Very Computer

Hi,
I was wondering if anyone could shed some light on the
following problem:

I'm running linux on a Cyrix P166+ with 256 K of pipeline cache
builtin to the mother board.  When I turn on the cache using
BIOS settings, I get all sorts of disk IO problems -- this
trashed my last ext2 fs.  I've tryed a different HD, but i get
the same problems.  With the cache turned off -- everything
works without a glitch.

Also, win95/dos works fine with the cache on.  Interestingly,
as a side note, i was able to write to DOS partitions with no
problems with the cache on in linux.  However i didn't test
this out extensively so forget i mentioned it.

Here's my system (from the top of my head) :
PC Chips MB - triton chip set with 256K pipeline burst cache
builtin
Cyrix P166+
Sound Blaster 16
Zoom fax modem 14.4
540 MB Conner HD <- all linux - ext2 fs
80 MB Seagate HD <- boot drive/ win 95 fs
130 MB Seagate HD <-win 95 fs

Any help would be appreciated! Thanx in advance.

-HASSAN HUQ
 SMD 99, UVA

I have the same problem with my system with a Cyrix 5x86 100 MHz
system:

I have a PCI/VL/ISA bus motherboard (UMC chipset) with integrated
EIDE/floppy controllers, serial ports, and parallel port.  It has
the AMI WinBIOS which supports and recognizes the Cyrix 5x86 100 MHz
processor that is installed.  I have 1.2 Mb and 1.44 Mb floppies and
16 Mb of RAM installed.  Here is the problem:

Under MSDOS 6.22/Windows 3.1 floppy reads and writes work okay.

Under Slackware 3.1 (kernel 2.0.0), floppy tars end up being
corrupted.  This happens especially when operating as root.  On
less-privaledged accounts, it isn't quite as bad (don't ask me why!).
When mounting MSDOS diskettes, reading and writing usually work
okay, though individual files are corrupted sometimes (always GIF
files).

Also (rarely), X-Windows crashes and won't restart without a
reboot.  Sometimes, even basic utilities such as "ls" cause a core
dump, again unresolvable without a reboot.

Is there a kernel conflict with the Cyrix 5x86 processor (I've heard
somewhere that this happens with some Cyrix processors - not all)?
Do I need to upgrade the kernel?

Is it a RAM problem (messed up binaries in the cache may be causing
this)?  I tried increasing the wait states via the BIOS configuration
but, the MSDOS XMS driver complained about bad RAM.  I didn't think
that increasing wait states would cause that problem.

Help in answering this problem would be greatly appreciated.  I want
to have total Linux bliss!  Other that these problems, my system
works quite well.

Mac

--
     Peter F Curran
     Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Use address in Organization line, finger
for PGP key.  Antispaam test in progress.