I am trying to help a small company with their graphics editing rig. Its a prebuilt rig from AutoDesk running Enterprise Linux Ver. 4. The machine is a HP xw9400 with 2 dual core AMD opterons, 8gb RAM. When I boot the computer and Linux begins its booting process I get this error line:

Creating root device
mkrootdev: label /1 not found
Mounting root filesystem
mount: error 2 mounting ext3
mount: error 2 mounting none
Switching to new root
switchroot: mount failed: 22
unmount/initrd/dev failed: 2
Kernel Panic - not synching: Attempted to kill init!

I tried using the install cd and going through rescue mode and got the following error message:

running install...
running /sbin/loader
Kernel panic - not synching: PCI-DMA: high address but no IOMMU

I did some research and I found that updating the BIOS would sometimes solve said issue. I did and got the same error. I am not very familiar with Linux I admit so I plead for help, we need the system running ASAP. Thank you.

Looks like the hard drive has died or is having problems. Since it's a prebuilt system from a vendor, the quickest way to get it going would be to contact the vendor, and tell them about the issue(s). Autodesk is most certainly commercial, as is Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

If the hard drive has died, there's little you can do aside from replacing the disk, and restoring files from backup. If you boot to the rescue CD, you MIGHT be able to run an fsck on the partitions. You can look in /dev for devices named something like /dev/sdxxx (/dev/sda1 would be the first partition on the first hard drive.../dev/sdb1 first partition on second drive, etc.). Try running something like "fsck -a -y /dev/sda1", and see how things progress. An important question would be, was the system shut down correctly? If someone just powered it off or pulled the plug, and fsck may be all that's needed.

Again, though...the client purchased the system and with it, support from the vendor. They would be the best ones to ask for a very accurate, fast response.

Do you think I could rescue the drive by doing a zero out reformat on another system?

No idea what you mean by a "zero out reformat on another system". If you format the drive, you erase it...your data is gone.

Again, your best option is to try to fsck the partitions, and see if you can get it going. Barring that (if you don't have a backup), all you can do is try to send the disk to a recovery center, and be prepared to spend a LOT of $$$ getting your data back. If you do have a backup, then buy a new disk, do a system installation, and reload your data.

I will again stress that you are paying for vendor support, and you should use it. THEY are the ones who built the system...they can walk you through things...that's what you're paying them to do.

The zero out reformat completely deletes out the drive turning all binary values to 0, a regular reformat merely erases the directory inside the drive. I do it for media cards with errors on film sets all the time. Its done through the disk utility on MacOS.

As far as the support. They tried to get support from AutoDesk and they said they could not diagnose until they could get the system to boot. I tried to go with RedHat and turns out they appear as a subscribed owner but they do not have a service contract which is separate. Thats why they called me.

There is an essential lack of information:
- is there still data on the machine that needs to be backed up?
- What have you already done to troubleshoot the system?
- have you tested the hardware for errors?

I am sorry that I have to say that, but from what you have posted til now in this thread you don't seem to be the right man for this job. Since this is a commercial system I would recommend to let trained professionals handle the situation.

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