[paully dub]

I have posted numerous times in the epic Panther Mouse Freeze thread, but since zeroing my drive and reinstalling my os, sans funky drivers, or hacks or anything, I'm getting frequent kernel panics.

Question: could the frequent powering down on my TiBook have hurt the HD in some way? This is a 2 and a half year old system that prior to the freezing has had no problems. Plus the freeze or kernel panics has yet to occur when I boot from my fw hd.

And finally should anyone be adept at decoding panics logs here's a couple:


panic(cpu 0): 0x300 - Data access
Latest stack backtrace for cpu 0:
Backtrace:
0x000836E4 0x00083BC8 0x0001EDA4 0x00090CD8 0x000940CC
Proceeding back via exception chain:
Exception state (sv=0x2517BA00)
PC=0x0021657C; MSR=0x00009030; DAR=0x00000008; DSISR=0x40000000; LR=0x000B5E44; R1=0x12033290; XCP=0x0000000C (0x300 - Data access)
Backtrace:
0x000B5DC0 0x000B5B30 0x000B4C98 0x000B3DD4 0x000B3EE4 0x001D010C 0x001F4168 0x001F53A8
0x001F1714 0x001D1580 0x001D1080 0x001DACAC 0x001DB8F8 0x000BE344 0x000BDD8C 0x000C7AE4
0x002463C4 0x00094260 0x000A0009
Exception state (sv=0x253CD280)
PC=0x900144CC; MSR=0x0200F030; DAR=0x02CA87A3; DSISR=0x40000000; LR=0x910CF928; R1=0xBFFFEF30; XCP=0x00000030 (0xC00 - System call)

Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 7.7.0:
Sun Nov 7 16:06:51 PST 2004; root:xnu/xnu-517.9.5.obj~1/RELEASE_PPC



*********

Tue Dec 28 21:01:35 2004


panic(cpu 0): bremfree: lost tail
Latest stack backtrace for cpu 0:
Backtrace:
0x000836E4 0x00083BC8 0x0001EDA4 0x000B389C 0x000C0A44 0x000C21C0 0x000C2610 0x001E8BB4
0x001E4DEC 0x000C56E8 0x000C30DC 0x0021768C 0x00220200 0x002463C4 0x00094260 0x00090009
Proceeding back via exception chain:
Exception state (sv=0x24D83000)
PC=0x9005F24C; MSR=0x0000D030; DAR=0x25D08000; DSISR=0x42000000; LR=0x000027A8; R1=0xBFFFFEB0; XCP=0x00000030 (0xC00 - System call)

Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 7.7.0:
Sun Nov 7 16:06:51 PST 2004; root:xnu/xnu-517.9.5.obj~1/RELEASE_PPC


Thanks for any help, anyone,

Paul

[alphasubzero949]

To find out if it is really HD failure, open Disk Utility. Highlight the HD (and not your volume) and look at the SMART status. If it is "verified," it is ok. Anything else, and it will be close to failing. Alternatively, DiskWarrior and TechTool Pro also check your drive's SMART status.

[Goldfinger]

Originally posted by alphasubzero949:
To find out if it is really HD failure, open Disk Utility. Highlight the HD (and not your volume) and look at the SMART status. If it is "verified," it is ok. Anything else, and it will be close to failing. Alternatively, DiskWarrior and TechTool Pro also check your drive's SMART status.

You can't trust SMART that much, it often gives wrong information.

[paully dub]

Originally posted by alphasubzero949:
To find out if it is really HD failure, open Disk Utility. Highlight the HD (and not your volume) and look at the SMART status. If it is "verified," it is ok. Anything else, and it will be close to failing. Alternatively, DiskWarrior and TechTool Pro also check your drive's SMART status.

SMART is indeed verified, and I've tried all sorts of stuff, from DiskWarrior, to TechTools to the Apple Hardware test, to fsck to repairing permissions to shaking the powerbook to see if I hear any loose components rattling around (just kidding). Everything checks out.

Now, I haven't checked the RAM, removing one module and then another to see if one is perhaps the cause. This is the last, and indeed most tedious stage. And the fact that I have gotten panic free performance booting from my firewire harddrive makes me suspect that it's either the internal hard drive or something software related.

[f1000]

I agree with Auric. SMART's useful in proving that a HD is bad; it isn't useful in proving that a HD is good.

Maybe you're having IDE interface problems: loose cable, bad logic board?

[Millennium]

I'm not entirely certain on this, but those kernel panics would seem to point to memory going bad, not the hard drive. Do you have any way of testing your RAM?

[paully dub]

Originally posted by Millennium:
I'm not entirely certain on this, but those kernel panics would seem to point to memory going bad, not the hard drive. Do you have any way of testing your RAM?

Well the RAM has passed the TechTools test, as well as the Apple Hardware Test, and I suppose the only other option is to remove the modules and see if one or the other might be the cause of the panic.

But I suppose the moral of this story is panic logs don't tell the whole story, or that people are having a hard time decoding them.

Having posted them on Apple's support board as well I got:

Maybe Disk Failure,

Maybe bad RAM,

Maybe software failure,

Maybe bad processor,

etc.

And since I've got AppleCare, I think I'll give them a call. I was simply hoping for a miracle fix to this during the holidays, and I'm currently travelling.

Since I'll be in California for 18 days next month, any idea how long the turnaround for a repair might be? I'm assuming not that long.