Boot hangs 3 times in 4, ureadahead out of memory

[vandyswa]

Binary package hint: ureadahead

Stock Kubuntu Lucid, fresh install. /var is on root. One time in four system will boot, other times it hangs after listing amount of shared and non-shared memory. After successful boot, I see complaints about ureadahead out of memory in the kernel log. This is an i7 quad core running in 32-bit mode, 6gigs of RAM and the PAE kernel.

Problem goes away after I removed ureadahead files from /etc/init. So ureadahead is sometimes--but not consistently--doing something for which it does not find it'll fit in memory. Its failure is apparently keeping the rest of the boot process from proceeding. Problem goes away 100% if ureadahead is not attempted during boot.

[vandyswa (ajv-cauriumbin)]

Dump of system version:

vandys@bruiser$ lsb_release -r
Release: 10.04
vandys@bruiser$ uname -a
Linux bruiser 2.6.32-22-generic-pae #36-Ubuntu SMP Thu Jun 3 23:14:23 UTC 2010 i686 GNU/Linux

[Leandro Hideo (hideo-ime)]

Same problem here. It gets worse over time, till it won't boot at all. Re-Installed ubuntu 5 times in 2 weeks already.

Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.524981] ureadahead invoked oom-killer: gfp_mask=0xd0, order=0, oom_adj=0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.524986] ureadahead cpuset=/ mems_allowed=0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.524990] Pid: 432, comm: ureadahead Not tainted 2.6.32-23-generic-pae #37-Ubuntu
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.524992] Call Trace:
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525000] [<c01d5714>] oom_kill_process+0xa4/0x2b0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525005] [<c01d5d89>] ? select_bad_process+0xa9/0xe0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525010] [<c01d5e11>] __out_of_memory+0x51/0xa0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525011] [<c01d5eb8>] out_of_memory+0x58/0xb0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525013] [<c01d86f7>] __alloc_pages_slowpath+0x407/0x4a0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525015] [<c01d88ca>] __alloc_pages_nodemask+0x13a/0x170
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525017] [<c01d891c>] __get_free_pages+0x1c/0x30
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525020] [<c01b643a>] ring_buffer_resize+0x18a/0x2a0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525022] [<c01b7a15>] tracing_resize_ring_buffer+0x25/0x80
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525024] [<c01bb772>] tracing_entries_write+0xe2/0x160
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525026] [<c01baf87>] ? trace_nowake_buffer_unlock_commit+0x37/0x50
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525029] [<c02fec84>] ? security_file_permission+0x14/0x20
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525032] [<c02123b4>] ? rw_verify_area+0x64/0xe0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525034] [<c02124d2>] vfs_write+0xa2/0x1a0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525035] [<c01bb690>] ? tracing_entries_write+0x0/0x160
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525037] [<c0212df2>] sys_write+0x42/0x70
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525039] [<c0109763>] sysenter_do_call+0x12/0x28
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525040] Mem-Info:
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525041] DMA per-cpu:
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525042] CPU 0: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525043] CPU 1: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525044] CPU 2: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525045] CPU 3: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525046] CPU 4: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525047] CPU 5: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525048] CPU 6: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525049] CPU 7: hi: 0, btch: 1 usd: 0
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525050] Normal per-cpu:
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525050] CPU 0: hi: 186, btch: 31 usd: 175
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525051] CPU 1: hi: 186, btch: 31 usd: 173
Jun 21 17:24:58 das-main kernel: [ 3.525052] CPU 2: hi: 186, btch: 31 ...

[Frits Jalvingh (fjalvingh)]

After the latest ureadahead update I cannot boot at all anymore- boot hangs 100% of the time. Disabling the ureadahead deamon using a boot CD was the only solution.

[Stenten (stenten)]

Dup of Bug 600359?

[pdf (pdffs)]

Looks like

[Lothsahn (lothsahn)]

We are also seeing this on a Dell R210 with 4GB of RAM using the 2.6.32-24-generic-pae (32-bit) ubuntu 10.04 system. We are seeing oom in ureadahead. This prevents bootup approximately 75% of the time, but sometimes it does boot.

Although Bug 600359 has similar symptoms, that appears to be problems where low-end systems (256MB or less of RAM) run out of memory. Our system has 4GB of memory and therefore I wouldn't expect it to run out of memory.

Perhaps this is a problem where ureadahead runs out of addressing space on 32-bit systems?

We're going to disable ureadahead to workaround the issue.

[shane (shane-animail)]

The latest ureadahead update in maverick has resolved the issues for me.