Re: PROBLEM: tickless scheduling

[Stefan Biereigel <security@biereigel-wb.de>]

> Attached. This is from the 2.6.30 kernel on the Arch Linux install cd.
>
> Here's another bit of data. As I've said previously, the problems I'm
> reporting were observed on a Toshiba NB310-305 netbook with a
> single-core Atom 450 processor. I just built myself a mini-ITX system
> using the Intel D510MO motherboard, which provides a dual-core D510
> Atom processor. The other hardware on the board is similar to the
> Toshiba. I installed the same Slackware snapshot I used on the
> Toshiba, and did the home directory transfer without any problem at
> all with the default tickless kernel. The hardware isn't identical,
> and while I don't know the internals of the Linux kernel at all, my
> gut, backed up by many years of OS development work in scheduling and
> memory management, is telling me that the key difference is dual- vs.
> single-core. Just a guess.
>
> Hope this helps --
>
> /Don
>    
Hello everyone,

I hope I can add something here, because I am experiencing the exact 
same Problem as Don describes. I'm running a PackardBell EasyNote MB89 
featuring a Core 2 Duo, 4 GB of RAM, Intel Chipset (Santa Rosa), SATA 
HDD. My Machine even hangs at boot, absolutely doing nothing until i 
wiggle the touchpad. This is definately reproduceable, but I think it 
doesn't occur that often in X-Window-System, if X is off I can just wait 
a couple of seconds and there I go.

I compiled other kernels myself with tickless disabled and Ticks set to 
various values (250, 1000) which completely resolved my problem. If you 
want, I can get you some Output/logs/whatever because I'm fixed to using 
this kernel ATM (which doesn't really hurt because I use X and son't 
shut down my Notebook that often).
Even though I don't know what exact kernel-version this problem brings 
(using another machine ATM from vacation) I can say that I existed since 
Opensuse 11.1 I guess, so maybe 2.6.30 and above.

Hope I can help --

Stefan