Not able to start netconsole when bonding is enabled in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5

Environment

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 5
• Bonding enabled
• Kernel version lower than kernel 2.6.18-238

Issue

• Not able to start netconsole when bonding is enabled in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5:

    # service netconsole start 
    Initializing netconsole FATAL: Error inserting netconsole(/lib/modules/2.6.18-164.el5/kernel/drivers/net/netconsole.ko): Invalid argument
  

Resolution

Upgrade to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 kernel 2.6.18-238 or later.

Root Cause

The bonding driver did not polling in kernel versions lower than kernel 2.6.18-238.

This solution is part of Red Hat’s fast-track publication program, providing a huge library of solutions that Red Hat engineers have created while supporting our customers. To give you the knowledge you need the instant it becomes available, these articles may be presented in a raw and unedited form.