*BSD News Article 72481


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From: uhclem@nemesis.lonestar.org (Frank Durda IV)
Subject: Re: Spontaneous reboots
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Organization: The Big Blue Box
Message-ID: <DtuFCL.63s@nemesis.lonestar.org>
References: <4r5jon$6g0@uriah.heep.sax.de>
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 1996 02:38:44 GMT
Lines: 21

J Wunsch (j@uriah.heep.sax.de) wrote:
: Btw., the kernel message buffer is not cleared on reboot, so after the
: system came up again, it should be fetched by syslogd (and it usually
: contains at least parts of the panic message there).  Have a look into
: /var/log/messages.

Uh, this depends on the type of crash.  For example, a triple fault or
parity error will cause the equivalent of a cold reset, complete with
the BIOS wiping the contents of all RAM during parity-preload/memory testing.

However, in all the surprise panics and clear-screen reboots my systems
used to have, I never once got anything useful in the way of recorded
panic messages.  Anything recorded is what I wrote down off the screen when
it didn't reboot by itself.   These crashes turned out to be a design flaw
in the Intel 82385 cache module.  Once removed, the system ran endlessly.

Frank Durda IV <uhclem@nemesis.lonestar.org>|"The Knights who say "LETNi"
or uhclem%nemesis@rwsystr.nkn.net           | demand...  A SEGMENT REGISTER!!!"
					    |"A what?"
or ...letni!rwsys!nemesis!uhclem	    |"LETNi! LETNi! LETNi!"  - 1983