Possible SMP bug: Linux kernel 2.4.18, Xeon

Possible SMP bug: Linux kernel 2.4.18, Xeon

[Anton Cook]

We are having an intermittent 'hang'  with Linux 2.4.18 on a dual Xeon CPU SMP enabled host:

[1] The hang occurs on  a production web server/database application system approximately 1/week. At a hang that there is no HDD activity. One console dump (see below) showed 'Divide error:0000' Kernel panic: Aiee, killing interrupt handler'. The host may still be 'pingable' after the hang in some cases. Examination of the console dump that we obtained indicated the DIV in smp_local_timer_interrupt called from smp_apic_timer_interrupt. This is the divide at the line:
__setup_APIC_LVTT(calibration_result/prof_counter[cpu]);
It seems likely that the problem may be triggered by high HDD activity. We have seen it most often when we run 'rsync'  for daily backups.
[2] Kernel version - 2.4.18. Slackware 8
[3] Kernel build options include:
    CONFIG_M586=y
    CONFIG_SMP=y
    CONFIG_HIMEM4G=y (There is 2GB RAM)
 
[4] Environment.
Processors: 2 x Intel Xeon 2.0GHz,
Mainboard: Intel SE7500CW.  
Disk drive configuration: 4 x IDE ST312028A - Software RAID1 array of 4 partitions on one pair of HDDs - the remaining 2 HDDs are not currently used

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Anton Cook

The console dump (handwritten source for what it is worth) is reproduced below:

Divide error: 0000
CPU - 1070834432
EIP - 0010[cc0110f30] Not tainted
E flag: 00010046
eax: 000f35eb ebx: 00b17400  ecx: 00000000 edx: 00000000
esi: 0558ba00 edi: 00000000 ebp: c02c5d00 esp: c195b758

ds: 0018 es: 0018 ss: 0018

Process (pid:0 stackpage:d953b00)

(Too much indistinct handwritten data  for stack and call trace to reproduce.)

Code: f7 f1 50 e8 dc ?? ??  8b 83 00 56 20 c0 83 c4 82 83 80

<0> Kernel panic: Aiee, killing interrupt handler
In interrupt handler - not syncing



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