Very Computer

Hi,
I recently bought a Supermicro PIIIDME + 2x733 PIII Coppermine CPUs, and
was unable to boot it in APIC mode because it would lockup occasionally.
Well, I have just managed to fsck my hard disc under Linux 2.4.0-test9
with IO-APIC enabled... All other crash-tests have failed to kill the
box...

Anyone else out there with PIIIDMEs care to give APIC a shot again?

Cheers,
Chris

There is no hope SuperMicro will support Linux. I have spoken to them
for many hours, and at one point offered to purchase one of their i840
boards to donate to someone for support. All they had to do was supply
the needed apic info, but they didn't care. They simply stated that it
is stable under NT and removed linux support.

If you want further tests (I was unable to get apic success under
earlier 2.4.0-pre kernels), you can probably force a lockup by rapidly
mounting and umounting a cd rom many times in a row. Be sure to sync
before you do this.

If you can boot under a newer kernel (I have not tried the test9, last I
tried was test1), and /var/log/messages does not contain something to
the effect of:
"WARNING: unexpected IO-APIC, please mail",
I would be interested in knowing. I am unaware of anyone having the
information needed to support the i840 chipset.

Quote:

> Anyone else out there with PIIIDMEs care to give APIC a shot again?

> Cheers,
> Chris

They don't necessarily have to support Linux for the board to work,
fortunately.

Quote:> If you want further tests (I was unable to get apic success under
> earlier 2.4.0-pre kernels), you can probably force a lockup by rapidly
> mounting and umounting a cd rom many times in a row. Be sure to sync
> before you do this.

I'll give this a shot...

Quote:> If you can boot under a newer kernel (I have not tried the test9, last I
> tried was test1), and /var/log/messages does not contain something to
> the effect of:
> "WARNING: unexpected IO-APIC, please mail",

Oh, those messages are still there. However, at the end of the day, all
that matters is whether the board goes "BOOM". There have been a couple
of APIC changes in recent test kernels, and these seem to have made a
difference.

Chris

This is true. But the means of actual hardwiring of the APIC to the
board can apparently be accomplished in more than one way, which might
be relevant to the means of fixing or supporting the APIC. So Intel
might be able to privide the info in place of SuperMicro, but I don't
think they are all that interested either, and even if they are, there
is the issue of the actual connection of the APIC to the board.

Quote:

> > If you want further tests (I was unable to get apic success under
> > earlier 2.4.0-pre kernels), you can probably force a lockup by rapidly
> > mounting and umounting a cd rom many times in a row. Be sure to sync
> > before you do this.
> I'll give this a shot...

> > If you can boot under a newer kernel (I have not tried the test9, last I
> > tried was test1), and /var/log/messages does not contain something to
> > the effect of:
> > "WARNING: unexpected IO-APIC, please mail",
> Oh, those messages are still there. However, at the end of the day, all
> that matters is whether the board goes "BOOM". There have been a couple
> of APIC changes in recent test kernels, and these seem to have made a
> difference.

I hope stability has gone up, it would be a cheery note. What I worry
about though, is that if we don't know *why* it is now working, there
might not be any consistent means of reproducing stability for the
chipset in future kernels. If the actual fix is understood, I'd have
faith that stability would continue far into the future. Right now I'm
hoping that the upcoming ServerWorks WS chipset will work as a
replacement (apparently nobody will be manufacturing boards on this
chipset until roughly December). That chipset has the 64 bit pci support
for ultra 3 scsi and gigabit network cards, along with the agp 4x
support (useful for those of us looking forward to OpenGL and the newer
generation of video cards).

Via is apparently coming out with an SMP chipset that has agp 4x, but I
don't think it supports 64 bit pci.

Quote:

> Chris