kern/59719 Re: 4.9 Stable Crashes on SuperMicro with SMP

[Uwe Doering]

Jonathan Gilpin wrote:
> I've run memtest (memtest86.com) kindly provided by Don and it passed all
> the tests. I've installed installed a kernel module to test for memory
> errors and found that again no memory errors are found... So this means it's
> either a problem with the CPU's or a geniune bug in the kernel. (bugger!)

No, that's unfortunately not what it means.  If a memory test fails you 
can draw the conclusion that you have bad memory, but this doesn't work 
the other way round.  If a memory test passes there is still a 
possibility that a memory chip is the culprit since memory test software 
cannot find all errors.

Also, there is the chip set on the mainboard that coordinates bus access 
etc. for the two CPUs.  Mainboard and chip set developers are known to 
make errors, too.  In this case you would have to swap the entire 
mainboard, possible with one from a different manufacturer.  I can tell 
you from my own experience that it is really hard to find reliable PC 
hardware these days, in light of ever shorter and faster product release 
cycles.

    Uwe
-- 
Uwe Doering         |  EscapeBox - Managed On-Demand UNIX Servers
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