Memory needed for a kdump kernel has been bloated

[Jay Lan]

Bernhard Walle wrote:
> * Jay Lan <jlan at sgi.com> [2008-08-21 13:35]:
>> 2) the kdump kernel tried to add disk /dev/sdb when it is not even
>>    in /etc/fstab. I think only the system disk and the disk where
>>    we want to save the vmcore to should be needed.
> 
> But what has that to do with the kernel? What do you mean with "add
> disk"? Mount? Load driver? That's up to initrd and/or system
> configuration ...

Hmm, it would be great if there is a way we can initialize only the
needed disk. "add_disk" was called from sd_probe:
   add_disk <-
     sd_probe <-
     driver_probe_device <-
     __device_attach <-
     bus_for_each_drv <-
     ...

So the solution might need come from initrd or a device driver? Maybe
we can use a new system configuration item. But it can save a lot of
memory if we do not need to initialize those devices.

Regards,
 - jay
> 
> 
> 
> Bernhard