not sure, whether this is an rt-related problem but on 2.6.23.12-rt14, i had the following message ... not sure, whether this is any help ... i have been running this kernel for quite some time without any problem, so i guess it is not easy to reproduce: kernel BUG at mm/slab.c:649! invalid opcode: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP Modules linked in: nfs lockd nfs_acl sunrpc snd_hdsp binfmt_misc ppdev parport_pc lp parport ipv6 cpufreq_powersave cpufreq_stats cpufreq_userspace cpufreq_conservative cpufreq_ondemand ext2 fuse dm_snapshot dm_mirror dm_mod acpi_cpufreq freq_table snd_hwdep joydev irtty_sir sir_dev snd_hda_intel pcmcia snd_pcm_oss snd_pcm arc4 snd_mixer_oss ecb blkcipher snd_seq_dummy snd_seq_oss snd_seq_midi snd_rawmidi snd_seq_midi_event snd_seq tsdev snd_timer yenta_socket rsrc_nonstatic iwl3945 snd_seq_device pcmcia_core battery ac psmouse firmware_class usbhid irda snd video i2c_i801 crc_ccitt serio_raw hid output mac80211 button iTCO_wdt i2c_core soundcore cfg80211 snd_page_alloc rtc intel_agp thinkpad_acpi pcspkr nvram evdev ext3 jbd mbcache sg sr_mod cdrom piix generic ide_core sd_mod ata_piix ehci_hcd uhci_hcd usbcore ata_generic ahci libata scsi_mod e1000 thermal processor fan CPU: 0 EIP: 0060:[<c0174d1c>] Not tainted VLI EFLAGS: 00010246 (2.6.23.12-rt14-686 #1) EIP is at kmem_cache_free+0x92/0x9b eax: 40000000 ebx: dfffc540 ecx: 00000000 edx: c130b040 esi: d8582c48 edi: d8582bfc ebp: 00000246 esp: df90df80 ds: 007b es: 007b fs: 00d8 gs: 0000 ss: 0068 preempt:00000001 Process softirq-rcu/0 (pid: 13, ti=df90d000 task=df926650 task.ti=df90d000) Stack: 00000000 d8582ce8 d8582c48 c03b1260 c0157119 c03b4200 fffffeff 00000000 00000100 c012b93e 00000000 00000001 df90dfc4 c03b4200 c03b1018 c2022fec c2022fe0 00000032 c2022fe0 c012b816 00000000 00000000 c01387c3 c013877b Call Trace: [<c0157119>] rcu_process_callbacks_rt+0x47/0x6e [<c012b93e>] ksoftirqd+0x128/0x251 [<c012b816>] ksoftirqd+0x0/0x251 [<c01387c3>] kthread+0x48/0x58 [<c013877b>] kthread+0x0/0x58 [<c0104e07>] kernel_thread_helper+0x7/0x10 ======================= Code: fa 89 f0 e8 0c fe ff ff 8b 04 24 03 1c 85 80 94 37 c0 89 d8 e8 06 bc 15 00 83 c4 04 5b 5e 5f c3 8b 52 0c 8b 0a eb 9e 0f 0b eb fe <0f> 0b eb fe 8b 52 0c eb 9f 56 53 89 c6 8b 58 08 8b 50 0c 89 d8 EIP: [<c0174d1c>] kmem_cache_free+0x92/0x9b SS:ESP 0068:df90df80 cheers, tim -- tim@xxxxxxxxxx http://tim.klingt.org There's no such entity as "most people". These are generalities. All generalities are meaningless. You've got to pin it down to a specific person doing a specific thing at a specific time and space. William S. Burroughs - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-rt-users" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html