how to find out what causes a kernel panic?
 

Hi

I am having the strangest of problems. I am using a customized real time kernel 2.6.26 (the only changes are the real time add on, the rest is vanilla, config taken from the Debian Lenny standard install).
Now I remember having had kernel panics (like 3 a day) some months ago. I now worked for like 2 months without a single crash.
Now, they are back and it is really annoying, since I have NO IDEA what could be causing he problem.
The only difference now is that I am on a wired ethernet interface and while I was panic free, I used a wireless all the time.

How can I find out what is causing the panic? When the panic strikes, there is nothing I can do or see. the Caps lock is flashing obviously. Is there a way to do a dump of the error when the crash occurs?

Markus

well, kernel debugging is ugly work.

you can try adding debug information to your kernel (in kernel hacking in kernel config ).

In the meanwhile, it has become much worse, I get a kernel panic now about every 10 minutes. Normal working is impossible. What a headache!
I don't get it. Nothing changed, eveything is the same and now for some reason, the kernel has become totally insane.

I wish Linux would at least be able to show a blue screen, instead of just dieing. Like this, I got NOTHING to go on. I am right now waiting for the next crash, I hope I can still send this. DARN!!!

(having had 5 panics already today)

Hardware problem. Start pulling hardware and/or trying different kernels (LiveCDs?)

start from network card

I am pretty sure it was the filesystem, after I did a fsck, it was all good. I just wish you could see a kernel panic the way you can in Windows, instead of the whole machine freezing and nothing to go on, no information about WHAT crashed on the screen.