Re: PEBS bug on HSW: "Unexpected number of pebs records 10" (was: Re: [GIT PULL] perf changes for v3.12)

[Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org>]

* Stephane Eranian <eranian@googlemail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, Sep 10, 2013 at 7:29 AM, Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org> wrote:
> >
> > * Stephane Eranian <eranian@googlemail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Tue, Sep 10, 2013 at 6:38 AM, Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org> wrote:
> >> >
> >> > * Stephane Eranian <eranian@googlemail.com> wrote:
> >> >
> >> >> Hi,
> >> >>
> >> >> Ok, so I am able to reproduce the problem using a simpler
> >> >> test case with a simple multithreaded program where
> >> >> #threads >> #CPUs.
> >> >
> >> > Does it go away if you use 'perf record --all-cpus'?
> >> >
> >> Haven't tried that yet.
> >>
> >> But I verified the DS pointers:
> >> init:
> >> CPU6 pebs base=ffff8808262de000 index=ffff8808262de000
> >> intr=ffff8808262de0c0 max=ffff8808262defc0
> >> crash:
> >> CPU6 pebs base=ffff8808262de000 index=ffff8808262de9c0
> >> intr=ffff8808262de0c0 max=ffff8808262defc0
> >>
> >> Neither the base nor the max are modified.
> >> The index simply goes beyond the threshold but that's not a bug.
> >> It is 12 after the threshold of 1, so total 13 is my new crash report.
> >>
> >> Two things to try:
> >> - measure only one thread/core
> >> - move the threshold a bit farther away (to get 2 or 3 entries)
> >>
> >> The threshold is where to generate the interrupt. It does not mean where
> >> to stop PEBS recording. So it is possible that in HSW, we may get into a
> >> situation where it takes time to get to the handler to stop the PMU. I
> >> don't know how given we use NMI. Well, unless we were already servicing
> >> an NMI at the time. But given that we stop the PMU almost immediately in
> >> the handler, I don't see how that would possible. The other oddity in
> >> HSW is that we clear the NMI on entry to the handler and not at the end.
> >> I never gotten an good explanation as to why that was necessary. So
> >> maybe it is related...
> >
> > Do you mean:
> >
> >         if (!x86_pmu.late_ack)
> >                 apic_write(APIC_LVTPC, APIC_DM_NMI);
> >
> > AFAICS that means the opposite: that we clear the NMI late, i.e. shortly
> > before return, after we've processed the PMU.
> >
> Yeah, the opposity, I got confused.
> 
> Let me try reverting that.
> Also curious about the influence of the LBR here.

You could exclude any LBR interaction by doing tests with "-e cycles:p".

Thanks,

	Ingo