Panic caused by bad memory?

[perryh at pluto.rain.com]

> I can't get a kernel dump since it fails like this each time:
>
> dumping to dev #da/0x20001, offset 2097152
> dump 1024 1023 1022 1021 Aborting dump due to I/O error.
> status == 0xb, scsi status == 0x0
> failed, reason: i/o error

Bad memory seems unlikely to cause an I/O error trying to write the
dump to the swap partition.  I'd guess a dicey drive -- and bad
swap space could also account for the original crash.  You might
be able to get a backup by booting single user, provided nothing
activates the (presumably bad) swap partition.