gentoo instability compared with other linux'es ??

[payam]

I was running Gentoo for several months on my computer, and I noticed the following:

a) there is a clock skew -- every few days my clock will be 5-10 minutes ahead
b) there is a high-pitched whine eminating from the southbridge chip (it's either from the onboard audio, onboard usb controller, or onboard ethernet -- not sure which but i know it's one of them, and maybe more than one)
c) my system will lock up once ever 2 days or so, whether in x or not, whether anyone's logged in or not.

All three problems (a), (b), and (c) were NOT evident when I ran RedHat and Mandrake, and I ran both of these distros for a few months. The three problems also don't exist when I leave my computer in the BIOS setup program.

What's the deal?

I figured at first that my CFLAGS variable was too intense -- it was something like "-O3 -march=athlon-xp -fomit-frame-pointers -funroll-loop -f1morething -pipe" so I wiped clean and reinstalled with "-O2 -march=athlon-xp -pipe" but I still have problems (a), (b), and (c). I also switched from ReiserFS partitions to ext3 partitions. So essentially, I made two efforts to promote stability: less rigorous CFLAGS, and an older more robust FS. (oddly enough, the system is about as fast as it was before, although doing an updatedb has gotten significantly slower, but that's beside the point)

My hardware is as follows:
CPU: Athlon XP Barton 2800+ (2.08, 333)
Mobo: Biostar M7NCD Pro (nForce2 Ultra 400)
Mem: 1GB Crucial PC2700 DDR, dual channel
Vid: EVGA GeForce FX5600 256MB
HD: Hitachi 180GB 180GXP
Onboard nforce net, nvidia audio
CD-RW, floppy, etc

I'm using vanilla-sources 2.4.22, and all packages are from the "stable" portage tree (i.e. no "~x86").

It's a real shame because Gentoo is definately faster than the other two distributions I've tried on this hardware, and I like how only the programs I want are installed, not some set of software that someone chose for me. Also, all the programs are (near) bleeding-edge (I'm a bit disappointed, actually, that Gentoo still uses GCC 3.2.x while other stable *binary* unix operating systems have switched to GCC 3.3.x, e.g. Mandrake, MacOSX, FreeBSD, etc...)

Does anyone have any suggestions? All comments and personal experience logs are appreciated, as well as possible solutions on how I can stick with Gentoo and be stable.
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Athlon XP 2800+ 2.08GHz 333FSB 512KB, Biostar M7NCD Pro nForce2, 1GB Crucial DDR 333, EVGA Geforce FX 5600 256MB, Hitachi 180GB 180GXP

[senectus]

just out of interest.. how was the nforce support under redhat?

Also.. what kernel version does redhat use? Do they do a 2.6 version?

Sorry about being OT
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Belief is 9/10 of YOUR reality.
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[paulisdead]

Try disabling apic in your kernel, and add these options to your lilo append line, or grub kernel line: pci=noacpi pci=biosirq. Those helped make my system pretty stable. Without them I'd get a hardlockup when there was a lot of disk activity with my Abit NF7-s.

You could also use rdate to sync up with a time server periodically. I run it at each boot up.

I don't really understand what you mean by a highpitch whine coming from the southbridge. You're literally hearing this from the chip itself, or over your speakers?
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"we should make it a law that all geeks have dates" - Linus

[payam]

[Malakin]

Gentoo is pretty much a build it yourself distro so problems are usually the cause of the system setup.
A: is kernel configuration.
B: I have no idea as it sounds bizzare.
C: Might be hardware related regardless of whether or not it happened in different distros. If not hardware maybe kernel setup.

[payam]

where can i get a "smart" kernel .config file?

i tried using genkernel once and it ruined my gentoo installation! i had to wipe clean is any kernel i built afterwards wouldn't boot.
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Athlon XP 2800+ 2.08GHz 333FSB 512KB, Biostar M7NCD Pro nForce2, 1GB Crucial DDR 333, EVGA Geforce FX 5600 256MB, Hitachi 180GB 180GXP