Reboot fails: 5 beeps and a freeze

[Billy Newsom]

Anthony Atkielski wrote:

> Billy Newsom writes:
> 
> BN> ...and that's all I ever see.  But while this is being printed to the
> BN> screen, I get five beeps.  I don't remember that many beeps in FreeBSD 4.x.
> BN>
> BN> BEEP, beep beep beep, BEEP
> 
> See http://bioscentral.com for a list of beep codes for many different
> BIOS.  Most BIOS seem to use BEEP beep beep beep for video or memory
> errors, but check and see.

I'm don't think that this is a BIOS issue.  The beeps may be from FreeBSD, I 
believe.
Can anyone tell me if one of the routines in the kernel beeps during a reboot?

If it is the BIOS, that beep code means that the first 64K of memory is bad, 
but obviously this would seem like a strange beep code during a reboot. The 
way I understand beep codes is that they should happen during a POST.  But 
looking at my console, I still see the stuff that you cropped out of my 
original post on my screen, namely, the

cpu_reset: Stopping other CPUs

In other words, it appears that the beeps are coming from the FreeBSD 5.3 
kernel, and not the BIOS.  But since perhaps the cpu_reset may be somewhat 
successful you may be right...  The beeps could be BIOS beeps.

I know, however, that this computer always did its reboots properly when I 
ran FreeBSD 4.7.  So meanwhile, I have been looking at the changes to this file:
http://fxr.watson.org/fxr/diff/i386/i386/vm_machdep.c?v=RELENG4;diffvar=v;diffval=RELENG5

The above link shows a diff between FreeBSD 4-Stable and 5-Stable.  The 
differences are numerous, and some are in the middle of the cpu_reset 
function which could be the problem.  I may try seeing if a freebsd-hacker 
might have some input.  I almost began this post in the hackers list, but I 
tried here first, as is my duty.

But I don't see any reason for the beeps looking into the FreeBSD kernel, 
either, so I may be barking up the wrong tree.


> BN> I don't know how long I've waited for the system to reboot, but so far
> BN> it hasn't.
> 
> If the BIOS is unhappy, it's not going to reboot.
> 

That's true.  But I wonder why it's not?  My memory has never failed a test 
during a POST, so failing on the reboot seems very odd.  On another twist, I 
happen to be buying a complete new set of memory for this machine to max it 
out.  I wonder if that will fix it?!

Billy