Informix Error -620: Unable to update next extent size.

Reasons / Common Causes

-620 is flagged by the official text as an internal error: the server can't update an internal data structure (not a system-catalog table) stored in the root dbspace — per the official guidance, possibly reflecting root dbspace corruption.

1. Root dbspace corruption, per the official guidance — the specific possibility it names directly.
2. An underlying ISAM-level error while updating the internal structure, per the official guidance's pointer to checking the accompanying ISAM error code.

Solutions / Resolution

1. Check the accompanying ISAM error code, per the official guidance, for the specific underlying reason.
2. Have the database server administrator run oncheck, onutil, or tbcheck, per the official guidance, to check for root dbspace corruption — the specific utility name depends on the platform/version in use.
3. If corruption is confirmed, engage IBM Informix Technical Support for remediation, given the root dbspace's critical role in the instance.

Examples

Running the diagnostic utility

$ oncheck -cr
-- checks reserved pages / root-dbspace-resident structures, as opposed to
-- oncheck -cc (system-catalog tables), which isn't what -620 is about
-- or the platform-appropriate equivalent (onutil / tbcheck)

Diagnostic Checks

1. Check the accompanying ISAM error code first, per the official guidance.
2. Run oncheck/onutil/tbcheck against the root dbspace, per the official guidance, to check for corruption.

Related Errors / Related Topics

• -621 — "Unable to update new lock level." Another internal error pointing at possible hardware/shared-memory problems, in the same general family of internal-structure-update failures.
• -622 — "Error on locating constraint index index-name." Another internal error pointing at possible system-catalog or root dbspace corruption.

An internal root-dbspace structure-update failure — have the administrator run oncheck/ onutil/tbcheck to check for corruption.