[PLUG] Newbie Troubleshooting Repeated Crash / Kernel Panic in IPCop

Erik edasher at javelin.net
Thu Dec 18 17:40:02 UTC 2003


Hello,

I've got an IPCop box running on a Pentium I @ 166Mhz.  The system boots
without generating any messages which I find suspect, yet the system is
very unstable.  Usually, it doesn't manage to stay up for more than 24
hours at a time.  I'm profoundly inept with Linux (I'm a recovering
Windows wussy), and in spite of Googling around can't seem to find
answers to the following questions:

1.  Where might I find kernel panic messages logged?  Is there something
I must do to cause kernel panic messages to be logged?

2.  Given a kernel panic message that mentions the swap partition, what
troubleshooting steps might one take to isolate and resolve the trouble?

Usually when the machine fails, the screen goes black and does not
respond to pings on the Green interface, nor keyboard activity at the
console.  No lights on Num lock or Caps Lock.  Generally the last
message in the DMESG ring buffer shows some packet stopped at the red
interface.  The system has three ethernet interfaces.  One runs the NEII
driver and is an old ISA card, the other are Linksys cards running on
the Tuplip drivers.

The reason I suspect swap file (NO swap PARTITION!) problems is because
I did see ONE kernel panic message that mentioned to word SWAP.  Alas, I
lacked the forsight to copy exactly the error message...

Any advice you can give would be helpful.  Thanks for your time, 
Erik.









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