kernel: attempt to access beyond end of device

[Norman Hooper <normanh@ossafrica.com>]

Hi there,

This has me a bit stumped, and Google isn't coming up with much.

I have a box with an Intel SRCS16 SATA controller. It uses the megaraid
module. At the moment it's running a standard 2.6.7-1-686-smp kernel.
I've built a custom kernel based on the .config from the 2.6.7-1 kernel,
the only difference being max addressable RAM: I changed it from 4GB to
64GB; and changed my CPU to Pentium4/Xeon/etc.

When I boot the custom kernel it comes up fine, but after a while, it
starts with: 
	kernel: attempt to access beyond end of device
	sda2: rw=0, want=1218969608, limit=1146494790
(sda2 is the /home partition)

The "want" value differs depending on which file has been requested. The
"limit" value remains the same.

Why does changing the value for max addressable RAM / CPU have this
effect? It's the same megaraid module, and the two kernels use identical
initrd images to load it. Am I barking up the wrong tree?

I've tried starting with a standard 2.6.8-2-686-smp kernel too, but the
same thing happened. Here's a diff of my config files:

/boot:$ diff config-2.6.8-2005042901 config-2.6.8-2-686-smp
70c70
< # CONFIG_M686 is not set
---
> CONFIG_M686=y
74c74
< CONFIG_MPENTIUM4=y
---
> # CONFIG_MPENTIUM4 is not set
88c88
< CONFIG_X86_L1_CACHE_SHIFT=7
---
> CONFIG_X86_L1_CACHE_SHIFT=5
89a90
> CONFIG_X86_PPRO_FENCE=y
95d95
< CONFIG_X86_INTEL_USERCOPY=y
119,120c119,120
< # CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G is not set
< CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G=y
---
> CONFIG_HIGHMEM4G=y
> # CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G is not set
122d121
< CONFIG_X86_PAE=y
1973a1973
> CONFIG_VIDEO_MEYE=m


Hints, tips, clues, pointers all welcome.

Cheers,

Norman.