Frebsd 7-STABLE, atapicd, atapicam and Intel errors [SOLVED]

[Jeremy Chadwick]

On Wed, Nov 19, 2008 at 12:41:01PM +0100, Jan Sebosik wrote:
> Andrew Snow napsal(a):
>>
>> Hi
>>
>> I have a P45 chipset but haven't noticed those problems.  I use AHCI  
>> mode because it enabled hotswap SATA.
>>
>> But do you also get error messages on the console about timecount going 
>> backwards for some processes? I can't make it go away, even if I force  
>> HPET as a counter
>>
>> - Andrew
>
> Hi
>
> obviously no, I don`t get any messages about time going backwards.
>
> I`ve also tryied AHCI mode, but after some mailing with Intel technical  
> support they claimed to downgrade to native SATA mode (non-AHCI 
> operation).

Andrew:

"Time going backwards" is known to happen on certain systems which use
features like Intel SpeedStep.  I can reproduce the problem on all sorts
of server hardware.  It's documented in my Wiki under "Kernel":

http://wiki.freebsd.org/JeremyChadwick/Commonly_reported_issues

Power-save modes such as C1E might also cause it, but I've enabled this
on systems without any repercussions.  Just EIST appears to behave
oddly, on RELENG_7.  (I've tried EIST on CURRENT, and it seems to behave
better.  I remember reading about major improvements jhb@ completed
there which might explain CURRENT working)

Jan:

(Quoting you from your misplaced mail to -stable)

> I thought also about bios bug... it`s pretty new piece of HW with modern
> chipset (Q45). I believe that the next release of BIOS comes soon.

The chipset has nothing to do with it.  I can show you two identical
systems, chipset-wise, and show you BIOS bugs.  The system manufacturer
is who maintains the BIOS, not the chipset manufacturer.

> But what about those atapicd problems? Is it related to SATA interface
> of DVD/CD drive? Maybe also the LG drive has buggy FW :).

Now I'm confused.  Didn't we just determine that your acd0 problems
disappear if you disable HPET in the BIOS (which makes no sense, but it
works, and is probably a BIOS bug)?  If so, then what's that got to do
with SATA interfaces or LG optical drives?  Please help me understand.

-- 
| Jeremy Chadwick                                jdc at parodius.com |
| Parodius Networking                       http://www.parodius.com/ |
| UNIX Systems Administrator                  Mountain View, CA, USA |
| Making life hard for others since 1977.              PGP: 4BD6C0CB |