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A thread on the lkml discussed whether or not the 2.6 kernel [forum] is stable enough for general use. Marcelo Tosatti said in another thread that 2.6 is stable enough for people to use, but the problem with 2.6 seems still to be binary-only drivers that are not included in the kernel. For example nvidia graphical drivers and VMWare virtual machine modules need a patch to work.
In this thread hardware is discussed too. The nforce2 chipset has been known to cause problems with the Linux kernel since early 2.5 releases, though there is a patch for that. All issues aren't specific to the kernel, some instead can be caused by buggy binary drivers or hardware problems.
The howto and patches for nvidia drivers can be found here and for the VMWare workstation here.
From: Jan Rychter [email blocked]
To: linux-kernel
Subject: Re: 2.4 vs 2.6
Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 17:08:31 -0800
>>>>>"Marcelo" == Marcelo Tosatti [email blocked] writes:
[...]
Marcelo> 2.6 is already stable enough for people to use it.
Yes, that's an old post I'm responding to, but I've just given 2.6 a try
on my desktop machine, and the above statement seems even more
annoying. I hit the following problems:
-- I had to wrestle ATI drivers into compiling, they finally did, but
the kernel prints scary-looking warnings with call stacks, about
"sleeping function called from invalid context at mm/slab.c:1856,
-- modules don't autoload for some reason (though I'm sure that could
be solved),
-- bttv does not compile, so no video input for me,
-- drivers for my telephony card (from Digium) are not 2.6-ready, so
no telephony support for me,
-- I have just frozen the machine hard by copying files over NFS and
doing a simulation write to an ATAPI CD-RW at the same time.
I haven't even gotten to VMware and user-mode Linux, which I also need,
and I'm not even dreaming about getting my scanner to work. Not to
mention that on my laptop there would be an entirely different set of
issues, and software suspend in 2.6 is, well, still lacking.
So, as for me, 2.6 is a definite no-no. I see no advantage whatsoever in
running it, it caused me nothing but pain, and there is no improvement
that I could see that would justify the upgrade.
So please be careful when making statements like that. 2.6 is *NOT*
stable enough nor ready enough for people to use it, unless those people
have a narrow range of hardware on which the 2.6 kernel has actually
been tested (translation: they have the same hardware as the main
developers do).
--J.
From: Roberto Sanchez [email blocked]
Subject: Re: 2.4 vs 2.6
Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 20:01:05 -0500
Jan Rychter wrote:
>>>>>> "Marcelo" == Marcelo Tosatti [email blocked] writes:
>
>
> [...]
> Marcelo> 2.6 is already stable enough for people to use it.
>
> Yes, that's an old post I'm responding to, but I've just given 2.6 a try
> on my desktop machine, and the above statement seems even more
> annoying. I hit the following problems:
>
> -- I had to wrestle ATI drivers into compiling, they finally did, but
> the kernel prints scary-looking warnings with call stacks, about
> "sleeping function called from invalid context at mm/slab.c:1856,
I have an nForce2 w/ Radeon 9000. No problems w/ DRI drivers (included
in kernel) or thi ATI supplied drivers, which ATI says successfully
compiled against 2.6.0-test6.
> -- modules don't autoload for some reason (though I'm sure that could
> be solved),
Make sure you have all the different module options turned on. In 2.6
there are different options for loading, unloading and force unloading
modules.
> -- bttv does not compile, so no video input for me,
I don't know anything about video input. Did you try Google?
> -- drivers for my telephony card (from Digium) are not 2.6-ready, so
> no telephony support for me,
I don't know anything about telephony. Did you try Google?
> -- I have just frozen the machine hard by copying files over NFS and
> doing a simulation write to an ATAPI CD-RW at the same time.
What CPU/chipset do you have? There are timing issues with nForce2
and AMD CPUs. A quick search of the LKML archives will yield lots
of discussion and patcheson this issue.
>
> I haven't even gotten to VMware and user-mode Linux, which I also need,
> and I'm not even dreaming about getting my scanner to work. Not to
> mention that on my laptop there would be an entirely different set of
> issues, and software suspend in 2.6 is, well, still lacking.
VMWare won't work (according to the VMWare tech support people), but
they will (probably) support 2.6 kernels in their next point release.
I assume you are talking about their workstation product. SWSusp
works fine on my laptop.
>
> So, as for me, 2.6 is a definite no-no. I see no advantage whatsoever in
> running it, it caused me nothing but pain, and there is no improvement
> that I could see that would justify the upgrade.
But there is plenty of improvement for plenty of people.
>
> So please be careful when making statements like that. 2.6 is *NOT*
> stable enough nor ready enough for people to use it, unless those people
> have a narrow range of hardware on which the 2.6 kernel has actually
> been tested (translation: they have the same hardware as the main
> developers do).
I doubt I have the same hardware as the main developers, but I did
read the documentation. Did you? Even if it is stable enough for
most people, it is still a beta kernel.
>
> --J.
-Roberto.
From: Daniel Gryniewicz [email blocked]
Subject: Re: 2.4 vs 2.6
Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 20:53:29 -0500
On Sat, 2003-12-13 at 20:08, Jan Rychter wrote:
<snip>
>> So please be careful when making statements like that. 2.6 is *NOT*
>> stable enough nor ready enough for people to use it, unless those people
>> have a narrow range of hardware on which the 2.6 kernel has actually
>> been tested (translation: they have the same hardware as the main
>> developers do).
I have a brand-spanken-new laptop (less than a month old), and all my
hardware works great. In fact, ATI drivers (only in pre-release X) only
work on 2.6, and ACPI never worked on 2.4. So, it works better for me
than on 2.4. Please be careful when saying that 2.4 is better than 2.6,
it's only that way for a narrow set of hardware.
--
Daniel Gryniewicz [email blocked]
From: coderman [email blocked]
Subject: Re: 2.4 vs 2.6
Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 18:01:10 -0800
Jan Rychter wrote:
> So, as for me, 2.6 is a definite no-no. I see no advantage whatsoever in
> running it, it caused me nothing but pain, and there is no improvement
> that I could see that would justify the upgrade.
>
> So please be careful when making statements like that. 2.6 is *NOT*
> stable enough nor ready enough for people to use it, unless those people
> have a narrow range of hardware on which the 2.6 kernel has actually
> been tested (translation: they have the same hardware as the main
> developers do).
>
>
For every person who has problems with 2.6, there are probably 2 others
who have none, and enjoy the benefits of the new features. 2.6 works
great for me, and one a number of hardware configurations including:
- PII-266
- SMP dual PIII-550
- M10000 mini-itx
- 1.1 Ghz Athlon
all with a variety of video chipsets, USB devices, IDE / ATAPI disks
and CD/DVD, sound cards, etc.
I doubt many of these are consistent with the main developers.
2.6 may not be usable for you, but this has no bearing on the utility
of the branch for others. I have noticed benefits (mainly prempt,
IPSEC, and the IDE device handling) which make it very worthwhile.
From: Voicu Liviu [email blocked]
Subject: Re: 2.4 vs 2.6
Date: Sun, 14 Dec 2003 09:05:16 +0200
Jan Rychter wrote:
|>>>>> "Marcelo" == Marcelo Tosatti
|>>>>> [email blocked] writes:
|
| [...] Marcelo> 2.6 is already stable enough for people to use it.
|
| Yes, that's an old post I'm responding to, but I've just given 2.6
| a try on my desktop machine, and the above statement seems even
| more annoying. I hit the following problems:
|
| -- I had to wrestle ATI drivers into compiling, they finally did,
| but the kernel prints scary-looking warnings with call stacks,
| about "sleeping function called from invalid context at
| mm/slab.c:1856, -- modules don't autoload for some reason (though
| I'm sure that could be solved), -- bttv does not compile, so no
| video input for me, -- drivers for my telephony card (from Digium)
| are not 2.6-ready, so no telephony support for me, -- I have just
| frozen the machine hard by copying files over NFS and doing a
| simulation write to an ATAPI CD-RW at the same time.
|
| I haven't even gotten to VMware and user-mode Linux, which I also
| need, and I'm not even dreaming about getting my scanner to work.
| Not to mention that on my laptop there would be an entirely
| different set of issues, and software suspend in 2.6 is, well,
| still lacking.
|
| So, as for me, 2.6 is a definite no-no. I see no advantage
| whatsoever in running it, it caused me nothing but pain, and there
| is no improvement that I could see that would justify the upgrade.
|
| So please be careful when making statements like that. 2.6 is *NOT*
| stable enough nor ready enough for people to use it, unless those
| people have a narrow range of hardware on which the 2.6 kernel has
| actually been tested (translation: they have the same hardware as
| the main developers do).
|
| --J.
My specs:
Cpu:Athlon XP 2500+ BARTON {10x190}
Mobo:EPOX 8RDA3 + NFORCE 2
Ram:Corsair TWINX 512 3200LL{dual channel/11-3-2-2.0}
Fan:Cooler Master +7
Video:Hercules 3D Prophet 9600 PRO Radeon 128MB
My Hercules 3D Prophet 9600 PRO Radeon simply freezes my comp. with
ati-drivers from ati.com so I need to press reset!(so I only can run
console)
My sound (nvidia on board) works very shitty and I have no control on
it (level sound I mean).
I was running 2.4.23 vanilla + lvm1 so I moved to 2.6 vanilla+lvm2 and
now I can not move back
Pardon Me
but he sounds like a little whiney %$#*& considering no one is fooled into thinking that 2.6test is yet stable, hense the "test" part. Sure, for most (many?) people - me included - it works great without issue. In my own personal experience its actually more stable for me, so YMMV. I'm sure for most people, whom I doubt have telephony hardware or any such exotics, it works fine. I use it day to day, but theres a reason why no major distro is yet shipping it.
...
He's "just given 2.6 a try", and expects all his bugs to be magically fixed. What he should have done is try earlier test releases, and file decent bug reports, with the offer to test patches.
bash: logic: command not found
The reason NVidia and VMWare need a patch is because NVidia and VMWare are waiting for 2.6 to be released before releasing their products/drivers that work on 2.6.
Isn't this a little obvious?
Hey, this is the whole freaking reason against binary modules.
2.6.0-beta11 works beautifully on multiple systems
My experience with 2.6.0-beta10, 2.6.0-beta11, and assorted 2.6.0-beta9-mm kernels is 180 degrees differrent from the original complaint.
I have used bttv drivers under 2.6.0-beta9, beta10, and beta11 with no difficulty (including using tvtime to watch tv, and zoneminder to watch and record activity on a security camera via my building's cable system). I use DRI on a radeon 8500le and 9100 card (different machines) with no difficulty whatsoever. One card I run in 1280x720 mode on a big TV, the other at 1920x1200 on a hi-res LCD (in both cases I use the xfree DRI drivers, NOT the binary drivers, though I have used both successfully). On two machines I use LVM2 to manage my oversized RAID arrays sensibly, and the transition from LVM to LVM2 was virtually seemless (I do not use LVM for my / or /boot partitions): simply remove the LVM utilities and install the LVM2 utilitiels. In once case I am using 2.6.0-test11 successfully on a backup/test NFS server in conjunction with LVM2, which is also working perfectly.
The only lockups with my DVD-RW device went away with either 2.6.0-beta10 or -beta11 (I don't recall which one now), and with my changing the ide-scsi config to use atapi directly (per the instructions, as ide-scsi is depricated and known to have issues).
I have used 2.6.0-beta10 and 2.6.0-beta11 with a Dell Inspiron 5000e as well as an IBM Thinkpad T-21, and both work perfectly, including DRI on the Insprion, audio on both, PCMCIA, atheros wireless (via the madwifi drivers and a little hand configuration), assorted hardwired pcmcia network drivers, and the list goes on.
I have even used 2.6.10-beta9 with a Fujitsu ST-4120 and ST-4120P tablet. Indeed, this was my first forray with the 2.6.x kernels, as I needed its ACPI capabilities to access the legacy-free serial interface to the digitizer for touch screen support (which works fine), which wasn't available in 2.4.22.
The list goes on, but you get the idea. While there are undoubtably issues remaining with specific configurations and hardware, 2.6.0-test11 appears to be quite ready for use on a wide variety of hardware I've thrown at it, and in one case (the Fujitsu legacy-free tablets) a requirement if you want to use the touch screen.
I should note that all of these installations were running Gentoo GNU/Linux, which is perhaps more "2.6.x-ready" than other distros (i.e. the correct module utilities are installed automatically when one emerges a 2.6.x kernel source tree for the first time, etc.), but there certainly isn't any magic involved.
I suspect, as others have noted, that the original complaint is more a result of the author rushing forward and missing a few key steps outlined in the Halloween docs, than in any deficiencies in the new kernels (though, of course, both could be true).
In any event, my experience bears out Marcello's original comment: 2.6.0-beta11 and later do appear to be very ready for people to use, provided one's distribution offers reasonable support (correct module utilities, LVM2 packages, etc.).
2.6.0 is rock solid...
been using it since 2.5.70 or so, and I have had almost no problems; since 2.6.0-test1 it has been really solid.
binary drivers should die. anyone dumb enough to use them should switch to windows or some other propietary OS, we don't want that crap here, thank you very much
//k
well i have used both and for
well i have used both and for the most part 2.6 works fine for me but like the original poster of this thread i think it needs time to mature and for software to catch up to it.... linux has always suffered from compatability and with an ever increasing desktop/workstaion user base compatability is key. it is difficult to spend hours for many users to find fixes and patches to restore ssytem functionality. while there is no doubt that 2.6 will be an excellent kernel i think it is still a giving it more time.