[Beowulf] Barcelona hardware error: how to detect

[Jason Clinton]

On Thu, Jun 5, 2008 at 1:09 PM, Mikhail Kuzminsky <kus at free.net> wrote:

> In message from Mark Hahn <hahn at mcmaster.ca> (Thu, 5 Jun 2008 13:55:01
> -0400 (EDT)):
>
>> I'm mystified by this: B2 was broken, so using it without the bios
>> workaround is just a mistake or masochism.  the workaround _did_ apparently
>> have performance implications, but that's why B3 exists...
>>
>> do you mean you know of G03 problems on B2 systems which are operating
>> _with_ the workaround?
>>
>
> I don't know exactly, but I think the crash was under absence of
> workaround, because I was not informed that there was some kernel patches or
> BIOS changes. This was interesting for me also, because I have no
> information how this hardware problem may be affected in the "real life".
>  Mikhail
>

The B2 BIOS work-around is to disable the L3 cache which gives you a 10-20%
performance hit with no reduction in power consumption.

The kernel patch is very extensive and, last I heard, under NDA. AMD has
said publicly that the patch gives you a 1-2% performance hit.
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