RAID error "out of memory in ata_raid_init_request" plus phantom filesystem errors

[Ashley Moran]

I'm using the VIA on-board RAID of an Asus A8V Deluxe in RAID-1 on a server 
running FreeBSD 6.0/amd64.  The server has 2GB RAM.

I just saw on the console the following messages which happened around the 
time of the successful fetch:
Feb 28 09:43:03 don FAILURE - out of memory in ata_raid_init_request
Feb 28 09:43:03 don FAILURE - out of memory in ata_raid_init_request
Feb 28 09:43:03 don FAILURE - out of memory in ata_raid_init_request
Feb 28 09:43:03 don g_vfs_done():ar0s1h[WRITE(offset=98480537600, 
length=8192)]error = 5
Feb 28 09:43:03 don g_vfs_done():ar0s1h[WRITE(offset=98480519168, 
length=2048)]error = 5
Feb 28 09:43:03 don g_vfs_done():ar0s1h[WRITE(offset=98480531456, 
length=4096)]error = 5

Googling the error didn't through up anything useful.  What causes this 
exactly?  The server is hardly using any of the RAM it has right now.

My 152 GB /var partition is now showing errors.  When I reboot into 
single-user mode, fsck thinks the file system is clean.  On continuing into 
multi-user mode, I get these errors:

-----
root at don# fsck -n /var
** /dev/ar0s1h (NO WRITE)
** Last Mounted on /var
** Phase 1 - Check Blocks and Sizes
** Phase 2 - Check Pathnames
** Phase 3 - Check Connectivity
** Phase 4 - Check Reference Counts
** Phase 5 - Check Cyl groups
FREE BLK COUNT(S) WRONG IN SUPERBLK
SALVAGE? no

SUMMARY INFORMATION BAD
SALVAGE? no

BLK(S) MISSING IN BIT MAPS
SALVAGE? no

119715 files, 6100274 used, 73522326 free (7158 frags, 9189396 blocks, 0.0% 
fragmentation)
-----

(I ran it at the physical console and actually got more errors)

Overall I'm very concerned.  We recently lost this whole server when the ATA 
RAID (on a different board) failed miserably and both disks ended up with 
masses of random errors, leaving it unbootable.



I've recently been talking to a guy off the amd64 list whose opinion of 
on-board SATA RAID is simply "POS".  Would it be possible to split the SATA 
RAID, and reconfigure the system to use gmirror?  Apparently that's a better 
solution.


Ashley