Athlon oops traced to CONFIG_MK7 code in arch/i386/lib/mmx.c

[Richard Chan <cshihpin@dso.org.sg>]

Athlon oops saga continues - I consistently get Athlon kernels oopsing
during the boot up process either in rc.sysinit or loading of usb modules
(this is a RedHat system 7.1). These kernels can boot to a shell init=/bin/sh
but once I try to do stuff like inserting modules they oops left, right, and centre.

System: Athlon 1.2GHz VIA KT 133A
Kernel: 2.4.5 and -ac, 2.4.6 and -ac
Compiler: gcc 2.96-RH/3.00/3.01 binutils 2.10.90/2.11.2/2.11.90


I have narrowed a(the?) problem down to the CONFIG_MK7 specific code in arch/i386/lib/mmx.c.
If I disable CONFIG_MK7 in that one file with the rest of the kernel untouched and
compiled with CONFIG_MK7 and -march=athlon then my kernel boots sucessfully and manages
to get into multi-user mode. With a few minutes of testing and X everything works fine.

I'm interested if there is an explanation of the MK7 specific code in mmx.c and
whether that could really be the source of the problem. I would like to get
to the bottom of this.

FWIW - the RedHat 7.1 stock 2.4.2 athlon kernel boots successfully without oopsen.

Thanks!

Richard Chan <cshihpin@dso.org.sg>