[Grant_G]

FSCK can be done on a journaled drive, but has to be forced. Type fsck -y -f to accomplish it.
G

[pkeene]

Of course I wrote too soon. Had another panic just after midnight waking from sleep (the iMac, not me - I'm not quite panicking yet!). These panics seem to happen around midday and midnight which may be a clue. No log this time - it was a 'nasty' panic.
Anyway, booted from the install CD and repaired disk. No errors reported. Re-booted from the startup volume and repaired permissions. No errors reported other than the usual "we are using special permissions...". Re-booted and reset PRAM. Now we shall see what we shall see.
If I can go 2 days without a panic I'll report back in case this will help someone else.
Peter

[pkeene]

Thanks Grant. Reading Apple's KB document on the subject I get the impression they don't consider it neccesary on a journaled volume - or am I wrong? What would be the difference to repairing disk from the install CD?
Peter

[pkeene]

Sorry to relate, none of those measures worked. The iMac has just suffered another kernel panic, again around midnight.
The common threads I see in the logs posted about these panics are the new kernel, >Kernel version: Darwin Kernel Version 7.5.0: Thu Aug 5 19:26:16 PDT 2004; root:xnu/xnu-517.7.21.obj~3/RELEASE_PPC< and some or other USB device. It seems, to my inexpert mind, that the kernel doesn't like something on the USB bus on certain machines.
I'm going to make up a report to send to Apple, maybe they can figure it out.
Peter

[ALG]

I think I stated earlier that you had a problem with a USB device. I do not know what USB devices you have connected but I am betting even if you send a log to Apple you are going to have to disconnect your USB devices until you find the one causing the conflict.

[pkeene]

Thanks ALG. I don't have any external USB devices connected other than the keyboard and mouse, I'll try that. What is pointed to in all my panic logs is the internal USB modem. I'm not aware that I can disconnect that from the bus.
Peter

[louisiana]

You may have already tried this, but you might want to remove the RAM and if you have more than one set then alternate between them to see if one is causing the problem. It also might help to simply re=seat the RAM. I had the same problem with my son's iMac and reseating solved the issue. No problems with 3 eMacs and 3 PBs.

[pkeene]

Hi Louisiana, thanks for the input. I only have the original RAM fitted so I don't think that's the problem. I actually may have got this solved but I want to go at least 2 days without a panic to be sure. Once I'm sure I'll report back.
Salut les gars!
Peter

[pkeene]

Okay, I think I can put this thread to bed. Before unplugging the keyboard and mouse for a minimum 24 hour period (there was only 1 panic a day) I decided to first try plugging them into a different USB port. Guess what? Sorted. No panic for 2 days. The USB port next to the modem port must have been damaged last week, don't know how.
Thanks to all who tried to help.
Peter