# hard drive constantly busy!?

## zambizzi

I'm running a dual-boot box w/ a single hard drive, partitioned in half, w/ Gentoo on one side and Windows XP on the other.

When I boot into Gentoo & KDE I've noticed that my hard drive light on the front of the box is always flickering and running at a steady pace...it never calms down...as if there is constant activity.  This never stops...even if I run Gentoo for several hours straight.

When I boot into XP, after everything finishes booting up...the light goes out until I run something.

I've got a fairly new ('bout 4 mo. old) Dell Dimension 8400, general specs are:

3GHz P4 (w/ HT)

120GB SATA HD

1GHz DDR2 SDRAM

256MB nVidia 6800 GT vid. card

SB Audigy 24-bit sound card

My Gentoo looks like this:

kernel 2.6.12-gentoo-r6 (smp enabled, sata drivers are correct as it all works)

nVidia 1066.x drivers (latest un-masked)

X.org (latest available un-masked)

KDE 3.4.1

Some points:

1. No boot errors or problems

2. Did not install slocate, so that's not it.

3. The system performace is fine...great in fact...no complaints there at all!  I've been multi-tasking the hell out of it w/o zero noticeable degredation in performance...putting XP to *shame* on this system.

4. KDE sysguard shows normal processor & memory activity (about 30% RAM in use - non-cache, cpu spiking between 0%-3%)

5. hdparm -tT test yields predictable results (hopefully?) but w/ some weird messages:

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> /dev/sda:
> 
>  Timing cached reads:   4368 MB in  2.00 seconds = 2184.33 MB/sec
> ...

 

...I get the same warnings when trying to activate settings w/ hdparm...not sure why, could this have something to do w/ it?

That's all I can think of, anyone have any ideas?

I appreciate all the help, thanks guys!

EDIT:

Here's my "ps ux" output:

```

USER       PID %CPU %MEM    VSZ   RSS TTY      STAT START   TIME COMMAND

root         1  0.0  0.0   1544   512 ?        S    22:53   0:00 init [3]

root         2  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [migration/0]

root         3  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        SN   22:53   0:00 [ksoftirqd/0]

root         4  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [migration/1]

root         5  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        SN   22:53   0:00 [ksoftirqd/1]

root         6  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [events/0]

root         7  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [events/1]

root         8  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [khelper]

root         9  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [kthread]

root        12  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [kacpid]

root        85  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [kblockd/0]

root        86  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [kblockd/1]

root        89  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [khubd]

root       141  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [pdflush]

root       142  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [pdflush]

root       143  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [kswapd0]

root       144  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [aio/0]

root       145  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [aio/1]

root       227  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [kseriod]

root       329  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [ata/0]

root       330  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S<   22:53   0:00 [ata/1]

root       332  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [scsi_eh_0]

root       333  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [scsi_eh_1]

root       334  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [scsi_eh_2]

root       335  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [scsi_eh_3]

root       372  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [kirqd]

root       373  0.0  0.0      0     0 ?        S    22:53   0:00 [kjournald]

root       424  0.0  0.0   1544   492 ?        S<s  22:53   0:00 udevd

root      5846  0.0  0.0   1612   628 ?        Ss   22:53   0:00 metalog [MASTER]

root      5847  0.0  0.0   1600   524 ?        S    22:53   0:00 metalog [KERNEL]

root      5991  0.0  0.2   3976  2480 ?        Ss   22:53   0:00 /usr/sbin/hald

root      6027  0.0  0.2   4344  2040 ?        Ss   22:53   0:00 /usr/bin/ivman

root      6669  0.0  0.0   1556   452 ?        Ss   22:53   0:00 /sbin/dhcpcd -h homer -R -N -Y eth0

root      6976  0.0  0.0   1820   736 ?        Ss   22:53   0:00 /usr/sbin/cron

root      7038  0.0  0.0   1588   620 tty1     Ss+  22:53   0:00 /sbin/agetty 38400 tty1 linux

root      7039  0.0  0.0   1588   620 tty2     Ss+  22:53   0:00 /sbin/agetty 38400 tty2 linux

root      7040  0.0  0.0   1584   616 tty3     Ss+  22:53   0:00 /sbin/agetty 38400 tty3 linux

root      7042  0.0  0.0   1584   620 tty4     Ss+  22:53   0:00 /sbin/agetty 38400 tty4 linux

root      7043  0.0  0.0   1588   624 tty5     Ss+  22:53   0:00 /sbin/agetty 38400 tty5 linux

root      7045  0.0  0.0   1588   620 tty6     Ss+  22:53   0:00 /sbin/agetty 38400 tty6 linux

root      7315  0.0  0.0   2592   748 ?        Ss   22:53   0:00 /usr/kde/3.4/bin/kdm

root      7318  1.1  2.3  25632 21608 ?        SL   22:53   0:11 /usr/bin/X -nolisten tcp :0 vt7 -auth /va

root      7319  0.0  0.1   3360  1424 ?        S    22:53   0:00 -:0

root      7656  0.0  0.1   2272  1000 pts/1    S    23:04   0:00 su

root      7659  0.0  0.1   2404  1344 pts/1    S    23:04   0:00 bash

root      7685  0.0  0.0   2552   868 pts/1    R+   23:10   0:00 ps ux

```

Do I have a virus?  :Cool: 

----------

## s0be

It could be metalog.  What's your dmesg ouput look like?  Maybe metalog is getting flooded so it has to write frequently?  What about lsmod output?  Those error/warning messages are due to using hdparm(libata utility) on a sata drive(not really 100% libata at this point)

----------

## zambizzi

 *s0be wrote:*   

> It could be metalog.  What's your dmesg ouput look like?  Maybe metalog is getting flooded so it has to write frequently?

 

I shut metalog off and the light didn't turn off.  Here's the output from dmesg:

```

Linux version 2.6.12-gentoo-r6 (root@homer) (gcc version 3.3.5-20050130 (Gentoo 3.3.5.20050130-r1, ssp-3.3.5.20050130-1, pie-8.7.7.1)) #5 SMP Sat Jul 30 21:45:19 MDT 2005

BIOS-provided physical RAM map:

 BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 00000000000a0000 (usable)

 BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)

 BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 000000003fe8cc00 (usable)

 BIOS-e820: 000000003fe8cc00 - 000000003fe8ec00 (ACPI NVS)

 BIOS-e820: 000000003fe8ec00 - 000000003fe90c00 (ACPI data)

 BIOS-e820: 000000003fe90c00 - 0000000040000000 (reserved)

 BIOS-e820: 00000000e0000000 - 00000000f0000000 (reserved)

 BIOS-e820: 00000000fec00000 - 00000000fed00400 (reserved)

 BIOS-e820: 00000000fed20000 - 00000000feda0000 (reserved)

 BIOS-e820: 00000000fee00000 - 00000000fef00000 (reserved)

 BIOS-e820: 00000000ffb00000 - 0000000100000000 (reserved)

Warning only 896MB will be used.

Use a HIGHMEM enabled kernel.

896MB LOWMEM available.

found SMP MP-table at 000fe710

On node 0 totalpages: 229376

  DMA zone: 4096 pages, LIFO batch:1

  Normal zone: 225280 pages, LIFO batch:31

  HighMem zone: 0 pages, LIFO batch:1

DMI 2.3 present.

ACPI: RSDP (v000 DELL                                  ) @ 0x000febf0

ACPI: RSDT (v001 DELL    8400    0x00000007 ASL  0x00000061) @ 0x000fccbc

ACPI: FADT (v001 DELL    8400    0x00000007 ASL  0x00000061) @ 0x000fccf8

ACPI: SSDT (v001   DELL    st_ex 0x00001000 MSFT 0x0100000d) @ 0xfffc948c

ACPI: MADT (v001 DELL    8400    0x00000007 ASL  0x00000061) @ 0x000fcd6c

ACPI: BOOT (v001 DELL    8400    0x00000007 ASL  0x00000061) @ 0x000fcdde

ACPI: MCFG (v001 DELL    8400    0x00000007 ASL  0x00000061) @ 0x000fce06

ACPI: HPET (v001 DELL    8400    0x00000007 ASL  0x00000061) @ 0x000fce44

ACPI: DSDT (v001   DELL    dt_ex 0x00001000 MSFT 0x0100000d) @ 0x00000000

ACPI: Local APIC address 0xfee00000

ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x01] lapic_id[0x00] enabled)

Processor #0 15:4 APIC version 20

ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x02] lapic_id[0x01] enabled)

Processor #1 15:4 APIC version 20

ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x03] lapic_id[0x01] disabled)

ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x04] lapic_id[0x07] disabled)

ACPI: LAPIC_NMI (acpi_id[0xff] high level lint[0x1])

ACPI: IOAPIC (id[0x08] address[0xfec00000] gsi_base[0])

IOAPIC[0]: apic_id 8, version 32, address 0xfec00000, GSI 0-23

ACPI: INT_SRC_OVR (bus 0 bus_irq 0 global_irq 2 dfl dfl)

ACPI: INT_SRC_OVR (bus 0 bus_irq 9 global_irq 9 high level)

ACPI: IRQ0 used by override.

ACPI: IRQ2 used by override.

ACPI: IRQ9 used by override.

Enabling APIC mode:  Flat.  Using 1 I/O APICs

Using ACPI (MADT) for SMP configuration information

Allocating PCI resources starting at 40000000 (gap: 40000000:a0000000)

Built 1 zonelists

Kernel command line: root=/dev/sda7

mapped APIC to ffffd000 (fee00000)

mapped IOAPIC to ffffc000 (fec00000)

Initializing CPU#0

PID hash table entries: 4096 (order: 12, 65536 bytes)

Detected 2994.076 MHz processor.

Using tsc for high-res timesource

Console: colour VGA+ 80x25

Dentry cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)

Inode-cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)

Memory: 904660k/917504k available (2734k kernel code, 12336k reserved, 1075k data, 220k init, 0k highmem)

Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok.

Calibrating delay loop... 5898.24 BogoMIPS (lpj=2949120)

Mount-cache hash table entries: 512

CPU: After generic identify, caps: bfebfbff 20000000 00000000 00000000 0000649d 00000000 00000000

CPU: After vendor identify, caps: bfebfbff 20000000 00000000 00000000 0000649d 00000000 00000000

monitor/mwait feature present.

using mwait in idle threads.

CPU: Trace cache: 12K uops, L1 D cache: 16K

CPU: L2 cache: 2048K

CPU: Physical Processor ID: 0

CPU: After all inits, caps: bfebfbff 20000000 00000000 00000080 0000649d 00000000 00000000

Intel machine check architecture supported.

Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#0.

CPU0: Intel P4/Xeon Extended MCE MSRs (24) available

CPU0: Thermal monitoring enabled

Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.

Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.

Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.

CPU0: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.00GHz stepping 03

Booting processor 1/1 eip 2000

Initializing CPU#1

Calibrating delay loop... 5980.16 BogoMIPS (lpj=2990080)

CPU: After generic identify, caps: bfebfbff 20000000 00000000 00000000 0000649d 00000000 00000000

CPU: After vendor identify, caps: bfebfbff 20000000 00000000 00000000 0000649d 00000000 00000000

monitor/mwait feature present.

CPU: Trace cache: 12K uops, L1 D cache: 16K

CPU: L2 cache: 2048K

CPU: Physical Processor ID: 0

CPU: After all inits, caps: bfebfbff 20000000 00000000 00000080 0000649d 00000000 00000000

Intel machine check architecture supported.

Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#1.

CPU1: Intel P4/Xeon Extended MCE MSRs (24) available

CPU1: Thermal monitoring enabled

CPU1: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.00GHz stepping 03

Total of 2 processors activated (11878.40 BogoMIPS).

ENABLING IO-APIC IRQs

..TIMER: vector=0x31 pin1=2 pin2=-1

checking TSC synchronization across 2 CPUs: passed.

Brought up 2 CPUs

CPU0 attaching sched-domain:

 domain 0: span 3

  groups: 1 2

  domain 1: span 3

   groups: 3

CPU1 attaching sched-domain:

 domain 0: span 3

  groups: 2 1

  domain 1: span 3

   groups: 3

NET: Registered protocol family 16

PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xfb768, last bus=4

PCI: Using MMCONFIG

mtrr: v2.0 (20020519)

ACPI: Subsystem revision 20050309

ACPI: Interpreter enabled

ACPI: Using IOAPIC for interrupt routing

ACPI: PCI Root Bridge [PCI0] (0000:00)

PCI: Probing PCI hardware (bus 00)

PCI: Ignoring BAR0-3 of IDE controller 0000:00:1f.1

Boot video device is 0000:01:00.0

PCI: Transparent bridge - 0000:00:1e.0

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0._PRT]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI1._PRT]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI2._PRT]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI3._PRT]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI4._PRT]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKA] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 *11 12 15)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKB] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 *10 11 12 15)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKC] (IRQs *3 4 5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKD] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15) *0, disabled.

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKE] (IRQs 3 4 *5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKF] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 *9 10 11 12 15)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKG] (IRQs 3 4 *5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKH] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 *10 11 12 15)

Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay

pnp: PnP ACPI init

pnp: PnP ACPI: found 11 devices

SCSI subsystem initialized

usbcore: registered new driver usbfs

usbcore: registered new driver hub

PCI: Using ACPI for IRQ routing

PCI: If a device doesn't work, try "pci=routeirq".  If it helps, post a report

pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x800-0x85f could not be reserved

pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0xc00-0xc7f has been reserved

pnp: 00:00: ioport range 0x860-0x8ff has been reserved

Simple Boot Flag value 0x87 read from CMOS RAM was invalid

Simple Boot Flag at 0x7a set to 0x1

Machine check exception polling timer started.

audit: initializing netlink socket (disabled)

audit(1123313892.886:0): initialized

inotify device minor=63

Installing knfsd (copyright (C) 1996 okir@monad.swb.de).

NTFS driver 2.1.22 [Flags: R/W].

Initializing Cryptographic API

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:01.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:01.0 to 64

assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability

Allocate Port Service[pcie00]

Allocate Port Service[pcie03]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1c.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1c.0 to 64

assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability

Allocate Port Service[pcie00]

Allocate Port Service[pcie02]

Allocate Port Service[pcie03]

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1c.1[B] -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 17

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1c.1 to 64

assign_interrupt_mode Found MSI capability

Allocate Port Service[pcie00]

Allocate Port Service[pcie02]

Allocate Port Service[pcie03]

Real Time Clock Driver v1.12

ACPI: Power Button (FF) [PWRF]

PNP: PS/2 controller doesn't have AUX irq; using default 0xc

PNP: PS/2 Controller [PNP0303:KBD] at 0x60,0x64 irq 112

serio: i8042 AUX port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12

serio: i8042 KBD port at 0x60,0x64 irq 1

Serial: 8250/16550 driver $Revision: 1.90 $ 8 ports, IRQ sharing disabled

ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A

ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:04:01.0[A] -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 17

ttyS5 at I/O 0xdc08 (irq = 17) is a 16450

ttyS6 at I/O 0xdc10 (irq = 17) is a 8250

ttyS7 at I/O 0xdc18 (irq = 17) is a 16450

ttyS1 at I/O 0xdc20 (irq = 17) is a 8250

ttyS2 at I/O 0xdc28 (irq = 17) is a 8250

parport: PnPBIOS parport detected.

parport0: PC-style at 0x378 (0x778), irq 7 [PCSPP(,...)]

mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice

io scheduler noop registered

io scheduler anticipatory registered

io scheduler deadline registered

io scheduler cfq registered

input: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard on isa0060/serio0

input: PS/2 Generic Mouse on isa0060/serio1

floppy0: no floppy controllers found

Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00alpha2

ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx

ICH6: IDE controller at PCI slot 0000:00:1f.1

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1f.1[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16

ICH6: chipset revision 3

ICH6: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later

    ide0: BM-DMA at 0xffa0-0xffa7, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:pio

Probing IDE interface ide0...

hda: SAMSUNG DVD-ROM SD-616E, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive

ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14

Probing IDE interface ide1...

Probing IDE interface ide2...

Probing IDE interface ide3...

Probing IDE interface ide4...

Probing IDE interface ide5...

hda: ATAPI 48X DVD-ROM drive, 512kB Cache, UDMA(33)

Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20

libata version 1.11 loaded.

ahci version 1.00

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1f.2[C] -> GSI 20 (level, low) -> IRQ 20

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1f.2 to 64

ahci(0000:00:1f.2) AHCI 0001.0000 32 slots 4 ports 1.5 Gbps 0xf impl SATA mode

ahci(0000:00:1f.2) flags: 64bit ncq pm led slum part

ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xF8804D00 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 20

ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xF8804D80 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 20

ata3: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xF8804E00 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 20

ata4: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xF8804E80 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 20

ata1: dev 0 cfg 49:2f00 82:346b 83:7f01 84:4003 85:3469 86:3c01 87:4003 88:207f

ata1: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 312500000 sectors: lba48

ata1: dev 0 configured for UDMA/133

scsi0 : ahci

ata2: no device found (phy stat 00000000)

scsi1 : ahci

ata3: no device found (phy stat 00000000)

scsi2 : ahci

ata4: no device found (phy stat 00000000)

scsi3 : ahci

  Vendor: ATA       Model: ST3160023AS       Rev: 8.12

  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 05

SCSI device sda: 312500000 512-byte hdwr sectors (160000 MB)

SCSI device sda: drive cache: write back

SCSI device sda: 312500000 512-byte hdwr sectors (160000 MB)

SCSI device sda: drive cache: write back

 sda: sda1 sda2 < sda5 sda6 sda7 >

Attached scsi disk sda at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 0

Attached scsi generic sg0 at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 0,  type 0

usbmon: debugs is not available

Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.9rc2  (Thu Mar 24 10:33:39 2005 UTC).

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:04:02.0[A] -> GSI 18 (level, low) -> IRQ 18

Model 1007 Rev 00000000 Serial 10071102

ALSA device list:

  #0: Live! 7.1 24bit [SB0413] at 0xd8e0 irq 18

oprofile: using NMI interrupt.

NET: Registered protocol family 2

IP: routing cache hash table of 4096 buckets, 64Kbytes

TCP established hash table entries: 131072 (order: 9, 2097152 bytes)

TCP bind hash table entries: 65536 (order: 7, 786432 bytes)

TCP: Hash tables configured (established 131072 bind 65536)

ip_conntrack version 2.1 (7168 buckets, 57344 max) - 220 bytes per conntrack

ip_tables: (C) 2000-2002 Netfilter core team

ipt_recent v0.3.1: Stephen Frost <sfrost@snowman.net>.  http://snowman.net/projects/ipt_recent/

arp_tables: (C) 2002 David S. Miller

NET: Registered protocol family 1

NET: Registered protocol family 17

Starting balanced_irq

kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds

EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.

VFS: Mounted root (ext3 filesystem) readonly.

Freeing unused kernel memory: 220k freed

Adding 530108k swap on /dev/sda6.  Priority:-1 extents:1

EXT3 FS on sda7, internal journal

tg3.c:v3.31 (June 8, 2005)

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:02:00.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:02:00.0 to 64

eth0: Tigon3 [partno(BCM95751) rev 4001 PHY(5750)] (PCIX:100MHz:32-bit) 10/100/1000BaseT Ethernet 00:11:11:e2:f3:01

eth0: RXcsums[1] LinkChgREG[1] MIirq[1] ASF[0] Split[0] WireSpeed[1] TSOcap[1]

eth0: dma_rwctrl[76180000]

ohci_hcd: 2004 Nov 08 USB 1.1 'Open' Host Controller (OHCI) Driver (PCI)

USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver v2.2

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.0[A] -> GSI 21 (level, low) -> IRQ 21

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.0 to 64

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #1

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: irq 21, io base 0x0000ff80

hub 1-0:1.0: USB hub found

hub 1-0:1.0: 2 ports detected

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.1[B] -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.1 to 64

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.1: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #2

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.1: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 2

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.1: irq 22, io base 0x0000ff60

hub 2-0:1.0: USB hub found

hub 2-0:1.0: 2 ports detected

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.2[C] -> GSI 18 (level, low) -> IRQ 18

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.2 to 64

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.2: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #3

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.2: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 3

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.2: irq 18, io base 0x0000ff40

hub 3-0:1.0: USB hub found

hub 3-0:1.0: 2 ports detected

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.3[D] -> GSI 23 (level, low) -> IRQ 23

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.3 to 64

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.3: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #4

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.3: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 4

uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.3: irq 23, io base 0x0000ff20

hub 4-0:1.0: USB hub found

hub 4-0:1.0: 2 ports detected

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.7[A] -> GSI 21 (level, low) -> IRQ 21

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.7 to 64

ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller

ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: debug port 1

ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 5

ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: irq 21, io mem 0xffa80800

PCI: cache line size of 128 is not supported by device 0000:00:1d.7

ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: USB 2.0 initialized, EHCI 1.00, driver 10 Dec 2004

hub 5-0:1.0: USB hub found

hub 5-0:1.0: 8 ports detected

Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...

usbcore: registered new driver usb-storage

USB Mass Storage support registered.

usbcore: registered new driver usbhid

drivers/usb/input/hid-core.c: v2.01:USB HID core driver

usbcore: registered new driver usblp

drivers/usb/class/usblp.c: v0.13: USB Printer Device Class driver

nvidia: module license 'NVIDIA' taints kernel.

ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:01:00.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 16

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:01:00.0 to 64

NVRM: loading NVIDIA Linux x86 NVIDIA Kernel Module  1.0-6629  Wed Nov  3 13:12:51 PST 2004

NTFS volume version 3.1.

usb 3-1: new low speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 3

input: USB HID v1.10 Mouse [Logitech Optical USB Mouse] on usb-0000:00:1d.2-1

tg3: eth0: Link is up at 100 Mbps, full duplex.

tg3: eth0: Flow control is on for TX and on for RX.

```

That's pretty handy...I had no idea it was there (there are gaps in my linux knowledge  :Embarassed: )

I noticed this:

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> Warning only 896MB will be used.
> 
> 

 

Why is that!!??  What can I tweak in my kernel to get full use of my RAM?  Come to think of it...I thought I remembered seeing something about HIGHMEM...but it didn't appear that I'd need it...perhaps that's it?

But...later it says this:

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> Memory: 904660k/917504k available (2734k kernel code, 12336k reserved, 1075k data, 220k init, 0k highmem)
> 
> 

 

Now highmem is OK?  :Shocked: 

Later, there's this:

 *Quote:*   

> 
> 
> EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
> 
> 

 

...no idea what that means.  It makes me wonder though...could the filesystem be doing something, keeping the drive busy?  Can I tweak the ext3 partition to change something?

 *s0be wrote:*   

> What about lsmod output?

 

```

Module                  Size  Used by

nvidia               3462876  12

usblp                  11648  0

usbhid                 25860  0

usb_storage            30596  0

ehci_hcd               29832  0

uhci_hcd               30736  0

ohci_hcd               19588  0

tg3                    95620  0

```

 *s0be wrote:*   

> Those error/warning messages are due to using hdparm(libata utility) on a sata drive(not really 100% libata at this point)

 

I figured it was something like that...I can't use a few of the hdparm options which don't sound like they'd apply to a SATA drive.

Thanks!

EDIT:

Also, here's my rc-update output...maybe someone will spot something here that shouldn't be running on boot:

```

           alsasound | boot

             apache2 |

            bootmisc | boot

             checkfs | boot

           checkroot | boot

               clock | boot

         consolefont | boot

         crypto-loop |

               cupsd |

                dbus |      default

          domainname |      default

                famd |

            firebird |

                 gpm |

                hald |      default

              hdparm |

            hostname | boot

             hotplug |

               ivman |      default

             keymaps | boot

                lisa |

               local |      default nonetwork

          localmount | boot

             metalog |      default

             modules | boot

               mysql |

            net.eth0 |      default

              net.lo | boot

            netmount |      default

                nscd |

             numlock |      default

             portmap |

             pwcheck |

             reslisa |

           rmnologin | boot

              rsyncd |

               samba |

           saslauthd |

              serial | boot

                sshd |

             urandom | boot

          vixie-cron |      default

              vmware |

          wrapper.pl |

                 xdm |      default

```

----------

## Tlaloc

Maybe it is this.

----------

## zambizzi

 *Tlaloc wrote:*   

> Maybe it is this.

 

Tried it - but that wasn't it.

I rebooted a couple of times and watched to see at what point the light comes on and sticks....and it's definitely while the kernel is booting...long before we get to X & KDE.

It happens at this line in the boot message from dmesg posted above:

```

ALSA device list:

  #0: Live! 7.1 24bit [SB0413] at 0xd8e0 irq 18 

```

It sticks there for 2-3 seconds and then blam!  The hard disk light on the front of the box pops on and stays lit.

Could alsa or my snd card drivers somehow cause my hard drive to constantly spin?  My sound seems to be working great...no problems there so far.

Hope this leads us somewhere!

Thanks again!

----------

## zambizzi

I've been playing around and removed alsa and my sound card from the kernel config...that wasn't causing it either.  I thought perhaps it was ACPI...so I removed that as well (don't need it anyhow.)

That wasn't it either.

Now it appears that the light pops on where libata is being loaded.

```

libata version 1.11 loaded.

```

Are there known bugs/issues w/ libata on SATA drives? 

Should I be worried?

Any tweaks I can do to adjust libata to play nicer, if this is the problem?  Do I absolutely need it since I don't have any ATA drives?  What else does libata do?  Is anyone paying attention to me?  :Laughing:  [/code](just jokes)

----------

## widan

 *zambizzi wrote:*   

> I noticed this:
> 
> ```
> Warning only 896MB will be used.
> ```
> ...

 

It seems you have 1GB RAM. In order to use that much RAM, you need to set HIGHMEM to 4G in the kernel configuration. Here it is not set (you have 0k highmem).

 *zambizzi wrote:*   

> Do I absolutely need [libata] since I don't have any ATA drives?

 

```
ata1: dev 0 cfg 49:2f00 82:346b 83:7f01 84:4003 85:3469 86:3c01 87:4003 88:207f

ata1: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 312500000 sectors: lba48

ata1: dev 0 configured for UDMA/133

  Vendor: ATA       Model: ST3160023AS       Rev: 8.12

  Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 05
```

You have a Serial ATA drive, so you need libata. Also from your dmesg you are using an AHCI controller. The AHCI driver is apparently known to cause the activity LED to stay always on. You can try to apply that patch:

```
# cd /usr/src/linux

# wget http://lkml.org/lkml/diff/2005/8/4/35/1 -O ahci-led.diff

# patch -p1 < ahci-led.diff
```

Then recompile your kernel.

----------

## zambizzi

 *widan wrote:*   

> 
> 
> It seems you have 1GB RAM. In order to use that much RAM, you need to set HIGHMEM to 4G in the kernel configuration. Here it is not set (you have 0k highmem).
> 
> 

 

Yes, you're right, I did this on a hunch and got myself another 126MB ram...sweet!

 *widan wrote:*   

> 
> 
> You have a Serial ATA drive, so you need libata. 
> 
> 

 

I was afraid of that, can't figure out how to get rid of it anyhow.  :Cool: 

 *widan wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Also from your dmesg you are using an AHCI controller. The AHCI driver is apparently known to cause the activity LED to stay always on. You can try to apply that patch:
> 
> ```
> ...

 

Holy hell, is that all it is!?  :Shocked:   I couldn't care less as long as I'm not spinning my hard drive to death...and it sounds like I'm not.  

I'm not sure I'll even bother w/ the patch since I'd have to re-patch it every time I re-compile my kernel...which is more work than I'm up to.

However, just to satisfy my curiosity...maybe I should just try it...what could it hurt?  I could just ignore it after my next kernel compile if it turns out to be the cure (to an almost-non-issue).

Thanks a bunch!

----------

