[PLUG] local hardware

[Steve Bonds]

On 3/23/06, Steve Bonds 1s7k8uhcd001-at-sneakemail.com wrote:

> My only concern is VMware now coredumps a lot, which is bad since
> that's all this box does.  However, I'm a revision behind on their
> beta server so I'll upgrade and see how it goes.  I'm a bit puzzled
> why everything else would work great yet have one application choke...

It turns out the problem is the AMD processor.  I figured AMD or Intel
made little difference-- but I was wrong.

AMD64 processors do not keep themselves in time sync on multiprocessor
systems.  VMware was getting confused because it would send a SCSI
command to its virtual disk, then when it checked how long it took it
came up with a negative number and panicked.

The workaround is to tell each virtual machine to only run on a single
processor.  This nicely fixed the coredumps.

Description of the source of the problem (SCSI timings):

http://www.vmware.com/community/thread.jspa?threadID=7644

The official fixes:

http://www.vmware.com/support/kb/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=2041 (didn't work)
http://www.vmware.com/support/kb/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=2039 (did work)

Some other folks who suffered my same fate:

http://www.vmware.com/community/thread.jspa?threadID=20973
http://www.vmware.com/community/thread.jspa?threadID=19953

Fortunately, with this fix my new system is all working now!

If I had to do it over I'd probably get an Intel dual-core processor
on an Intel motherboard-- a bit pricier, but probably fewer surprises
in the long run.

  -- Steve