On Thursday 05 June 2008, Paul Schmehl wrote: > --On Thursday, June 05, 2008 10:23:55 -0400 John Baldwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > wrote: > > FWIW, at Y! 6.3 is more stable than 6.2 (I had a list of about 10 patches > > for known deadlocks and kernel panics that were errata candidates for 6.2 > > that never made it into RELENG_6_2 but all of them are in 6.3). We also > > have many machines with bge(4) and from our perspective 6.3 has less > > issues with bge0 devices than 6.2. > > I'm glad to hear that. I have a server that uses bce, and it was > completely non-functional until I hunted down some beta code that made it > usable. I'd like to upgrade, but this is a critical server with no > redundancy (and it's a hobby site with no money to pay for expensive > support), and I'm not about to upgrade unless I know for certain the > problems won't reoccur, because I have to upgrade remotely and pay money if > the system goes down. > > The problems with that driver were bad enough when the server was being > configured in my study. (The system would lock up, and only a hard reboot > would restore networking.) It would be hell trying to troubleshoot > problems if I had to drive the 45 miles to the hosting site and spend a > night there trying to get the server back up, then go to work the next day. > > # uname -a > FreeBSD www.stovebolt.com 6.1-RELEASE-p10 FreeBSD 6.1-RELEASE-p10 #2: Mon > Oct 16 15:38:02 CDT 2006 > [EMAIL PROTECTED]:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC i386 > > # grep bce /var/run/dmesg.boot > bce0: <Broadcom NetXtreme II BCM5708 1000Base-T (B1), v0.9.6> mem > 0xf4000000-0xf5ffffff irq 16 at device 0.0 on pci9 > bce0: ASIC ID 0x57081010; Revision (B1); PCI-X 64-bit 133MHz > miibus0: <MII bus> on bce0 > bce0: Ethernet address: 00:13:72:fb:2a:ad > bce1: <Broadcom NetXtreme II BCM5708 1000Base-T (B1), v0.9.6> mem > 0xf8000000-0xf9ffffff irq 16 at device 0.0 on pci5 > bce1: ASIC ID 0x57081010; Revision (B1); PCI-X 64-bit 133MHz > miibus1: <MII bus> on bce1 > bce1: Ethernet address: 00:13:72:fb:2a:ab > > # grep bce0 /var/log/messages > May 2 09:10:31 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to DOWN > May 2 09:10:39 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to UP > May 25 07:49:49 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to DOWN > May 25 07:50:31 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to UP > May 26 21:28:36 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to DOWN > May 26 21:28:40 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to UP > May 27 13:13:21 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to DOWN > May 27 13:13:31 www kernel: bce0: link state changed to UP > > It's been like that since the server was installed. > > So, if I upgrade to 6.3 or 7.0, am I still going to experience these > problems? Is the server going to stop working entirely? How can I know > that for sure before starting an upgrade? > [...]
There's a really easy way to test this. Build & install a new kernel, but keep the old kernel around (by default it's in /boot/kernel.old). If the problem is gone, do the upgrade as usual. If it's still there, you know upgrading won't fix it and you don't waste time; simply rename kernel.old to kernel. This even works with 7.0 provided that you leave COMPAT_FREEBSD6 in the kernel configuration file. -- Pieter de Goeje _______________________________________________ freebsd-stable@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-stable To unsubscribe, send any mail to "[EMAIL PROTECTED]"
