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DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

 
hongsee_2
New Member

DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

I am runing HP-UX 10.20 and Oracle 7.3.4.

Our database crashed due to the DBWR process terminated. The database can be restarted without any problem.

In the Oracle DBWR trace file:
error 7404 detected in background process
OPIRIP: Uncaught error 447. Error stack:
ORA-00447: fatal error in background process
ORA-07404: sfareq: Timeout occurred waiting for request to complete.

Has anybody encountered this before? Any solution?

Thank you.
5 REPLIES 5
Sanjay Kumar Suri
Honored Contributor

Re: DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

Check this link:

http://dco-proxima.dco.pima.edu/oracle/bug/index/os000201.htm
http://dco-proxima.dco.pima.edu/oracle/bug/s479/b000027.htm

ORA-07404: sfareq: Timeout occurred waiting for request to complete.
Cause: The master database writer timed out waiting for a write or close to complete. One of the database writers may have stopped running.
Action: Check all database writer trace files. Shut down the database and try to warm start.

sks
A rigid mind is very sure, but often wrong. A flexible mind is generally unsure, but often right.
Indira Aramandla
Honored Contributor

Re: DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

Hi Hongsee,

Problems have been indicated with HP-UX 10.20 and multiple db writers, which result in errors such as ├в ORA-07404: sfareq: Timeout occurred waiting for request to complete├в

The cause for this is the master database writer timed out waiting for a write or close to complete i. e the dbwr timed out waiting for a write to complete to disk. The key here is that Oracle requests an I/O and times out after 180 seconds. After the first timeout, a warning is written to the alert log and DBWR trace file. It then waits another 360 seconds, and if the writes still aren't done, DBWR terminates with an ORA-7404.

The action for this will be to check all database writer trace files. Shut down the database and try to warm start.

The workaround is to decrease the amount of dbwrs used on the system.

In metalink Bug No: 600823 discusses a port specific bug on HP when using multiple dbwrs.

There were quite a few bugs filed for these problems and 99% are due to OS hardware problems ├в This is what Oracle says.

I hope this helps

Never give up, Keep Trying
Peter Godron
Honored Contributor

Re: DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

Hongsee,
reduce the number of writers and/or split the transaction into smaller sections.
Also consider upgrading to get Oracle Support
Regards
hongsee_2
New Member

Re: DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

Thank you all for your reply... however, my client is asking that if the multiple db_writers cause the problem on their DB version. Why does it happen after so many years?? They have been using the 4 db_writers value for the past 6 yrs... & not only it give problem??

I have talk to them & they said nobody modified the db_writers value... The bad side is the system is very critical system & we couldn't have a choice to try reducing the db_writers value...

I have talk to HP as well & they are saying it could be something on the kernel size...

any more suggestion???

Thank you
hongsee_2
New Member

Re: DBWR crashing with ORA-7404 on HP-UX

Anyone else??? any more suggestion besides to reduce the DBWR process???

Can I have the exact value of the MAXSIZ, MAXUPRC & MAXUSERS for my 7.3.4 database on hp-ux 10.2???

Tq