FC3 x86-64 freezes on SATA?!?!

[Angelo Machils]

Hello there!

Sometimes my box just 'freezes' on me, especially when I try some 
disk-intensive task (like rebuilding the database for slocate).  It's 
probably a kernel panic (afterwards there are no entries in any log) and 
this also happens sometimes even at startup (most times at the 'checking 
for hardware' point). I get a message then about a kernel panic, not 
being able to sync and there is a mention about two SCSI modules who 
lock up (sorry, don't have the exact message, and here also there is 
nothing in the log, since it's a kernel panic). From searches on the 
internet I gather there must be some bad blocks on the disk, and 
smartctl could help, but since my SATA uses libata (the disk shows up as 
being a SCSI disk -- a /dev/sda) and this has no support in smartctl. 
What other util or solution could I try, because my box is even more 
unstable now then a win box at the moment.
The entries in the websites show a little different error message, but 
the result is very similar. Very strange is that the only mention I find 
about such problems are always in a RAID environment, and I don't use 
RAID.....

Any help would be greatly appreciated, because I would prefer not to 
have to re-install the box.

Thanks in advance,
Angelo