Kernel panic on hardware wireless switch toggle

[Robie Basak]

If I try to turn wireless off using Fn-F2 on my Asus Eee PC 701SDX the kernel panics. This is reproducible every time.

I can avoid the panic by manually removing the r8187se driver first (using rmmod). Then the kernel does not panic, and I can turn the wireless back on using Fn-F2 again, r8187se appears to autoload and everything continues to work fine.

I think that this problem the same as bug 522119, but a comment there says to file a new bug, so here it is.

I have also had a possibly related problem with the same r8187se driver causing the system to freeze if I boot it the system with wireless on and on AC power, suspend it, resume it and then switch to battery power. I have worked around this by adding SUSPEND_MODULES="r8187se" to /etc/pm/config.d/unload_module. Other reports of this suspend problem are in bug 663784, bug 665728, bug 667238 and bug 672591. These may not be related, although both the suspend problem and this wireless switch problem appear to go away when the r8187se module is not loaded.

I can provide more information / do more debugging if needed, I'm comfortable hacking kernel code. I have not been able to get the kernel to reboot after panic, and I presume this is why I'm not getting anything in /var/crash after installing linux-crashdump. Setting /proc/sys/kernel/panic (or doing it with sysctl) does not seem to work.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.10
Package: linux-image-2.6.35-22-generic-pae 2.6.35-22.35
Regression: No
Reproducible: Yes
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.35-22.35-generic-pae 2.6.35.4
Uname: Linux 2.6.35-22-generic-pae i686
AlsaVersion: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.23.
AplayDevices:
 **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
 card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC269 Analog [ALC269 Analog]
   Subdevices: 1/1
   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
Architecture: i386
ArecordDevices:
 **** List of CAPTURE Hardware Devices ****
 card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC269 Analog [ALC269 Analog]
   Subdevices: 1/1
   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: robie 1284 F.... pulseaudio
CRDA: Error: [Errno 2] No such file or directory
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0xf3eb8000 irq 44'
   Mixer name : 'Realtek ALC269'
   Components : 'HDA:10ec0269,10438330,00100004'
   Controls : 11
   Simple ctrls : 7
Date: Thu Nov 11 22:49:24 2010
HibernationDevice: RESUME=UUID=511d8d4a-7fbf-46ad-9a9e-25e50f26895d
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-Netbook 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" - Release i386 (20101007)
Lsusb:
 Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
 Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
 Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
 Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
 Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
MachineType: ASUSTeK Computer INC. 701SDX
ProcCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.35-22-generic-pae root=UUID=659ad3ee-b65b-4715-9edf-11b4945710f7 ro crashkernel=384M-2G:64M,2G-:128M quiet splash
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_GB.utf8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
RelatedPackageVersions: linux-firmware 1.38
RfKill:
 0: eeepc-wlan: Wireless LAN
  Soft blocked: no
  Hard blocked: no
SourcePackage: linux
StagingDrivers: r8187se
Title: [STAGING]
dmi.bios.date: 02/12/2009
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: 0402
dmi.board.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.board.name: 701SDX
dmi.board.vendor: ASUSTeK Computer INC.
dmi.board.version: x.xx
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: 0x00000000
dmi.chassis.type: 10
dmi.chassis.vendor: ASUSTek Computer INC.
dmi.chassis.version: x.x
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvr0402:bd02/12/2009:svnASUSTeKComputerINC.:pn701SDX:pvr0402:rvnASUSTeKComputerINC.:rn701SDX:rvrx.xx:cvnASUSTekComputerINC.:ct10:cvrx.x:
dmi.product.name: 701SDX
dmi.product.version: 0402
dmi.sys.vendor: ASUSTeK Computer INC.

[Robie Basak (racb)]

Also reproduced on upstream kernel 2.6.35-02063504.201008271919.

[Robie Basak (racb)]

Also reproduced on upstream kernel 2.6.37-020637rc1.201011020905.

[Robie Basak (racb)]

Reported upstream; thread is here: http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.kernel.wireless.general/59134

[Jeremy Foshee (jeremyfoshee)]

Hi Robie,

This bug was reported a while ago and there hasn't been any activity in it recently. We were wondering if this is still an issue? Can you try with the latest development release of Ubuntu? ISO CD images are available from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/ .

If it remains an issue, could you run the following command from a Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal). It will automatically gather and attach updated debug information to this report.

apport-collect -p linux 674285

Also, if you could test the latest upstream kernel available that would be great. It will allow additional upstream developers to examine the issue. Refer to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelMainlineBuilds . Once you've tested the upstream kernel, please remove the 'needs-upstream-testing' tag. This can be done by clicking on the yellow pencil icon next to the tag located at the bottom of the bug description and deleting the 'needs-upstream-testing' text. Please let us know your results.

Thanks in advance.

    [This is an automated message. Apologies if it has reached you inappropriately; please just reply to this message indicating so.]

[Robie Basak (racb)]

Bug reproduced on Natty Alpha 1. There is a workaround for this now in the upstream kernel in commit f36d83a8cb7224f45fdfa1129a616dff56479a09. This seems to prevent a panic so is worth applying if possible, but still causes issues.

A complete workaround is to "sudo rmmod r8187se" before using the wireless toggle (Fn-F2) and also before standby/hibernate. Turning wireless back on autoloads the module again.

I haven't checked the upstream build, but have tested the above commit and have verified that there have been no other upstream changes to this module, so I think it's safe to conclude that the panic workaround still exists upstream but a fix does not.

[Robie Basak (racb)]

apport-collect -p linux 674285 fails with:

Error connecting to Launchpad: <!DOCTYPE HTML...
...301 Moved Permanently...
...has moved <a href="https://launchpad.net/+request-token">here</a>...

You can reset the credentials by removing the file "/home/ubuntu/.cache/apport/launchpad.credentials"

[Christopher M. Penalver (penalvch)]

Robie Basak, thank you for reporting this and helping make Ubuntu better. This bug was reported a while ago and there hasn't been any activity in it recently. We were wondering if this is still an issue? If so, could you please capture the oops following https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelTeam/KernelTeamBugPolicies#Capturing_OOPs ? As well, can you try with the latest development release of Ubuntu? ISO CD images are available from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/ .

If it remains an issue, could you run the following command from a Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal). It will automatically gather and attach updated debug information to this report.

apport-collect -p linux <replace-with-bug-number>

Also, if you could test the latest upstream kernel available that would be great. It will allow additional upstream developers to examine the issue. Refer to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelMainlineBuilds . Once you've tested the upstream kernel, please remove the 'needs-upstream-testing' tag. This can be done by clicking on the yellow pencil icon next to the tag located at the bottom of the bug description and deleting the 'needs-upstream-testing' text. Please let us know your results.

Thanks in advance.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for linux (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]