Re: [PATCH clocksource 1/3] clocksource: Reject bogus watchdog clocksource measurements

["Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@kernel.org>]

On Wed, Nov 30, 2022 at 12:49:24PM +0800, Feng Tang wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 29, 2022 at 08:12:06PM -0800, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > On Wed, Nov 30, 2022 at 09:38:00AM +0800, Feng Tang wrote:
> > > On Tue, Nov 29, 2022 at 11:29:15AM -0800, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > > [...]
> > > > > > > IIUC, this will make TSC to watchdog HPET every 500 ms. We have got
> > > > > > > report that the 500ms watchdog timer had big impact on some parallel
> > > > > > > workload on big servers, that was another factor for us to seek
> > > > > > > stopping the timer.
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > Another approach would be to slow it down.  Given the tighter bounds
> > > > > > on skew, it could be done every (say) 10 seconds while allowing
> > > > > > 2 milliseconds skew instead of the current 100 microseconds.
> > > > > 
> > > > > Yes, this can reduce the OS noise much. One problem is if we make it
> > > > > a general interface, there is some clocksource whose warp time is
> > > > > less than 10 seconds, like ACPI PM_TIMER (3-4 seconds), and I don't
> > > > > know if other ARCHs have similar cases.
> > > > 
> > > > Maybe a simpler approach is for systems with such high sensitivity to
> > > > OS noise to simply disable the clocksource watchdog.  ;-)
> > > 
> > > That's what the reported did, test with and without "tsc=reliable"
> > > parameter :)
> > > 
> > > And AFAIK, many customers with big server farms hate to add more
> > > cmdline parameters when we suggested so.
> > 
> > It can be surprisingly hard.  It is sometimes easier to patch the kernel
> > to change the default. 
> 
> Indeed, sometimes we were askd to provide patch than cmdline parameters :)

Do any of them like CONFIG_BOOT_CONFIG_EMBED?  ;-)

> > Part of the problem is getting the right set
> > of command-line parameters associated with the right versions of the
> > kernel in the not-uncommon case where different portions of the server
> > farm are running different versions of the kernel.
> > 
> > > > > > > Is this about the concern of possible TSC frequency calibration
> > > > > > > issue, as the 40 ms per second drift between HPET and TSC? With 
> > > > > > > b50db7095fe0 backported, we also have another patch to force TSC
> > > > > > > calibration for those platforms which get the TSC freq directly
> > > > > > > from CPUID or MSR and don't have such info in dmesg:
> > > > > > >  "tsc: Refined TSC clocksource calibration: 2693.509 MHz" 
> > > > > > > 
> > > > > > > https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20220509144110.9242-1-feng.tang@intel.com/
> > > > > > > 
> > > > > > > We did met tsc calibration issue due to some firmware issue, and
> > > > > > > this can help to catch it. You can try it if you think it's relevant.
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > I am giving this a go, thank you!
> > > > > 
> > > > > Thanks for spending time testing it!
> > > > 
> > > > And here are the results from setting tsc_force_recalibrate to 1:
> > > > 
> > > > $ dmesg | grep -E 'calibrat|clocksource'
> > > > [    5.272939] clocksource: refined-jiffies: mask: 0xffffffff max_cycles: 0xffffffff, max_idle_ns: 1910969940391419 ns
> > > > [   16.830644] clocksource: hpet: mask: 0xffffffff max_cycles: 0xffffffff, max_idle_ns: 76450417870 ns
> > > > [   17.938020] clocksource: tsc-early: mask: 0xffffffffffffffff max_cycles: 0x36a8d32ce31, max_idle_ns: 881590731004 ns
> > > > [   24.548583] clocksource: jiffies: mask: 0xffffffff max_cycles: 0xffffffff, max_idle_ns: 1911260446275000 ns
> > > > [   49.762432] clocksource: Switched to clocksource tsc-early
> > > > [   50.076769] clocksource: acpi_pm: mask: 0xffffff max_cycles: 0xffffff, max_idle_ns: 2085701024 ns
> > > > [   55.615946] clocksource: tsc: mask: 0xffffffffffffffff max_cycles: 0x36a8d32ce31, max_idle_ns: 881590731004 ns
> > > > [   55.640270] clocksource: Switched to clocksource tsc
> > > > [   56.694371] tsc: Warning: TSC freq calibrated by CPUID/MSR differs from what is calibrated by HW timer, please check with vendor!!
> > > > [   56.724550] tsc: Previous calibrated TSC freq:        1896.000 MHz
> > > > [   56.737646] tsc: TSC freq recalibrated by [HPET]:     1975.000 MHz
> > > 
> > > Looks like there is really something wrong here. I assume the first
> > > number '1896 MHz' is got from CPUID(0x15)'s math calculation.
> > 
> > How about this from earlier in that same console?
> > 
> > [    0.000000] efi: EFI v2.80 by American Megatrends
> > [    0.000000] efi: ACPI=0x6f569000 ACPI 2.0=0x6f569014 TPMFinalLog=0x6f56b000 SMBIOS=0x753e1000 SMBIOS 3.0=0x753e0000 MEMATTR=0x62176018 ESRT=0x64bd1018 TPMEventLog=0x58737018
> > [    0.000000] [Firmware Bug]: TPM Final Events table missing or invalid
> > [    0.000000] SMBIOS 3.5.0 present.
> > [    0.000000] DMI: Quanta Grand Teton 1F0TUBZ0007/Grand Teton MB, BIOS F0T_1A15 08/25/2022
> > [    0.000000] tsc: Detected 1900.000 MHz processor
> > [    0.000000] tsc: Detected 1896.000 MHz TSC
> 
> I'm still not sure, but it's likely from CPUID(0x15). I met cases
> that even severs of same generations get their tsc frequence from
> different sources.
> 
> I locally have debug patch to check it:
> 
> diff --git a/arch/x86/kernel/tsc.c b/arch/x86/kernel/tsc.c
> index cafacb2e58cc..82ddb4b0529a 100644
> --- a/arch/x86/kernel/tsc.c
> +++ b/arch/x86/kernel/tsc.c
> @@ -654,8 +654,11 @@ unsigned long native_calibrate_tsc(void)
>  	 * frequency and is the most accurate one so far we have. This
>  	 * is considered a known frequency.
>  	 */
> -	if (crystal_khz != 0)
> +	if (crystal_khz != 0) {
> +		printk("tsc: using CPUID[0x15] crystal_khz= %d kHz ebx=%d eax=%d\n",
> +		crystal_khz, ebx_numerator, eax_denominator);
>  		setup_force_cpu_cap(X86_FEATURE_TSC_KNOWN_FREQ);
> +	}
>  
>  	/*
>  	 * Some Intel SoCs like Skylake and Kabylake don't report the crystal
> @@ -668,6 +671,7 @@ unsigned long native_calibrate_tsc(void)
>  		cpuid(0x16, &eax_base_mhz, &ebx, &ecx, &edx);
>  		crystal_khz = eax_base_mhz * 1000 *
>  			eax_denominator / ebx_numerator;
> +		printk("tsc: using CPUID[0x16] base_khz=%d kHz\n", crystal_khz);
>  	}
>  
>  	if (crystal_khz == 0)

I will give this one a go, thank you!

> This remind me that maybe we can add a line in dmesg telling people
> which exact soure that the TSC frequency comes from (CPUID, MSR or
> calibration from HW timers like HPET/PM_TIMER).

Thus far, it seems that this information could be useful.

> > > I thinks 2 more things could be try:
> > > 
> > > * add "nohpet" to the cmdline, so the tsc_force_recalibrate should use
> > >   ACPI PM_TIMER to do the calibration, say a third-party check.
> > 
> > OK, getting things teed up for TSC recalibration and nohpet.
> > 
> > > * If the system don't have auto-adjusted time setting like NTP, I
> > >   guess the system time will have obvious drift comparing to a normal
> > >   clock or a mobile phone time, as the deviation is about 4%, which
> > >   is 2.4 minutes per hour.
> > 
> > No ntpd, but there is a chronyd.
> > 
> > I will let you know what happens with HPET disabled and TSC recalibration
> > enabled.

And here you go:

[    0.000000] tsc: Detected 1900.000 MHz processor
[    0.000000] tsc: Detected 1896.000 MHz TSC
[    5.254788] clocksource: refined-jiffies: mask: 0xffffffff max_cycles: 0xffffffff, max_idle_ns: 1910969940391419 ns
[   25.669260] clocksource: tsc-early: mask: 0xffffffffffffffff max_cycles: 0x36a8d32ce31, max_idle_ns: 881590731004 ns
[   32.182958] clocksource: jiffies: mask: 0xffffffff max_cycles: 0xffffffff, max_idle_ns: 1911260446275000 ns
[   57.785756] clocksource: Switched to clocksource tsc-early
[   58.106661] clocksource: acpi_pm: mask: 0xffffff max_cycles: 0xffffff, max_idle_ns: 2085701024 ns
[   63.578433] clocksource: tsc: mask: 0xffffffffffffffff max_cycles: 0x36a8d32ce31, max_idle_ns: 881590731004 ns
[   63.602169] clocksource: Switched to clocksource tsc
[   64.636612] tsc: Warning: TSC freq calibrated by CPUID/MSR differs from what is calibrated by HW timer, please check with vendor!!
[   64.664615] tsc: Previous calibrated TSC freq:        1896.000 MHz
[   64.677714] tsc: TSC freq recalibrated by [PM_TIMER]:         1975.000 MHz

Same same, give or take, anyway.

							Thanx, Paul