I just built a desktop from new parts (the hardware specs are at the bottom of this post), but it powers off without warning. The thing is, this has only happened under Linux. Here are the relevant details:

64-bit linux (both Ubuntu and Gentoo live CDs) power off quickly, usually before boot is complete. If the computer has been off overnight, it can take a few minutes. This happens even with nothing but the DVD-ROM connected. 32-bit linux (Ubuntu installation) only powers off after at least two hours, and only under heavy load. This happens even with everything but the HD disconnected. WindowsXP has never powered off, even after long up times and heavy load. Even under heavy load, neither CPU temperature gets above 45. I updated the BIOS, but nothing changed. I have run memtest twice, and no errors were found.

I tried running with a box fan blowing directly on the motherboard, and the problem was unchanged, so I can rule out ventilation. Besides, unless the sensors are broken, the thing isn't overheating. So I assume its the MB or the PSU, but if so, why doesn't the problem happen under Windows?

Thanks for your help!

AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5600+
MB: ECS GeForce6100SM-M AM2
Video: onboard nVidia GeForce 6100 nForce 405 / MCP61S
PSU: Antec EA-380

Could be a problem with APM or ACPI.
Have your tried turning them off at boot?
Anything in the logs to indicate what is doing it and why?

Have you tried booting using a Live-CD to see if the problem is with your particular distro?

Also, have you run memtest on the computer?
I have seen Linux complain about bad memory while Windows didn't seem to care!

Thanks for responding. Turning off ACPI and APM at boot made no difference. Nothing relevant appears in the log files. Your other questions were answered in my original post.

Look for evidence in the system logs. If it is linux's fault there is something there in the logs. (/var/log)

I've scrutinized the syslog, and can find nothing suspicious. It is not true that the logs would necessarily reflect a software error - a kernel bug (or a hardware bug, for which a kernel workaround is necessary) might crash the system without logging a message.

I vaguely recall that there were some problems with mobo's using the Nvidia mcp61s.
The system would power down if using the smp kernel (I think) in some distros!
You could try a non-smp kernel, (I know waste of a dual core cpu!) to see if this is the same problem.
I thought this was fixed since I have heard of people using Linux on these mobo's.


Also, can you be more specific about which version of Ubuntu & Gentoo you are using?

Well, partly solved.

roy_lt_69:
That cleared up the problem with the amd64 liveCDs - they both boot now without trouble! However, my installed Ubuntu (x86 Gutsy 7.10) just died again, even with nosmp option. The option is not being ignored - the system monitor shows only one CPU. Again, the crash happened under heavy load. Is it possible I have two different issues that cause the same symptom?

Sorry, I wasn't intending for the non-smp kernel to be a solution, just a test for a specific problem.

As for your system 'crashing' under heavy load, define crashing! Froze, shutdown, rebooted?
Anything in the logs?
Does the fan come on at anytime during heavy load?
Heavy load reboot/shutdown tend to be a heat problem (ie fan not coming on)!

Can you post the dmesg from a good boot?
Maybe someone can spot something in it, or compare it to their's if using the same mobo/chipset/etc!

I'm sorry if the original post wasn't clear: the system powers off without warning, and without logging anything special. The system is not overheating, as I mentioned in the original post. Here is a dmesg from the installed Ubuntu x86:

[ 0.000000] Linux version 2.6.22-14-generic (buildd@palmer) (gcc version 4.1.3 20070929 (prerelease) (Ubuntu 4.1.2-16ubuntu2)) #1 SMP Sun Oct 14 23:05:12 GMT 2007 (Ubuntu 2.6.22-14.46-generic)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 000000000009f400 (usable)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000000009f400 - 00000000000a0000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 000000003bee0000 (usable)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000003bee0000 - 000000003bee3000 (ACPI NVS)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000003bee3000 - 000000003bef0000 (ACPI data)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000003bef0000 - 000000003bf00000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000003c000000 - 0000000040000000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000f0000000 - 00000000f4000000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000fec00000 - 0000000100000000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] 62MB HIGHMEM available.
[ 0.000000] 896MB LOWMEM available.
[ 0.000000] found SMP MP-table at 000f3a30
[ 0.000000] Entering add_active_range(0, 0, 245472) 0 entries of 256 used
[ 0.000000] Zone PFN ranges:
[ 0.000000] DMA 0 -> 4096
[ 0.000000] Normal 4096 -> 229376
[ 0.000000] HighMem 229376 -> 245472
[ 0.000000] early_node_map[1] active PFN ranges
[ 0.000000] 0: 0 -> 245472
[ 0.000000] On node 0 totalpages: 245472
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 32 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 0 pages reserved
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 4064 pages, LIFO batch:0
[ 0.000000] Normal zone: 1760 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] Normal zone: 223520 pages, LIFO batch:31
[ 0.000000] HighMem zone: 125 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] HighMem zone: 15971 pages, LIFO batch:3
[ 0.000000] DMI 2.2 present.
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDP signature @ 0xC00F7A40 checksum 0
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDP 000F7A40, 0014 (r0 Nvidia)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDT 3BEE3040, 0038 (r1 Nvidia NVDAACPI 42302E31 NVDA 0)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: FACP 3BEE30C0, 0074 (r1 Nvidia NVDAACPI 42302E31 NVDA 0)
[ 0.000000] ACPI Warning (tbfadt-0442): Optional field "Pm2ControlBlock" has zero address or length: 0000000000000000/1 [20070126]
[ 0.000000] ACPI: DSDT 3BEE3180, 6395 (r1 NVIDIA NVDAACPI 1000 MSFT 100000E)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: FACS 3BEE0000, 0040
[ 0.000000] ACPI: SSDT 3BEE9640, 02CC (r1 PTLTD POWERNOW 1 LTP 1)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: _HPT 3BEE9980, 0038 (r1 Nvidia NVDAACPI 42302E31 NVDA 98)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: MCFG 3BEE9A00, 003C (r1 Nvidia NVDAACPI 42302E31 NVDA 0)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: APIC 3BEE9580, 007C (r1 Nvidia NVDAACPI 42302E31 NVDA 0)
[ 0.000000] Nvidia board detected. Ignoring ACPI timer override.
[ 0.000000] If you got timer trouble try acpi_use_timer_override
[ 0.000000] ACPI: PM-Timer IO Port: 0x1008
[ 0.000000] ACPI: Local APIC address 0xfee00000
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x00] lapic_id[0x00] enabled)
[ 0.000000] Processor #0 15:3 APIC version 16
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x01] lapic_id[0x01] enabled)
[ 0.000000] Processor #1 15:3 APIC version 16
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC_NMI (acpi_id[0x00] high edge lint[0x1])
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC_NMI (acpi_id[0x01] high edge lint[0x1])
[ 0.000000] Using ACPI for processor (LAPIC) configuration information
[ 0.000000] Intel MultiProcessor Specification v1.4
[ 0.000000] Virtual Wire compatibility mode.
[ 0.000000] OEM ID: OEM00000 Product ID: PROD00000000 APIC at: 0xFEE00000
[ 0.000000] I/O APIC #2 Version 17 at 0xFEC00000.
[ 0.000000] Enabling APIC mode: Flat. Using 1 I/O APICs
[ 0.000000] Processors: 2
[ 0.000000] Allocating PCI resources starting at 50000000 (gap: 40000000:b0000000)
[ 0.000000] Built 1 zonelists. Total pages: 243555
[ 0.000000] Kernel command line: BOOT_IMAGE=Linux ro root=/dev/hdb6 nosmp pci=noacpi
[ 0.000000] mapped APIC to ffffd000 (fee00000)
[ 0.000000] mapped IOAPIC to ffffc000 (fec00000)
[ 0.000000] Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
[ 0.000000] Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.
[ 0.000000] Initializing CPU#0
[ 0.000000] PID hash table entries: 4096 (order: 12, 16384 bytes)
[ 0.000000] Detected 2948.363 MHz processor.
[ 0.000000] spurious 8259A interrupt: IRQ7.
[ 0.000000] Console: colour VGA+ 80x25
[ 0.000000] Dentry cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
[ 0.000000] Inode-cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)
[ 0.000000] Memory: 962000k/981888k available (2015k kernel code, 19428k reserved, 916k data, 364k init, 64384k highmem)
[ 0.000000] virtual kernel memory layout:
[ 0.000000] fixmap : 0xfff4d000 - 0xfffff000 ( 712 kB)
[ 0.000000] pkmap : 0xff800000 - 0xffc00000 (4096 kB)
[ 0.000000] vmalloc : 0xf8800000 - 0xff7fe000 ( 111 MB)
[ 0.000000] lowmem : 0xc0000000 - 0xf8000000 ( 896 MB)
[ 0.000000] .init : 0xc03e3000 - 0xc043e000 ( 364 kB)
[ 0.000000] .data : 0xc02f7d26 - 0xc03dce84 ( 916 kB)
[ 0.000000] .text : 0xc0100000 - 0xc02f7d26 (2015 kB)
[ 0.000000] Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok.
[ 0.000000] SLUB: Genslabs=22, HWalign=64, Order=0-1, MinObjects=4, CPUs=2, Nodes=1
[ 0.084000] Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 5902.59 BogoMIPS (lpj=11805198)
[ 0.084000] Security Framework v1.0.0 initialized
[ 0.084000] SELinux: Disabled at boot.
[ 0.084000] Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
[ 0.084000] CPU: After generic identify, caps: 178bfbff ebd3fbff 00000000 00000000 00002001 00000000 0000001f
[ 0.084000] CPU: L1 I Cache: 64K (64 bytes/line), D cache 64K (64 bytes/line)
[ 0.084000] CPU: L2 Cache: 1024K (64 bytes/line)
[ 0.084000] CPU 0(2) -> Core 0
[ 0.084000] CPU: After all inits, caps: 178bfbff ebd3fbff 00000000 00000410 00002001 00000000 0000001f
[ 0.084000] Compat vDSO mapped to ffffe000.
[ 0.084000] Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
[ 0.100000] SMP alternatives: switching to UP code
[ 0.100000] Early unpacking initramfs... done
[ 0.296000] ACPI: Core revision 20070126
[ 0.296000] ACPI: Looking for DSDT in initramfs... error, file /DSDT.aml not found.
[ 0.296000] ACPI: setting ELCR to 0e20 (from 0c20)
[ 0.296000] CPU0: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5600+ stepping 03
[ 0.296000] SMP mode deactivated, forcing use of dummy APIC emulation.
[ 0.296000] Brought up 1 CPUs
[ 0.296000] Booting paravirtualized kernel on bare hardware
[ 0.296000] Time: 13:23:51 Date: 10/20/107
[ 0.296000] NET: Registered protocol family 16
[ 0.296000] EISA bus registered
[ 0.296000] ACPI: bus type pci registered
[ 0.304000] PCI: PCI BIOS revision 3.00 entry at 0xfa7b0, last bus=4
[ 0.304000] PCI: Using configuration type 1
[ 0.304000] Setting up standard PCI resources
[ 0.308000] ACPI: EC: Look up EC in DSDT
[ 0.312000] ACPI: Interpreter enabled
[ 0.312000] ACPI: (supports S0 S1 S3 S4 S5)
[ 0.312000] ACPI: Using PIC for interrupt routing
[ 0.316000] Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay
[ 0.316000] pnp: PnP ACPI init
[ 0.316000] ACPI: bus type pnp registered
[ 0.320000] pnp: PnP ACPI: found 13 devices
[ 0.320000] ACPI: ACPI bus type pnp unregistered
[ 0.320000] PnPBIOS: Disabled by ACPI PNP
[ 0.320000] PCI: Probing PCI hardware
[ 0.320000] PCI: Probing PCI hardware (bus 00)
[ 0.320000] PCI: Transparent bridge - 0000:00:04.0
[ 0.364000] NET: Registered protocol family 8
[ 0.364000] NET: Registered protocol family 20
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x1000-0x107f has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x1080-0x10ff has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x1400-0x147f has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x1480-0x14ff has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x1800-0x187f has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x1880-0x18ff has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x2000-0x207f has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: ioport range 0x2080-0x20ff has been reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: iomem range 0xfec80000-0xfecbffff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: iomem range 0xfefe0000-0xfefe01ff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: iomem range 0xfefe1000-0xfefe10ff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:01: iomem range 0x3c000000-0x3fffffff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:0b: iomem range 0xf0000000-0xf3ffffff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:0c: iomem range 0xf0000-0xfffff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:0c: iomem range 0xfeff0000-0xfeff00ff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:0c: iomem range 0x3bee0000-0x3befffff could not be reserved
[ 0.364000] pnp: 00:0c: iomem range 0xffff0000-0xffffffff could not be reserved
[ 0.396000] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:04.0
[ 0.396000] IO window: c000-cfff
[ 0.396000] MEM window: fdf00000-fdffffff
[ 0.396000] PREFETCH window: fd800000-fd8fffff
[ 0.396000] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:09.0
[ 0.396000] IO window: b000-bfff
[ 0.396000] MEM window: fde00000-fdefffff
[ 0.396000] PREFETCH window: fdd00000-fddfffff
[ 0.396000] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:0b.0
[ 0.396000] IO window: a000-afff
[ 0.396000] MEM window: fdc00000-fdcfffff
[ 0.396000] PREFETCH window: fdb00000-fdbfffff
[ 0.396000] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:0c.0
[ 0.396000] IO window: 9000-9fff
[ 0.396000] MEM window: fda00000-fdafffff
[ 0.396000] PREFETCH window: fd900000-fd9fffff
[ 0.396000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:04.0 to 64
[ 0.396000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:09.0 to 64
[ 0.396000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0b.0 to 64
[ 0.396000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0c.0 to 64
[ 0.396000] NET: Registered protocol family 2
[ 0.400000] Time: acpi_pm clocksource has been installed.
[ 0.400000] Switched to high resolution mode on CPU 0
[ 0.436000] IP route cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
[ 0.436000] TCP established hash table entries: 131072 (order: 8, 1572864 bytes)
[ 0.436000] TCP bind hash table entries: 65536 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
[ 0.436000] TCP: Hash tables configured (established 131072 bind 65536)
[ 0.436000] TCP reno registered
[ 0.448000] checking if image is initramfs... it is
[ 0.832000] Freeing initrd memory: 7032k freed
[ 0.832000] audit: initializing netlink socket (disabled)
[ 0.832000] audit(1195565031.400:1): initialized
[ 0.832000] highmem bounce pool size: 64 pages
[ 0.832000] VFS: Disk quotas dquot_6.5.1
[ 0.832000] Dquot-cache hash table entries: 1024 (order 0, 4096 bytes)
[ 0.832000] io scheduler noop registered
[ 0.832000] io scheduler anticipatory registered
[ 0.836000] io scheduler deadline registered
[ 0.836000] io scheduler cfq registered (default)
[ 0.852000] Boot video device is 0000:00:0d.0
[ 0.852000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:09.0 to 64
[ 0.852000] assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability
[ 0.852000] Allocate Port Service[0000:00:09.0cie00]
[ 0.852000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0b.0 to 64
[ 0.852000] assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability
[ 0.852000] Allocate Port Service[0000:00:0b.0cie00]
[ 0.852000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0c.0 to 64
[ 0.852000] assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability
[ 0.852000] Allocate Port Service[0000:00:0c.0cie00]
[ 0.852000] isapnp: Scanning for PnP cards...
[ 1.204000] isapnp: No Plug & Play device found
[ 1.216000] Real Time Clock Driver v1.12ac
[ 1.216000] Serial: 8250/16550 driver $Revision: 1.90 $ 4 ports, IRQ sharing enabled
[ 1.216000] serial8250: ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 1.216000] 00:07: ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 1.216000] RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 65536K size 1024 blocksize
[ 1.216000] input: Macintosh mouse button emulation as /class/input/input0
[ 1.220000] PNP: PS/2 Controller [PNP0303:PS2K,PNP0f13:PS2M] at 0x60,0x64 irq 1,12
[ 1.220000] serio: i8042 KBD port at 0x60,0x64 irq 1
[ 1.220000] serio: i8042 AUX port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12
[ 1.220000] mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice
[ 1.220000] EISA: Probing bus 0 at eisa.0
[ 1.220000] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 1
[ 1.220000] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 2
[ 1.220000] EISA: Detected 0 cards.
[ 1.220000] TCP cubic registered
[ 1.220000] NET: Registered protocol family 1
[ 1.220000] Using IPI No-Shortcut mode
[ 1.220000] Magic number: 15:733:382
[ 1.220000] Freeing unused kernel memory: 364k freed
[ 1.280000] input: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard as /class/input/input1
[ 1.344000] AppArmor: AppArmor initialized<5>audit(1195565031.900:2): type=1505 info="AppArmor initialized" pid=1218
[ 1.348000] fuse init (API version 7.8)
[ 1.352000] Failure registering capabilities with primary security module.
[ 1.360000] ACPI: Fan [FAN] (on)
[ 1.364000] ACPI Exception (processor_core-0783): AE_NOT_FOUND, Processor Device is not present [20070126]
[ 1.364000] ACPI: Thermal Zone [THRM] (40 C)
[ 1.736000] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
[ 1.736000] usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
[ 1.736000] usbcore: registered new device driver usb
[ 1.736000] ohci_hcd: 2006 August 04 USB 1.1 'Open' Host Controller (OHCI) Driver
[ 1.736000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:02.0 to 64
[ 1.736000] ohci_hcd 0000:00:02.0: OHCI Host Controller
[ 1.736000] ohci_hcd 0000:00:02.0: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
[ 1.736000] ohci_hcd 0000:00:02.0: irq 11, io mem 0xfe02f000
[ 1.764000] Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00alpha2
[ 1.764000] ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
[ 1.772000] forcedeth.c: Reverse Engineered nForce ethernet driver. Version 0.60.
[ 1.780000] SCSI subsystem initialized
[ 1.784000] libata version 2.21 loaded.
[ 1.792000] usb usb1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 1.792000] hub 1-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 1.792000] hub 1-0:1.0: 8 ports detected
[ 1.896000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:02.1 to 64
[ 1.896000] ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: EHCI Host Controller
[ 1.896000] ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 2
[ 1.896000] ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: debug port 1
[ 1.896000] PCI: cache line size of 64 is not supported by device 0000:00:02.1
[ 1.896000] ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: irq 5, io mem 0xfe02e000
[ 1.896000] ehci_hcd 0000:00:02.1: USB 2.0 started, EHCI 1.00, driver 10 Dec 2004
[ 1.896000] usb usb2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 1.896000] hub 2-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 1.896000] hub 2-0:1.0: 8 ports detected
[ 2.000000] NFORCE-MCP61: IDE controller at PCI slot 0000:00:06.0
[ 2.000000] NFORCE-MCP61: chipset revision 162
[ 2.000000] NFORCE-MCP61: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
[ 2.000000] NFORCE-MCP61: 0000:00:06.0 (rev a2) UDMA133 controller
[ 2.000000] ide0: BM-DMA at 0xf000-0xf007, BIOS settings: hdaMA, hdbMA
[ 2.000000] Probing IDE interface ide0...
[ 2.512000] hdb: WDC WD3200AAJB-00TYA0, ATA DISK drive
[ 2.568000] ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
[ 2.568000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:07.0 to 64
[ 2.568000] forcedeth: using HIGHDMA
[ 3.088000] eth0: forcedeth.c: subsystem: 01019:2602 bound to 0000:00:07.0
[ 3.088000] sata_nv 0000:00:08.0: version 3.4
[ 3.088000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:08.0 to 64
[ 3.088000] scsi0 : sata_nv
[ 3.088000] scsi1 : sata_nv
[ 3.088000] ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x000109f0 ctl 0x00010bf2 bmdma 0x0001d800 irq 11
[ 3.088000] ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x00010970 ctl 0x00010b72 bmdma 0x0001d808 irq 11
[ 3.092000] hdb: max request size: 512KiB
[ 3.100000] hdb: 625142448 sectors (320072 MB) w/8192KiB Cache, CHS=38913/255/63, UDMA(100)
[ 3.100000] hdb: cache flushes supported
[ 3.100000] hdb: hdb1 hdb2 < hdb5 hdb6 hdb7 hdb8 >
[ 3.400000] ata1: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)
[ 3.480000] Attempting manual resume
[ 3.480000] swsusp: Resume From Partition 3:69
[ 3.480000] PM: Checking swsusp image.
[ 3.480000] PM: Resume from disk failed.
[ 3.488000] SGI XFS with ACLs, security attributes, realtime, large block numbers, no debug enabled
[ 3.492000] SGI XFS Quota Management subsystem
[ 3.520000] XFS mounting filesystem hdb6
[ 3.592000] Ending clean XFS mount for filesystem: hdb6
[ 3.876000] ata2: SATA link up 1.5 Gbps (SStatus 113 SControl 300)
[ 4.040000] ata2.00: ATAPI: TSSTcorpCD/DVDW SH-S183L, SB02, max UDMA/33
[ 4.040000] ata2.00: applying bridge limits
[ 4.212000] ata2.00: configured for UDMA/33
[ 4.212000] scsi 1:0:0:0: CD-ROM TSSTcorp CD/DVDW SH-S183L SB02 PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[ 11.512000] ath_hal: module license 'Proprietary' taints kernel.
[ 11.512000] ath_hal: 0.9.18.0 (AR5210, AR5211, AR5212, RF5111, RF5112, RF2413, RF5413)
[ 11.648000] i2c-adapter i2c-0: nForce2 SMBus adapter at 0x1c00
[ 11.648000] i2c-adapter i2c-1: nForce2 SMBus adapter at 0xf400
[ 11.692000] pci_hotplug: PCI Hot Plug PCI Core version: 0.5
[ 11.692000] shpchp: Standard Hot Plug PCI Controller Driver version: 0.4
[ 11.716000] Linux agpgart interface v0.102 (c) Dave Jones
[ 11.892000] wlan: 0.8.4.2 (0.9.3.2)
[ 12.072000] ath_pci: 0.9.4.5 (0.9.3.2)
[ 12.696000] input: PC Speaker as /class/input/input2
[ 13.028000] ath_rate_sample: 1.2 (0.9.3.2)
[ 13.032000] wifi0: 11b rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps
[ 13.032000] wifi0: 11g rates: 1Mbps 2Mbps 5.5Mbps 11Mbps 6Mbps 9Mbps 12Mbps 18Mbps 24Mbps 36Mbps 48Mbps 54Mbps
[ 13.032000] wifi0: H/W encryption support: WEP AES AES_CCM TKIP
[ 13.032000] wifi0: mac 7.8 phy 4.5 radio 5.6
[ 13.032000] wifi0: Use hw queue 1 for WME_AC_BE traffic
[ 13.032000] wifi0: Use hw queue 0 for WME_AC_BK traffic
[ 13.032000] wifi0: Use hw queue 2 for WME_AC_VI traffic
[ 13.032000] wifi0: Use hw queue 3 for WME_AC_VO traffic
[ 13.032000] wifi0: Use hw queue 8 for CAB traffic
[ 13.032000] wifi0: Use hw queue 9 for beacons
[ 13.080000] sr0: scsi3-mmc drive: 24x/24x writer dvd-ram cd/rw xa/form2 cdda tray
[ 13.080000] Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20
[ 13.080000] sr 1:0:0:0: Attached scsi CD-ROM sr0
[ 13.104000] wifi0: Atheros 5212: mem=0xfdff0000, irq=10
[ 13.104000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:0d.0 to 64
[ 13.104000] NVRM: loading NVIDIA UNIX x86 Kernel Module 100.14.19 Wed Sep 12 14:12:24 PDT 2007
[ 13.112000] sr 1:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg0 type 5
[ 13.276000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:05.0 to 64
[ 13.320000] input: ImPS/2 Generic Wheel Mouse as /class/input/input3
[ 13.324000] parport_pc 00:08: reported by Plug and Play ACPI
[ 13.324000] parport0: PC-style at 0x378 (0x778), irq 7, dma 3 [PCSPP,TRISTATE,COMPAT,ECP,DMA]
[ 14.444000] loop: module loaded
[ 14.472000] lp0: using parport0 (interrupt-driven).
[ 14.588000] Adding 1461904k swap on /dev/hdb5. Priority:-1 extents:1 across:1461904k
[ 27.632000] ReiserFS: hdb7: found reiserfs format "3.6" with standard journal
[ 27.632000] ReiserFS: hdb7: using ordered data mode
[ 27.640000] ReiserFS: hdb7: journal params: device hdb7, size 8192, journal first block 18, max trans len 1024, max batch 900, max commit age 30, max trans age 30
[ 27.640000] ReiserFS: hdb7: checking transaction log (hdb7)
[ 27.648000] ReiserFS: hdb7: Using r5 hash to sort names
[ 29.156000] No dock devices found.
[ 29.216000] input: Power Button (FF) as /class/input/input4
[ 29.216000] ACPI: Power Button (FF) [PWRF]
[ 29.240000] input: Power Button (CM) as /class/input/input5
[ 29.244000] ACPI: Power Button (CM) [PWRB]
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: Found 1 AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5600+ processors (version 2.00.00)
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 0 : fid 0x14 (2800 MHz), vid 0x8
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 1 : fid 0x12 (2600 MHz), vid 0xa
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 2 : fid 0x10 (2400 MHz), vid 0xc
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 3 : fid 0xe (2200 MHz), vid 0xe
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 4 : fid 0xc (2000 MHz), vid 0x10
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 5 : fid 0xa (1800 MHz), vid 0x10
[ 29.492000] powernow-k8: 6 : fid 0x2 (1000 MHz), vid 0x12
[ 30.380000] eth0: no link during initialization.
[ 45.468000] Failure registering capabilities with primary security module.
[ 45.896000] Clocksource tsc unstable (delta = -128505229 ns)
[ 56.568000] cdrom: sr0: mrw address space DMA selected
[ 56.724000] cdrom: sr0: mrw address space DMA selected
[ 56.888000] UDF-fs: No VRS found
[ 56.952000] ISO 9660 Extensions: Microsoft Joliet Level 3
[ 57.004000] ISO 9660 Extensions: RRIP_1991A
[ 73.092000] NET: Registered protocol family 17
[ 81.372000] NET: Registered protocol family 10
[ 81.372000] lo: Disabled Privacy Extensions
[ 81.372000] ADDRCONF(NETDEV_UP): eth0: link is not ready
[ 92.124000] ath0: no IPv6 routers present

Are you using the Ubuntu 7.10 32-bit version as your installed distro?
Have you tried the amd64 version?