bus_dmamem_alloc failed to align memory properly

[Clifton Royston]

On Mon, Jun 23, 2008 at 01:53:35PM -0400, Jeff Blank wrote:
> On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 11:43:42AM -0400, Jeff Blank wrote:
> > I've installed a PCI (not PCIE) video card in a FreeBSD 7-STABLE
> > (20080616 ~19:00 UTC) amd64 system, and when Xorg starts, the kernel
> > logs the message in the subject.  Context:
> > 
> > Jun 17 11:27:30 bender kernel: drm0: <ATI Radeon RV280 9250> on vgapci0
> > Jun 17 11:27:30 bender kernel: info: [drm] Initialized radeon 1.25.0 20060524
> > Jun 17 11:27:33 bender kernel: info: [drm] Setting GART location based on new memory map
> > Jun 17 11:27:33 bender kernel: bus_dmamem_alloc failed to align memory properly.
> > Jun 17 11:27:33 bender kernel: info: [drm] Loading R200 Microcode
> > Jun 17 11:27:33 bender kernel: info: [drm] writeback test succeeded in 2 usecs
> > Jun 17 11:27:33 bender kernel: drm0: [ITHREAD]
> > 
> > Is this anything to worry about?  Part of the reason I ask is that the
> > machine locked up hard (had to cut power) the first time I hit
> > ctrl-alt-bs to kill Xorg, though I can't reproduce that reliably (or,
> > really, at all just yet).
> 
> Still hoping for an answer, as the PC locked up hard a few more times,
> always when trying to exit the X server (normal logout/all clients
> terminated, ctl-alt-bs, init 6).  The PC is a Dell Optiplex 740.  Its
> onboard video is NVidia NVS 210S nVidia GForce 6150, but that is
> disabled when an add-in video card is present (wasn't present in the
> 'pciconf -lv' I posted last week).
> 
> What can I do to determine whether the X11 problem is
> "bus_dmamem_alloc failed to align memory properly" or something
> else with the card?

  I can not be completely sure, but believe this may be a cross-OS
problem with Xorg support of this specific ATI card family.  I have had
a nearly identical problem with X lockups on a Debian server using the
ATI Radeon 9200 Pro (PCI) which uses the same RV280 processor and the
same X driver, with similar startup messages:

$ dmesg | grep drm
[drm] Initialized drm 1.0.1 20051102
[drm] Initialized radeon 1.25.0 20060524 on minor 0
[drm] Setting GART location based on new memory map
[drm] Loading R200 Microcode
[drm] writeback test succeeded in 2 usecs

  Next time it appears to freeze, see if you can ssh into it; my
experience on the Debian box was that this continued to work even
though the console was completely unresponsive following the freeze.

  If you don't want to spend a lot of time on this, I'd try a different
video card; I have a strong suspicion that your problems are not
FreeBSD related and would go away with that change.

  -- Clifton

-- 
    Clifton Royston  --  cliftonr at iandicomputing.com / cliftonr at lava.net
       President  - I and I Computing * http://www.iandicomputing.com/
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