__alloc_pages: 3-order allocation failed. for 2.4.1-pre9

[Yann Dupont]

I had thoses errors messages on 2.4.1-pre9 :

__alloc_pages: 2-order allocation failed.
__alloc_pages: 3-order allocation failed.
__alloc_pages: 3-order allocation failed.
(ad nauseum)

I was doing backups on scsi streamers using tar ;

The files are on a md0 array, file system is reiserfs;

the machine has 128MB RAM, Swap is 512MB and was pratically unused ;

the tar then failed miserably -But the system was OK after that; 
Please note that this was after an hour or so of backup... 
And that I was doing 2 backups in the same time ...

The machine is an old pentium pro 200,
the scsi cards are Buslogic BT958 ( I have 3 of them ; 3x9 Gb on 1, 3x9b
on 2, 2 scsi tape on 3)

I remember sawing that those errors were due to improperly written
drivers . Is the buslogic driver or tape driver are to blame here ?? Or
maybe this is a vm balancing issue ?

Side note : Free gives this :

admin@dumbo:~$ free
             total       used       free     shared    buffers
cached
Mem:        126592     122856       3736          0     100968
8960
-/+ buffers/cache:      12928     113664
Swap:       522104       2352     519752

As we can expect, buffers are large, maybe a little too much ?

Yann Dupont.

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