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4GB of ram random crashes/freezes/kernel panics..


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social, it's because you don't have the jmicron kext, I tried the same thing, and while it was much more stable (with the new IOATA + original JMicron kext), I still got a kernel panic. When I removed the JMicron kext, I also lost my IDE drives

 

On another note: the sata controller I ordered works, although only one port. I talked to newegg, and it's definitely a bad card. Thus, they're sending me a new one. I know it's a bad card because it also doesn't work in windows.

 

Anywho, os x actually detected it! Rock! I'm so close to being rid of the dreaded JMicron...

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I don't know, because in system monitoring read 4GB but if you see the statistic at the left of the screen the available + free memory is 3GB.

When memory remap is enabled the available + free memory is 4GB.

It's happening because of the BIOS incorrect reading. If you check in OS X, you'll see that it's 4gb. If you have further doubts you can run some tests to verify that.

 

Hey, that's good news Kirby! Hopefully that will sort your panic problem out!

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social, it's because you don't have the jmicron kext, I tried the same thing, and while it was much more stable (with the new IOATA + original JMicron kext), I still got a kernel panic. When I removed the JMicron kext, I also lost my IDE drives

 

On another note: the sata controller I ordered works, although only one port. I talked to newegg, and it's definitely a bad card. Thus, they're sending me a new one. I know it's a bad card because it also doesn't work in windows.

 

Anywho, os x actually detected it! Rock! I'm so close to being rid of the dreaded JMicron...

 

so neither one solves the problem?

 

I found a site that has a patched AppleVIAATA for the GA P35-DS3L, and while it is written in ukranian, it is less than 3 months old:

 

http://my.ukrweb.info/ich9-universal-driver-ahci-generic-lpc

 

maybe this will help?

 

EDIT::

 

is there source code for either AppleVIAATA or JMicronATA that we could fix?

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Sigh I have the same problem with my DS3R, worked perfectly with iATKOS though, I think it has something to do with the drivers, anyway I set it to AHCI i ran Photoshop,Dreamweaver,Flash,Illustrator CS 3, Itunes, Safari, Transmission, Speed Download, Calender, AddressBook, Msn, Transmit, everything i have almost, didn't crash yet, I don't think it has anything to do with usage though, I'll keep you guys posted if i get it working then def the fix for DS3R's is to enable AHCI.

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so neither one solves the problem?

 

Not yet, at least.

 

I found a site that has a patched AppleVIAATA for the GA P35-DS3L, and while it is written in ukranian, it is less than 3 months old:

 

http://my.ukrweb.info/ich9-universal-driver-ahci-generic-lpc

 

maybe this will help?

 

EDIT::

 

is there source code for either AppleVIAATA or JMicronATA that we could fix?

 

Social, did you see the bit about the other kext? The LPC? It says it is for ICH9R, which is what we have... I'll have to try these later tonight. Could be interesting! How did you find this site?

 

I left a comment on that blog entry, we'll see if I get a response!

 

Yamcha, I'm glad to hear that setting it to AHCI may have solved your problem, but I bet it didn't. I've had my board set to AHCI the entire time before now, and the panics were occurring. If you really want to test your system, try doing a large copy operation (like your entire music folder) from one drive to the other, with at least one of the drives being on the JMicron controller.

 

I almost guarantee it will panic.

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social, it's because you don't have the jmicron kext, I tried the same thing, and while it was much more stable (with the new IOATA + original JMicron kext), I still got a kernel panic. When I removed the JMicron kext, I also lost my IDE drives

 

On another note: the sata controller I ordered works, although only one port. I talked to newegg, and it's definitely a bad card. Thus, they're sending me a new one. I know it's a bad card because it also doesn't work in windows.

 

Anywho, os x actually detected it! Rock! I'm so close to being rid of the dreaded JMicron...

 

Can you (or anyone) clarify something for me, because this memory issue is the one remaining issue holding me back from building a hackintosh. Are you saying that:

 

- Even with the JMicron kext removed, there are still kernel panics? Or..

- With the JMicron kext removed the system is 100% stable but there's no IDE?

 

If the latter, I would be extremely happy because I don't need IDE. I just need to build an all-SATA (only three drives needed), 4GB 100% stable system. For that matter, I assume there's no problems with 8GB?

 

Thanks for the clarification!

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Update: No Crashes so far, with 4GB ram. The only change I made is set Disabled to AHCI (Sata Raid Option), I'll get more indepth info tonight, I think it needs more time to really confirm if it works :(. This was for my DS3R, I would recommend everyone use the most stable settings in bios and that means don't set it to Auto, set to what its actually supposed to be.. It improves stability..

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Can you (or anyone) clarify something for me, because this memory issue is the one remaining issue holding me back from building a hackintosh. Are you saying that:

 

- Even with the JMicron kext removed, there are still kernel panics? Or..

- With the JMicron kext removed the system is 100% stable but there's no IDE?

 

If the latter, I would be extremely happy because I don't need IDE. I just need to build an all-SATA (only three drives needed), 4GB 100% stable system. For that matter, I assume there's no problems with 8GB?

 

Thanks for the clarification!

 

I would assume there are not problems with 8gb, because the problem lies in 32-bt vs 64-bit addressing.

 

If you don't need IDE, then you are golden, since you can just disable the JMicron controller, solving all problems.

 

To clarify:

 

The kernel panic related to this issue is caused by the following condition and no other:

having greater than 2.5ish GB RAM and JMicron Controller ENABLED in BIOS.

 

Having the JMicron kext loaded or not is moot, since the only time it has the potential to be loaded is when the controller is enabled. It's the enabling that causes the panic, not the loaded kext. the kext may contribute to the panic-potential, but I know it's not just the kext because I've removed the kext, with the controller enabled, and I still get kernel panics when referencing disks controlled by JMicron.

 

Also, if the controller is enabled, but no devices are attached, only then does removing the JMicron kext have a chance at helping you. This depends on your motherboard. On mine, it does nothing.

 

For the big finish: if you don't need the JMicron controller (2 SATA ports with RAID, IDE connection) AND have greater than 2.5ish gigs of ram, disable the controller.

 

Unless you want kernel panics during critical moments, like saving documents. And that blows.

 

mrogers, if something here doesn't make sense, let me know!

 

EDIT::::

I forgot to say that using the new IOATA linked earlier in this thread, you no longer have "default" pata operations on an enabled JMicron. Before I used this new kext, if I deleted JMicron.kext it would have no effect on system stability. The only difference was that I would see JMicron in the extensions list. I also would have my pata drives available. This is what I mean by default. Now, since I deleted AppleVIATA to use the new kext, if I remove/delete the JMicron kext, my pata connection is not picked up by OS X, and thus I cannot see those drives. Also, using the new IOATA kext with the JMicron kext did not cure the kernel panics. However, I am currently running with the JMicron enabled in BIOS, deleted JMicron.kext, and I have not had a kernel panic thus far.

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I am using the JMicron-Controller...but not with IDE-Drives...No Panics

I have the controller enabled, set to AHCI, kext deletete, I have two SATAdrives attached, running on softraid, booted from these drives, well using the rd=disk3 trick, 6 GB of RAM and a superstable 10.5.2.

 

happy Hacking

 

Jürgen

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SUCCESS!

 

I am extremely happy to report that I no longer have kernel panics, and am free (I'm free!) of the JMicron controller. Here's how I did it:

 

I bought the following:

1 2-port SATA pci-e(1x) card: Link

2 IDE to SATA converters: link. From the dropdown, choose OS X, and then you want the first driver listed, the one that says: * SiI 3132 32-bit universal Mac OS X 10.4.9, 10.4.10, & 10.5.1 BASE Driver. Notice how there is also a RAID driver there! So you could have real RAID working as well.

 

I installed it, like any other program, and I didn't have to do anything special. I rebooted, with the new drives plugged in, and everything showed up. I'm now transferring over 100gb and no panics. Awesome. This is of course with my JMicron controller completely disabled in BIOS, and the JMicron kext deleted (actually just renamed) for good measure.

 

If anyone has any questions regarding the install and what-not, feel free to ask!

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To clarify:

 

The kernel panic related to this issue is caused by the following condition and no other:

having greater than 2.5ish GB RAM and JMicron Controller ENABLED in BIOS.

 

Having the JMicron kext loaded or not is moot, since the only time it has the potential to be loaded is when the controller is enabled. It's the enabling that causes the panic, not the loaded kext. the kext may contribute to the panic-potential, but I know it's not just the kext because I've removed the kext, with the controller enabled, and I still get kernel panics when referencing disks controlled by JMicron.

My motherboard doesn't have a JMicron chip and the >2.5G memory issue was there also. AHCI mode is perfect. Like mentioned in the other thread seems a few kexts have issues with more memory such as IOATAFamily. (Does Dune's replacement work with ICH9R chipset? Says it doesn't but has anyone tried?)

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Hi all

 

I am not having any luck, I have an extra Sil3132 controller so I disabled all the onboard controllers. Not using ICH9 or J Micron, deleted the kexts to make sure they don't load. I have 6 GIG of RAM installed tried only 4 GIG as well, still experiencing system hang when more than 3.2 GIG of ram is used. Easy way of using lots of ram is to use a parrallels VM with 2 GIG ram allocated. Then when you open some more software you quickly reach 3.2 GIG, the momement you do system hangs. Haven't had a Kernel Panic now had before at times with more than 4 GIG now system hangs. Using vanilla 10.5.2 and Gigabyte P35 DS3L motherboard and Transcend RAM.

 

This would indicate that problem is not with ICH9 or J Micron

 

Any input would be appreciated

 

-M

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I can't believe that is from Ram above 3 Gigs. I have the GA P35-DS4 Rev 3. My Leopard is on SATA Drive and i have my IDE Drive with old Windows XP on it. When i use my Leopard, after an hour, i hear that the IDE Drive go to something like Sleep Mode. It didn't Rotate. And then, when i want to save something and open the Dialog it gives Black Screen "Need to Restart System", Kernel Panic?!. My DVD Writer is IDE too, so i need the Port. At the moment i have unplugged the Power Connector from the HDD, i plug it in when i need it before i boot the system.

 

When my drive is not in Sleep Mode, there is no Problem. Is that the same Problem like yours or is the Problem with 3 Gibs above of Ram an other Problem and i am searching the worng thing? When i unplug my IDE HDD it works perfectly, 24 hours and within...

My System:

Kalyway Leopard 10.5.2

Gigabyte GA P35-DS4 Rev 2

4 GB DDR2 800 RAM TeamMemory

Gigabyte Radeon HD 2600 Pro, 512 MB dual DVI

1 x SATA 250 GB Samsung Drive with Leopard and Partitions

1 x IDE 120 GB Maxtor Drive with WIndows XP and Partitions

1x IDE LG DVD Writer

 

thx,

KS

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I can't believe that is from Ram above 3 Gigs. I have the GA P35-DS4 Rev 3. My Leopard is on SATA Drive and i have my IDE Drive with old Windows XP on it. When i use my Leopard, after an hour, i hear that the IDE Drive go to something like Sleep Mode. It didn't Rotate. And then, when i want to save something and open the Dialog it gives Black Screen "Need to Restart System", Kernel Panic?!. My DVD Writer is IDE too, so i need the Port. At the moment i have unplugged the Power Connector from the HDD, i plug it in when i need it before i boot the system.

 

When my drive is not in Sleep Mode, there is no Problem. Is that the same Problem like yours or is the Problem with 3 Gibs above of Ram an other Problem and i am searching the worng thing? When i unplug my IDE HDD it works perfectly, 24 hours and within...

My System:

Kalyway Leopard 10.5.2

Gigabyte GA P35-DS4 Rev 2

4 GB DDR2 800 RAM TeamMemory

Gigabyte Radeon HD 2600 Pro, 512 MB dual DVI

1 x SATA 250 GB Samsung Drive with Leopard and Partitions

1 x IDE 120 GB Maxtor Drive with WIndows XP and Partitions

1x IDE LG DVD Writer

 

thx,

KS

 

you could resolve the panics by simply deleteing AppleVIAATA.kext and JMicronATA.kext, but you would lose all IDE devices. If this doesn't matter, then do it. That will fully fix your problem.

 

I found the source code to AppleVIAATA and am going to look through it to see if i can fix the problem, but no promises. I need to learn more stuff along the way.

 

good luck!

 

btw, a SATA drive isn't that expensive. you could also try an IDE to SATA patch cable.

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Hi, I have an Abit IP35-E ICR9-equipped motherboard and 8GB of DDR2. The memory is confirmed to work great using Memtest86+ on a bootable floppy (ah, the nostagia). Windows XP SP2 does the normal thing and reports 3.25GB (prior to SP2 you could get XP to recognize more, but drivers unaware of PAE would cause trouble.)

 

I tried both Tiger and Leopard versions of Dune's IOATAFamily.kext, and while it allows all 4 SATA channels of the ICR9 to be recognized it doesn't fix the kernal panics. It may be some other driiver causing this (AppleVIAATA shows up in -v mode in boot up, even though the kext is gone.) JMicron is disabled in BIOS and its kext is also deleted.

 

Reading through this thread I see most don't know how to test if the memory is working. I have a couple of different copies of OSX Memtest. Rember has a nice simple OSX interface, but it only tests about 2.5GB if you tell it to test All, but if you duplicate it you can run two copies simultaneously for a little over 5GB.

 

Another method that works is starting up a couple of virtual machines with large memory allocations (1.5GB each for my older copy of Parallels.) and/or Photoshop--creating a large bitmap with several layers. Activity Monitor will show how much memory is actually being used, and for me it would panic everytime it hit 3.25GB.

 

So, for us vanilla ICR8/9 owners without AHCI, it looks like 3GB is a real limit. If you have 4GB and can boot 32bit XP SP2 or Vista you should probably use whatever amount it reports as your maximum in OSX.

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Hi, there is a solution for the problem of 4gb, see this http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?showtopic=88335 , i delete my viaata kext and replace the ioata kext that you can find in that thread, now with p5k i can use 4gb without kernel panic (test with hight load software)!!!

 

p.s sorry for my english

 

 

I gotta say this thing worked perfect, running Rember (memtest) and it's working flawlessly with 6gigs RAM and gigabyte mobo and AHCI disabled, not sure if IDE is working or not since I don't have any devices hoocked to it.

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Hi, I have an Abit IP35-E ICR9-equipped motherboard and 8GB of DDR2. The memory is confirmed to work great using Memtest86+ on a bootable floppy (ah, the nostagia). Windows XP SP2 does the normal thing and reports 3.25GB (prior to SP2 you could get XP to recognize more, but drivers unaware of PAE would cause trouble.)

 

I tried both Tiger and Leopard versions of Dune's IOATAFamily.kext, and while it allows all 4 SATA channels of the ICR9 to be recognized it doesn't fix the kernal panics. It may be some other driiver causing this (AppleVIAATA shows up in -v mode in boot up, even though the kext is gone.) JMicron is disabled in BIOS and its kext is also deleted.

 

Reading through this thread I see most don't know how to test if the memory is working. I have a couple of different copies of OSX Memtest. Rember has a nice simple OSX interface, but it only tests about 2.5GB if you tell it to test All, but if you duplicate it you can run two copies simultaneously for a little over 5GB.

 

Another method that works is starting up a couple of virtual machines with large memory allocations (1.5GB each for my older copy of Parallels.) and/or Photoshop--creating a large bitmap with several layers. Activity Monitor will show how much memory is actually being used, and for me it would panic everytime it hit 3.25GB.

 

So, for us vanilla ICR8/9 owners without AHCI, it looks like 3GB is a real limit. If you have 4GB and can boot 32bit XP SP2 or Vista you should probably use whatever amount it reports as your maximum in OSX.

 

When you deleted it, did you delete Extensions.mkext? if you didn't then the kext is still loaded. OS X uses an Extensions cache, and so AppleVIAATA may still be in there.

 

I have a 974 MB photoshop file, and by using quick look and Photoshop on it at the same time, i can fill my memory past the breaking point. Then, i try to copy a movie to my IDE drive and it panics immediately. thats how i do it.

 

and smx2, if you have no IDE devices, then this thread does not apply to you! :rolleyes:

 

I am working on fixing AppleVIAATA (by moving the code to a newer API). The current one was last updated at 10.4.3 so its super old. :/ No promises, but i'll report back if i succeed. I am posting regularly in this thread: http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?sho...82546&st=40

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When you deleted it, did you delete Extensions.mkext? if you didn't then the kext is still loaded. OS X uses an Extensions cache, and so AppleVIAATA may still be in there.

Yes, but I had some other problem. I had the AppleVIAATA and the JMicron kexts still in there, though I am sure I "sudo rm"ed them. I also didn't have Dune's IOATAFamily installed right. Now with it installed using Kext Helper b7, Leopard (10.5.1) is working fine. I ran memtest 4.2 and it passed all tests using a nice big 7GB chunk of memory.

 

So disregard my previous post. The vanilla ICH9 is fine for 8GB and Leopard, now I just need to get Tiger (10.4.11) working with it.

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SUCCESS!

 

I am extremely happy to report that I no longer have kernel panics, and am free (I'm free!) of the JMicron controller. Here's how I did it:

 

I bought the following:

1 2-port SATA pci-e(1x) card: Link

2 IDE to SATA converters: link. From the dropdown, choose OS X, and then you want the first driver listed, the one that says: * SiI 3132 32-bit universal Mac OS X 10.4.9, 10.4.10, & 10.5.1 BASE Driver. Notice how there is also a RAID driver there! So you could have real RAID working as well.

 

I installed it, like any other program, and I didn't have to do anything special. I rebooted, with the new drives plugged in, and everything showed up. I'm now transferring over 100gb and no panics. Awesome. This is of course with my JMicron controller completely disabled in BIOS, and the JMicron kext deleted (actually just renamed) for good measure.

 

If anyone has any questions regarding the install and what-not, feel free to ask!

 

KirbySaysHi,

 

Your post is the first that I have seen that seems to finally fix the 4GB Ram Kernel Panick problem. I have a system very similar to yours: GA-p35-DS3L, E6750 @2.7 OCed to 3.2, Nvidia 7900 gs, 2 Sata HDs, 1 IDE DVD burner, and 4 x 1 GB Reaper Ram. My only big complaint is Kernel panicks during large ram usage. I have been able to trigger the panciks with HighLoad (which I think uses memtest).

 

THe only way I can get a stable memtest is with AHCI enabled, and my IDE drive disconnected. Your comment was very helpful - and I had two questions:

 

1. Is my understanding correct?: The IDE drive causes the crash (jmicron whatever...)- but on this board using AHCI you are limited to 2 SATA inputs?

 

2. To fix this - I instead of the SATA to IDE converter I could get just a new SATA DVD burner (lis only $15 more than the SATA to IDE converter), and a pci card for the additional SATA ports (becuase AHCI limits to 2)? Is that correct?

 

Again, I appreciate your insight on this. Thanks very much.

Riff-Raff

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kirby, are you sure that we are limited to just 2 SATA ports? Cause there are 6 ports on the ICH9R controller, and only the last two are on the Auxillary (JMicron??) controller along with the IDE. And even with AppleVIAATA and JMIcron deleted, system profiler still picks up 8 SATA ports (though no IDE drives). While i haven't actually tested each one, it is my guess that they would work.

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I'm confused again. I need the 6 SATA ports ;-)

 

For the Asus P5K-E WiFi/AP, the 10.5.2 wiki says

"WORKS OUT OF THE BOX: ICH9 6x Sata ports. Jmicron 2x E-Sata ports"

 

I'd assume that losing the jmicron kext disables the two ESATA ports. Disabling the 6 ports is unlikely. Can anyone test that?

 

There are SATA CDROM drives now that appear to be good (eg. LG), and are around 25$ each (NCIX). I've bought SATA drives since they came out, so I'm safe there.

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i think to have the same problem.... sporadicaly i have kernel panics...

 

my systam:

ASUS P5K

4gb ram 800mhz

C2D E6750

ATI HD3870

3 SATA hard drive

1 IDE hard drive

1 SATA master

 

i try to disable the remap memory and it seams to be ok... no kernel paniks at the moment. But i'm not shure to use all 4 gb of ram.

 

If i disable the jmicron i can reenable the memory remap?? in this case i lost only a IDE channel... my sati is all on the northbridge....

 

What you sudgest me to do??

 

 

PS: sorry for my bad english...

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I'd suggest moving the IDE Hard Drive to another machine, or an external enclosure, or selling it. Then you can disable JMicron and enable Memory Remap. This is somewhat extreme, but IDE drives will be slower, older, and smaller, while an extra gigabyte of RAM helps speed.

 

Or keep the drive, and lose the 1gb of RAM without memory remap.

 

Or find a different motherboard. The P35 chipset seems best, and it looks like you have a great motherboard, but it does have this issue. I'm unaware of any good boards that don't have the issue. Hackers willing, this issue will be fixed at some point.

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SUCCESS!

 

Hi

 

i have the GA-EP35-DS3P. I think it should use the same bios. I can't figure out how to disable Jmicron in the bios. I tried just removing the Jmicron.kext, but started up to a kernel panic.

 

Can you tell me how you disabled Jmicron in the bios? I posted this message to you personally, but decided it might be a good idea to repeat it in the thread, as someone else may also know.

 

thanks

 

Pandar

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