So sometimes hal9k boots, sometimes doesn't. Symptoms: fsck required. Sometimes. I just took a look at the logs. Sometimes there are perfectly normal boots. Sometimes things like:

Nov 21 09:52:56 hal9k depmod: /lib/modules/2.2.14-12/ipv4/ip_masq_mfw.o: unresolved symbol(s)

(That's just one example.) show up.

During the same boot (I think. The system log timestamp is also screwed up during booting -- it starts booting with the correct time, jumps around, and finishes booting with the correct time), I see this:

Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: /dev/hda5 was not cleanly unmounted, check forced. Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: /dev/hda5: Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: E Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: ntry Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: ' Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: l Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: o Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: g Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: ' in Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: / Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: d Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: e Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: v Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: ) Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: has Nov 21 09:53:09 hal9k kernel: VFS: Mounted root (ext2 filesystem) readonly. Nov 21 09:53:09 hal9k kernel: Freeing unused kernel memory: 48k freed Nov 21 09:53:09 hal9k kernel: Adding Swap: 514040k swap-space (priority -1) Nov 21 09:53:09 hal9k kernel: Adding Swap: 60440k swap-space (priority -2) Nov 21 09:53:09 hal9k kernel: EXT2-fs warning (device ide0(3,5)): ext2_free_inode: bit already cleared for inode 40458 Nov 21 09:53:10 hal9k crond: crond startup succeeded Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: deleted Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: /unused Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: inode Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: 40458 Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: . Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: CLEARED. Nov 21 09:52:52 hal9k fsck: /dev/hda5: 9176/78312 files (0.3% non-contiguous), 129528/313236 blocks

hda5 is the root FS.