RE: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

Marlier, Ian

18 Oct 2005 18 Oct '05

16:38

-----Original Message----- From: Chris St. Pierre [mailto:stpierre@NebrWesleyan.edu] Sent: Tuesday, October 18, 2005 12:33 PM To: suse-linux-e@suse.com Subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

We have a lot of older Dell OptiPlex GX1's lying around that we use for text boxes, miscellaneous small servers, etc. Most are around 450-550 Ghz, 128-256 Mb RAM, etc. We've discovered that, on some of these boxes, the SuSE 10 install procedures fail and freeze the box. It will first freeze when the machine reboots after installing the first CD; if you leave the CD in the drive, then it freezes on boot when the second icon from the bottom is lit up; the last message to the console is:

Creating /dev/mapper/control character device with major:10 and minor:63

If I pop the CD out and reboot, it boots fine and gets back to the installation, at which point it prompts for the second CD. When I insert the second CD and click "OK," it thinks for a second and appears to start reading the CD, then freezes. (The clock stops spinning.)

I've used the same CD set to install on four other machines without a problem, so I know that's not an issue. Of the three GX1's we've tried to install on, though, only one has worked. I've tried both upgrading the machines from 9.3, and doing fresh installs; both fail the same way. We never had a problem with SuSE 9.1-9.3 on these machines, and on one box I installed 9.3 in the morning and tried installing 10.0 in the afternoon, so I don't think the boxes are flaky. Has anyone had similar problems? Or does anyone know a workaround? Thanks!

Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University

Any chance that the machines that are freezing have 128MB of RAM, and the one that worked has 256MB?

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Chris St. Pierre

18 Oct 18 Oct

16:51

New subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

I'm afraid not. The one that succeeded had 196 Mb RAM; one that failed also had 196 Mb and the other had 128 Mb. I tried bumping one of the failures up to 320 Mb, but it still didn't work. I know the memory is good, as this box has been housing a production system for nearly six months. Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University On Tue, 18 Oct 2005, Marlier, Ian wrote:

...

...
-----Original Message----- From: Chris St. Pierre [mailto:stpierre@NebrWesleyan.edu] Sent: Tuesday, October 18, 2005 12:33 PM To: suse-linux-e@suse.com Subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

We have a lot of older Dell OptiPlex GX1's lying around that we use for text boxes, miscellaneous small servers, etc. Most are around 450-550 Ghz, 128-256 Mb RAM, etc. We've discovered that, on some of these boxes, the SuSE 10 install procedures fail and freeze the box. It will first freeze when the machine reboots after installing the first CD; if you leave the CD in the drive, then it freezes on boot when the second icon from the bottom is lit up; the last message to the console is:

Creating /dev/mapper/control character device with major:10 and minor:63

If I pop the CD out and reboot, it boots fine and gets back to the installation, at which point it prompts for the second CD. When I insert the second CD and click "OK," it thinks for a second and appears to start reading the CD, then freezes. (The clock stops spinning.)

I've used the same CD set to install on four other machines without a problem, so I know that's not an issue. Of the three GX1's we've tried to install on, though, only one has worked. I've tried both upgrading the machines from 9.3, and doing fresh installs; both fail the same way. We never had a problem with SuSE 9.1-9.3 on these machines, and on one box I installed 9.3 in the morning and tried installing 10.0 in the afternoon, so I don't think the boxes are flaky. Has anyone had similar problems? Or does anyone know a workaround? Thanks!

Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University

Any chance that the machines that are freezing have 128MB of RAM, and the one that worked has 256MB?

Steve Graegert

17:06

New subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

On 10/18/05, Chris St. Pierre wrote:

...

I'm afraid not. The one that succeeded had 196 Mb RAM; one that failed also had 196 Mb and the other had 128 Mb. I tried bumping one of the failures up to 320 Mb, but it still didn't work. I know the memory is good, as this box has been housing a production system for nearly six months.

I suspect the device mapper module (dm_mod) to be the culprit. I am not sure if a text-based install is still possible, but if so, try starting the installation in textmod and try to switch to another console an unload (rmmod dm_mod) the device mapper module if loaded. Since I haven't done a text-based installation for years I can't be more precise here. Repeat this procedure before the second CD is read by YaST. Hope this points you to the right direction. \Steve

Chris St. Pierre

19:39

New subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

I'm afraid that didn't work, either. Any other ideas? Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University On Tue, 18 Oct 2005, Steve Graegert wrote:

...

On 10/18/05, Chris St. Pierre wrote:

...
I'm afraid not. The one that succeeded had 196 Mb RAM; one that failed also had 196 Mb and the other had 128 Mb. I tried bumping one of the failures up to 320 Mb, but it still didn't work. I know the memory is good, as this box has been housing a production system for nearly six months.

I suspect the device mapper module (dm_mod) to be the culprit. I am not sure if a text-based install is still possible, but if so, try starting the installation in textmod and try to switch to another console an unload (rmmod dm_mod) the device mapper module if loaded. Since I haven't done a text-based installation for years I can't be more precise here. Repeat this procedure before the second CD is read by YaST. Hope this points you to the right direction.

\Steve

Stan Glasoe

21:08

New subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

On Tuesday 18 October 2005 2:39 pm, Chris St. Pierre wrote:

...

I'm afraid that didn't work, either. Any other ideas?

Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005, Steve Graegert wrote:

...
On 10/18/05, Chris St. Pierre wrote:

...
I'm afraid not. The one that succeeded had 196 Mb RAM; one that failed also had 196 Mb and the other had 128 Mb. I tried bumping one of the failures up to 320 Mb, but it still didn't work. I know the memory is good, as this box has been housing a production system for nearly six months.

I suspect the device mapper module (dm_mod) to be the culprit. I am not sure if a text-based install is still possible, but if so, try starting the installation in textmod and try to switch to another console an unload (rmmod dm_mod) the device mapper module if loaded. Since I haven't done a text-based installation for years I can't be more precise here. Repeat this procedure before the second CD is read by YaST. Hope this points you to the right direction.

\Steve

Failsafe install choice? If that works then its figuring out which parameter(s) is the problem. Try acpi=off, apm=on first and go from there. Are these trouble system's BIOS all updated? Are there any known hardware differences between these problem machines and the ones that Just Work(TM)? At this point in the install you aren't at the hardware config for video card, NICs, TV cards, printers, etc IIRC. So I would look for ACPI versus APM, etc. Stan

Chris St. Pierre

19 Oct 19 Oct

18:36

New subject: [SLE] SuSE 10 freezes during installation

I've been doing the install in Failsafe mode all along, actually. All the machines are the same rev of the BIOS, and the only hardware difference, AFAIK, is the amount of memory. Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University On Tue, 18 Oct 2005, Stan Glasoe wrote:

...

On Tuesday 18 October 2005 2:39 pm, Chris St. Pierre wrote:

...
I'm afraid that didn't work, either. Any other ideas?

Chris St. Pierre Unix Systems Administrator Nebraska Wesleyan University

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005, Steve Graegert wrote:

...
On 10/18/05, Chris St. Pierre wrote:

...
I'm afraid not. The one that succeeded had 196 Mb RAM; one that failed also had 196 Mb and the other had 128 Mb. I tried bumping one of the failures up to 320 Mb, but it still didn't work. I know the memory is good, as this box has been housing a production system for nearly six months.

I suspect the device mapper module (dm_mod) to be the culprit. I am not sure if a text-based install is still possible, but if so, try starting the installation in textmod and try to switch to another console an unload (rmmod dm_mod) the device mapper module if loaded. Since I haven't done a text-based installation for years I can't be more precise here. Repeat this procedure before the second CD is read by YaST. Hope this points you to the right direction.

\Steve

Failsafe install choice? If that works then its figuring out which parameter(s) is the problem. Try acpi=off, apm=on first and go from there.

Are these trouble system's BIOS all updated? Are there any known hardware differences between these problem machines and the ones that Just Work(TM)? At this point in the install you aren't at the hardware config for video card, NICs, TV cards, printers, etc IIRC. So I would look for ACPI versus APM, etc.

Stan

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Chris St. Pierre
Marlier, Ian
Stan Glasoe
Steve Graegert