Bug#545224: grub-pc: Makes xen-hypervisor-3.2-1-amd64 hang with "early fatal page fault" on boot

[Julian Mehnle]

Package: grub-pc
Version: 1.96+20090808-1
Severity: important

I have a machine running Xen 3.2 (from the xen-hypervisor-3.2-1-amd64
package).  Previously I was using grub-pc 1.96+20080724-16 to boot the
hypervisor with a Xen-Dom0-enabled 2.6.26 Linux kernel (from the
linux-image-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64 package); this was working fine.

When I upgraded grub-pc and grub-common to 1.96+20090808-1, this broke the
booting of the Xen 3.2 hypervisor with an "early fatal page fault" error
message like described in the following:

  http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=516610
  http://lists.xensource.com/archives/html/xen-users/2009-02/msg00768.html

Note that I'm merely referring to the described symptoms.  I have no way
of telling whether these cases are also caused by a GRUB incompatibility.

In my case, however, this is definitely the cause, since downgrading
grub-pc and grub-common to 1.96+20080724-16 restores Xen 3.2 to a working
state.

Note further that I cannot upgrade to Xen 3.4 because, even though it does
not hang with an "early fatal page fault" error with the latest GRUB, the
Linux kernel then hangs during hardware detection, for possibly unrelated
reasons.

The currently latest version of GRUB, 1.97~beta2-1, too, makes Xen 3.2
hang with identical symptoms.  I see that there were many other GRUB
releases between 1.96+20080724-16 (last known good) and 1.96+20090808-1
(first known bad), but I wasn't able to test them.

-Julian


-- Package-specific info:

*********************** BEGIN /proc/mounts
/dev/md0 / xfs rw,noatime,attr2,nobarrier,noquota 0 0
*********************** END /proc/mounts

*********************** BEGIN /boot/grub/device.map
(hd0)	/dev/sda
(hd1)	/dev/sdb
(hd2)	/dev/sdc
(hd3)	/dev/sdd
*********************** END /boot/grub/device.map

*********************** BEGIN /boot/grub/grub.cfg
#
# DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE
#
# It is automatically generated by /usr/sbin/update-grub using templates
# from /etc/grub.d and settings from /etc/default/grub
#

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/00_header ###
set default=0
set timeout=5
terminal console
### END /etc/grub.d/00_header ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###
set menu_color_normal=cyan/blue
set menu_color_highlight=white/blue
### END /etc/grub.d/05_debian_theme ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/09_xen ###
menuentry "Xen 3.2: Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.26-1-xen-amd64" {
        multiboot   /boot/xen-3.2-1-amd64.gz dom0_mem=512M
        module      /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro  
        module      /boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64
}
### END /etc/grub.d/09_xen ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_hurd ###
### END /etc/grub.d/10_hurd ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.30-1-amd64" {
	insmod raid
	set root=(md0)
	search --fs-uuid --set 2fe9a464-35bf-41b7-9284-5d5932ae06e0
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.30-1-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro  
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.30-1-amd64
}
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.30-1-amd64 (single-user mode)" {
	insmod raid
	set root=(md0)
	search --fs-uuid --set 2fe9a464-35bf-41b7-9284-5d5932ae06e0
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.30-1-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro single 
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.30-1-amd64
}
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.26-1-xen-amd64" {
	insmod raid
	set root=(md0)
	search --fs-uuid --set 2fe9a464-35bf-41b7-9284-5d5932ae06e0
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro  
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64
}
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.26-1-xen-amd64 (single-user mode)" {
	insmod raid
	set root=(md0)
	search --fs-uuid --set 2fe9a464-35bf-41b7-9284-5d5932ae06e0
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro single 
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-1-xen-amd64
}
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.26-1-amd64" {
	insmod raid
	set root=(md0)
	search --fs-uuid --set 2fe9a464-35bf-41b7-9284-5d5932ae06e0
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-1-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro  
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-1-amd64
}
menuentry "Debian GNU/Linux, linux 2.6.26-1-amd64 (single-user mode)" {
	insmod raid
	set root=(md0)
	search --fs-uuid --set 2fe9a464-35bf-41b7-9284-5d5932ae06e0
	linux	/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-1-amd64 root=/dev/md0 ro single 
	initrd	/boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-1-amd64
}
### END /etc/grub.d/10_linux ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###
### END /etc/grub.d/30_os-prober ###

### BEGIN /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###
# This file is an example on how to add custom entries
### END /etc/grub.d/40_custom ###
*********************** END /boot/grub/grub.cfg

-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (600, 'testing'), (90, 'unstable'), (80, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.26-1-xen-amd64 (SMP w/4 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash

Versions of packages grub-pc depends on:
ii  debconf [debconf-2.0]   1.5.27           Debian configuration management sy
ii  grub-common             1.96+20090808-1  GRand Unified Bootloader, version 
ii  libc6                   2.9-25           GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  liblzo2-2               2.03-1           data compression library
ii  libncurses5             5.7+20090803-1   shared libraries for terminal hand

grub-pc recommends no packages.

Versions of packages grub-pc suggests:
pn  desktop-base                  <none>     (no description available)
pn  os-prober                     <none>     (no description available)

-- debconf information:
  grub2/kfreebsd_cmdline:
  grub-pc/linux_cmdline: fillme
* grub2/linux_cmdline:
  grub-pc/chainload_from_menu.lst: true
* grub-pc/install_devices:
  grub-pc/postrm_purge_boot_grub: false
  grub2/kfreebsd_cmdline_default: quiet
* grub2/linux_cmdline_default: