Re: [discuss] Re: [PATCH] x86-64: Fix bad assumption that dualcore cpus have synced TSCs

From: Andi Kleen
Date: Wed Sep 21 2005 - 10:04:30 EST


On Wed, Sep 21, 2005 at 10:15:08AM -0500, Ray Bryant wrote:
> On Tuesday 20 September 2005 23:03, Daniel Jacobowitz wrote:
>
> >
> > FYI, at least I have reproduced this without powernow loaded.
>
> There are cases that we are aware of where the TSC will count slower while the
> processor is halted. This can make TSC's get out of sync on dual cores.

Ok thanks for the confirmation. I guess John's patch is ok then.
Drawback is much slower to extremly slow gettimeofday (depending
if the chipset/BIOS has usable HPET, most seem not to)

>
> I wonder if you can reproduce this problem while also running a pair of cpu
> bound tasks on your dual core box. If you can't, then this is the culprit.
>
> In general, however, on multisocket systems, you can't depend on TSC's being
> synchronized between sockets, so all of this is moot. We just have to deal
> with it.

We handle this, but single socket dual core was special cased because
I was told previously it should be ok.

-Andi
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