.bfs)

[T6]

the entries should be failsafe, old kernel new kernel and another, can't remember which one

boot using the new kernel form the list, verify you don't have more kernel panics or at least less kernel panics

if that is the case, you can uninstall the old kernel or any kernel you installed that you don't need

then you can edit the boot menu in pclinux control center/boot/setup boot system/next button/

there you will see the same options you mention, you can edit them the way you need it

[Old-Polack]

Ok, installed. I'll report back if I see the problem again during my boot ups for the rest of the week. I was under the impression the kernels get updated automatically too, good to know that they are not. Thanks!

Now in Grub i have several entries. I'd upload a snapshot but I can't quite figure out how to do that via the forum. Can I delete the old ones (eg clean it up)? If so, which ones specifically?

My current grub list is:
2.6.38.8-pclos1(/boot/vmlinuz/2.6.38.8-pclos1)
linux(/boot/vmlinux)
linux-nonfb(/boot/vmlinuz)
failsafe(/boot/vmlinuz)
2.6.33.7-pclos6.bfs(/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.33.7-pclos6.bfs)

The newest installed kernel becomes the default kernel as part of the installation process, so you can use the default first selection on the boot menu to boot to the newest kernel.

[Just17]

Now in Grub i have several entries. I'd upload a snapshot but I can't quite figure out how to do that via the forum. Can I delete the old ones (eg clean it up)? If so, which ones specifically?

You can .....  but I advise against it ......  keep the old kernel for a while to ensure the new one is operating correctly.

Also, it seems you may have an older install and thus should install and run  Aptupgrade while using the newer kernel.

[AS]

I have PCLOS installed on my lab computer (Dell Optiplex GX620).

Dell Optiplex remember me something ... are you using an updated version of BIOS ?

AS

[alphaace]

Heh, I don't know. I didn't check as I usually update the bios only as a method of last resort...too risky if something goes wrong. However, after installing the new kernel it seems (knock on wood) to be working fine. Tomorrow is my last day at the lab until december as I'll be at a different university but for the last few days it's been working fine! I'll mark this as solved for now.