Arch Linux

crom

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2008-05-11

Posts: 43

Dell D600 boycotting Linux

Hi,

it started the day before yesterday when i woke my Dell D600 from sleep. After some minutes, system performance became bad and there was a very quiet , strange sound if I remember right.
I rebooted and udev took 40 seconds instead of 8. The whole system was unuseable slow. After some forum search, i reinstalled udev, but that didn't make it better. dd if=/dev/zero of=~/foo was performing at 7 MB/s.  So I exchanged the hard drive because of that sound.

The other drive still contained the OEM XP-installation that booted and performed just fine. I installed Ubuntu hardy(2.6.24) and intrepid(2.6.27), both installers were really slow and the installed systems were just as slow as my arch install and the system just powered off at average load, the last time during a kernel update -.-.

I decided not to trust subjective feelings about speed and stability, so I ran Prime95 and BST parallel on XP. Both programs produced no error within 8 hours and the hdd was reading and writing at 33 MB/s. No crash, no poor performance.
I flashed the bios and removed the backup-battery to reset all chipsets from some maybe weird state. But no change.

Summary: Windows XP just runs fine, any Linux-kernel I tried has issues with my hardware for whatever reason.
I'm writing my diploma thesis and haven't got the time for endless investigations, so I'm using my PIII with fluxbox and kile, which is ok for writing so far, but not as portable as the Dell.

If I had more time, i would try OpenSolaris to use a completely different kernel.

I'm looking forward to any hint, this is beyond my comprehension.

P.s. Please excuse any poor english, I'm not a native speaker.

Daenyth

Forum Fellow

From: Boston, MA

Registered: 2008-02-24

Posts: 1,244

Re: Dell D600 boycotting Linux

First, your english is fine.
Second, have you run any tools like fsck on the drive?

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crom

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2008-05-11

Posts: 43

Re: Dell D600 boycotting Linux

Thanks, I ran e2fsck with fDpv but no errors were found. Right after installing, the FS should be in great condtion anyway, but the symptoms point to a storage problem IMO.

Isn't there a distro that runs in RAM completeley from CD, I have 1GB installed.

Edit: I used Damn Small for this purpose, it booted with no problems. I could mount the partition containing intrepid and dd into a file. But I didn't specify bs and couldn't kill it, only with the power button. After the next boot into DSL, the file had 400 MB, but removing it took 2 minutes at 100% cpu load. Further tests with a specified size were running without problems, removing was quick, too.
As DSL uses kernel 2.4.31, I'm about to blame the 2.6.x kernel.

Next stop will be puppy, it's comparable to DSL, but with a recent kernel.

Last edited by crom (2008-12-07 13:21:43)

test1000

Member

Registered: 2005-04-03

Posts: 834

Re: Dell D600 boycotting Linux

my hd has been making some weird schreeching noises lately, like for example when i opened an mplayer file from nautilus(but not when i opened it from temrinal, yeah i know: weird) don't know if it's related.. maybe hdparm has sat some weird setting or the kernel or.. something equally peculiar

Last edited by test1000 (2008-12-07 16:06:20)

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crom

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2008-05-11

Posts: 43

Re: Dell D600 boycotting Linux

Maybe I should look for a manufacturer tool to reset the HD-Firmware.
Or are there safe hdparm options for that?

Opensolaris also failed to install, btw.

Edit: The problem persists, even after a "low-level" format of the drive with the vendor utility and automated partitioning. I think, I'll sell that piece of crap to some windows fanboy, he won't notice any problems.:rolleyes:

Last edited by crom (2008-12-07 21:43:10)

dav7

Member

From: Australia

Registered: 2008-02-08

Posts: 674

Re: Dell D600 boycotting Linux

One, you might try smartctl.

Two, I know such a fanboy... what would be your asking price?

-dav7

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Windows was made for looking at success from a distance through a wall of oversimplicity. Linux removes the wall, so you can just walk up to success and make it your own.
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beissemj

Member

Registered: 2007-05-11

Posts: 43

Re: Dell D600 boycotting Linux

What is the speed of your hard drive?  I had this same problem with my dell d600.Once I upgrade to a 5400rpm and the problem dissapeared.

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Professor: This isn't right...It isn't even wrong...