Weird Kernel Panic in a New Computer

alexbariv · May 1, 2010, 5:07pm

Hi everybody.

I got this weird kernel panic in a brand new computer that my friend bought a few days ago.

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4026/4567692509_9db1c9ceeb.jpg](http://www.flickr.com/photos/39953455@N04/4567692509/)

The hardware specs are:

AMD Athlon II X3
4 GB RAM
SATA HDD and DVD
Motherboard: MSI K9N6PGM2

Whats happening? I have installed openSUSE in a lot of machines and this is the first time that i got this.

Tried with a lot of media that i have here, LiveCD’s, various DVD’s and nothing.

Thanks in advance for all your help.

ken_yap · May 1, 2010, 5:09pm

Does this mobo have so-called fakeraid in the BIOS? Can you turn it off?

alexbariv · May 1, 2010, 5:29pm

I check the bios and there is no option to disable the RAID… Actually i try to boot with raid=noautodetect and nothing.

I forgot to say that this error appears in the DVD before the installation, so it doesn’t let me install

Tried already with safe settings, without acpi, nothing

gogalthorp · May 1, 2010, 5:37pm

Bad install media of flaky DVD drive maybe??

alexbariv · May 1, 2010, 5:50pm

Tried with various medias, that i have used in other installs.

DenverD · May 1, 2010, 5:54pm

if i understand what you wrote you get the same or a similar kernel
panic with everything you try to boot…so, i would begin by removing
the RAM and inserting only one stick…and, see if it will then boot
the DVD…

if not, then i’d shut down the machine, unplug it from the wall and
carefully unhook the CD/DVD, floppy (if installed), all hard drives,
the keyboard and mouse…then, i’d plug in the CD/DVD (and still with
only one RAM still in) i’d plug it in and try again to boot a DVD/CD

if it wouldn’t i’d put it all back together and take it back where you
bought it and tell’em to fix it…

wait: hmmmmmm…did it come with windows and windows boots? then it is
probably a bad CD/DVD reader…

if it does boot, then shutdown and add ONE of the things still
un-plugged (like the keyboard) and if it boots with that, i’d add
another (like mouse) and another (hard drive, then floppy and RAM
sticks one at a time) until i found the bad actor, OR after all was
back in if it works that means you had a bad connection in some place
to begin with…

good luck

alexbariv · May 1, 2010, 6:09pm

Eh… thanks DenverD but the problem is that: Windows works perfect… This machine should have dual boot and Windows install and works

The DVD, Audio and all peripherals works.

If i try to run a LiveCD system crash

Tried already with other distros, and same error

DenverD · May 1, 2010, 8:01pm

alexbariv wrote:
> Eh… thanks DenverD but the problem is that: Windows works perfect…
> This machine should have dual boot and Windows install and works

i guess we were supposed to figure that out somehow…dang, i’m gonna
have go polish my crystal ball…but, before i go i noticed in your
Flickr posting two error message, suggest you google them:

VFS: Cannot open root device “<NULL>” or unknown.block(3.1)

Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on
unknown-block(3.1)

gogalthorp · May 1, 2010, 10:12pm

Check the memory whether Windows works or not the usage pattern of memory is significantly different. Windows may just not have found the bad memory yet. Also check the media again on this machine difference in CD/DVD players can cause errors. Don’t just assume because you used the same media else where that it will wotk in this case.

alexbariv · May 2, 2010, 4:19am

At the end, DenverD was right xD

I start taking off piece by piece to see wich one has problems and it was the second dimm of ram xD

Now the install its working as usual

Thanks everybody! And you DenverD

DenverD · May 2, 2010, 10:08am

> Thanks everybody! And you DenverD

welcome.

rule one: it is a well known fact that Redmond’s software ‘accepts’
(or just doesn’t ‘see’) lots of little problems that causes Linux to
barf…

rule two: most kernel panics are caused by memory problems–which can
occur from either in software or hardware faults…since you were
getting kernel panics with a variety of software (multiple disks) it
was easy to smell a hardware problem…

lwfinger · May 2, 2010, 4:56pm

On 05/02/2010 03:08 AM, DenverD wrote:
>> Thanks everybody! And you DenverD
>
> welcome.
>
> rule one: it is a well known fact that Redmond’s software ‘accepts’
> (or just doesn’t ‘see’) lots of little problems that causes Linux to
> barf…
>
> rule two: most kernel panics are caused by memory problems–which can
> occur from either in software or hardware faults…since you were
> getting kernel panics with a variety of software (multiple disks) it
> was easy to smell a hardware problem…

The interpretation of rule 1 is that Redmond and Linux utilize memory in
different ways. Redmond tries to keep memory “free”. Linux has the
philosophy that free memory is being wasted, thus any RAM not needed by
the kernel or a program is used to store disk cache. As a result, if any
part of RAM is bad, Linux will find it, but Redmond may never even try
to use it.

DenverD · May 2, 2010, 6:29pm

i didn’t actually know why what i was saying was true, but now i
do…THANKS for that.