Sporadic sound / IDE issues due to suspected IRQ sharing issue

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel]

On my Ubuntu Gutsy 7.10 system (Linux andromeda 2.6.22-14-generic #1 SMP Sun Oct 14 21:45:15 GMT 2007 x86_64 GNU/Linux) I am sporadically confronted with the situation that all of a sudden the sound output is kind of chopped/garbled, i.e. only some fragments of the audio output is played, some miliseconds are skipped, and so on...

In parallel, some IRQ issues are reported in the dmesg output, which hint at an IRQ sharing conflict between the {S|P}ATA controller (ata_piix, pata_marvell via libata) and my sound card (Creative Labs SB Live! 5.1 using the emu10k driver). Unforunately, I cannot change the IRQ routing for the PCI card to use an unshared IRQ (most likely a limitation of the MSI P965 Neo-F V2 mainboard [which is, BTW, running the most recent BIOS version 3.7] I am using) I will attach detailed lspci and dmesg output to this ticket shortly.

The problem can only be corrected by a reboot.

Let me know if you need additional details.

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

As I just noticed, the IDE issues did not pop up this time (but just an "irq 11: nobody cared" error), so I am attaching an older dmesg output, which showed some IDE issues.

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

FYI: Both lspci results were captured *after* rebooting. If this is not sufficient, please let me know and I will attach updated versions taken before rebooting when the issue pops up the next time.

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

Hi Thilo,

You might want to try booting with the "irqpoll" kernel option. Also the following wiki might help:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/DebuggingIRQProblems

Let us know if this helps resolve your issue.

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

One more thing. . .

The Hardy Heron kernel was recently uploaded for testing. We'd really appreciate it if you could try testing with this newer kernel and verify if this issue still exists. Unfortunately, the Hardy Heron Alpha1 LiveCD was released with the older 2.6.22 kernel. You'll have to manually install the newer Hardy Heron kernel in order to test. This should not be the case for Alpha2 which is set to come out around Dec 20. However, here are the instructions to install if you choose to do so, otherwise just wait for Alpha2 to come out:

1) edit the file /etc/apt/sources.list and add the following line:

deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu hardy main restricted

2) sudo apt-get update
3) sudo apt-get install linux-image-2.6.24-1-generic
4) reboot and select the new kernel from the grub menu

After you've tested, please feel free to revert back - ie boot into the old kernel, sudo apt-get remove linux-image-2.6.24-1-generic, and remove the line from /etc/apt/sources.list . Please update this report with your results. Thanks in advance!

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

This bug report is being closed because we received no reponse to the last inquiry for information. Please reopen it if this is still an issue in the current Ubuntu release. To reopen the bug report you can click on the current status, under the Status column, and change the Status back to "New". Also note, the Hardy Heron Alpha4 series was recently released which contains an updated version of the kernel. You can download and try the new Hardy Heron Alpha release from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/hardy/ . You should be able to then test the new kernel via the LiveCD rather than needing to manually install. If you can, please verify if this bug still exists or not and report back your results. General information regarding the release can also be found here: http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/ . Thanks.

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

Sorry, it took a while to get back...

In the meantime I upgraded to Hardy. Unfortunately, the issue still exists:

Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619700] irq 17: nobody cared (try booting with the "irqpoll" option)
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619710] Pid: 0, comm: swapper Tainted: PF 2.6.24-18-generic #1
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619712]
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619712] Call Trace:
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619715] <IRQ> [__report_bad_irq+0x1e/0x80] __report_bad_irq+0x1e/0x80
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619748] [note_interrupt+0x2ad/0x2e0] note_interrupt+0x2ad/0x2e0
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619761] [handle_fasteoi_irq+0xa1/0x110] handle_fasteoi_irq+0xa1/0x110
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619770] [do_IRQ+0x7b/0x100] do_IRQ+0x7b/0x100
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619773] [mwait_idle+0x0/0x50] mwait_idle+0x0/0x50
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619777] [default_idle+0x0/0x40] default_idle+0x0/0x40
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619780] [ret_from_intr+0x0/0x0a] ret_from_intr+0x0/0xa
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619783] <EOI> [mwait_idle+0x42/0x50] mwait_idle+0x42/0x50
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619802] [cpu_idle+0x6f/0xc0] cpu_idle+0x6f/0xc0
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619810] [start_kernel+0x2c5/0x350] start_kernel+0x2c5/0x350
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619819] [x86_64_start_kernel+0x12e/0x140] _sinittext+0x12e/0x140
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619828]
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619829] handlers:
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619830] [ata_piix:ata_interrupt+0x0/0x240] (ata_interrupt+0x0/0x240 [libata])
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619851] [snd_emu10k1:snd_emu10k1_interrupt+0x0/0x5c0] (snd_emu10k1_interrupt+0x0/0x5c0 [snd_emu10k1])
Jun 8 16:43:10 andromeda kernel: [70816.619863] Disabling IRQ #17
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.025348] ata1.01: exception Emask 0x0 SAct 0x0 SErr 0x0 action 0x2 frozen
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.025360] ata1.01: cmd a0/00:00:00:00:00/00:00:00:00:00/b0 tag 0
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.025361] cdb 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.025362] res 40/00:03:00:00:00/00:00:00:00:00/a0 Emask 0x4 (timeout)
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.025365] ata1.01: status: { DRDY }
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.026566] BAR5:00:02 01:7F 02:22 03:CA 04:00 05:00 06:00 07:00 08:00 09:00 0A:00 0B:00 0C:07 0D:00 0E:00 0F:00
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.027621] ata1: soft resetting link
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.680722] ata1.00: configured for UDMA/66
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.852420] ata1.01: configured for UDMA/66
Jun 8 16:43:42 andromeda kernel: [70848.852434] ata1: EH complete

Booting with 'irqpoll' enabled, suppresses the issue (and already did so in Gutsy).

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

Thanks Thilo, Unfortunately this bug doesn't qualify for a stable release update to Hardy or Gutsy - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/StableReleaseUpdates . However, the kernel team is actively developing the upcoming 2.6.26 based Intrepid Ibex 8.10 kernel. If you could confirm this issue (and workaround of booting with irqpoll) still exists against the upcoming Intrepid kernel by testing the latest Intrepid Alpha release that would be great. The following link will contain more information about the Inrepid Ibex Alpha releases, currently Intrepid Ibex Alpha 2 - http://www.ubuntu.com/testing . The only thing to note is that the Alpha 1 and 2 releases unfortunately do not contain LiveCD images for testing. You may want to wait until Alpha3 is released so you can test via a LiveCD. Thanks in advance.

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

The Ubuntu Kernel Team is planning to move to the 2.6.27 kernel for the upcoming Intrepid Ibex 8.10 release. As a result, the kernel team would appreciate it if you could please test this newer 2.6.27 Ubuntu kernel. There are one of two ways you should be able to test:

1) If you are comfortable installing packages on your own, the linux-image-2.6.27-* package is currently available for you to install and test.

--or--

2) The upcoming Alpha5 for Intrepid Ibex 8.10 will contain this newer 2.6.27 Ubuntu kernel. Alpha5 is set to be released Thursday Sept 4. Please watch http://www.ubuntu.com/testing for Alpha5 to be announced. You should then be able to test via a LiveCD.

Please let us know immediately if this newer 2.6.27 kernel resolves the bug reported here or if the issue remains. More importantly, please open a new bug report for each new bug/regression introduced by the 2.6.27 kernel and tag the bug report with 'linux-2.6.27'. Also, please specifically note if the issue does or does not appear in the 2.6.26 kernel. Thanks again, we really appreicate your help and feedback.

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel (thilo.ginkel)]

I tried to reproduce the bug using the Alpha 4 live CD and have been unsuccessful so far (in an audio playback session lasting multiple hours where Gutsy and Hardy usually locked up). Of course, not being able to reproduce the bug does not necessarily mean that it is really gone - we will probably see after Intrepid has been released... ;-)

If I have time, I will also re-test this with 2.6.27, but I'll have to wait for the live CD to become available as just installing a new kernel will break my X server...

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

Thanks Thilo. I'm going to tentatively mark this "Fix Released" for Intrepid based on your Alpha4 results. Alpha5 shouldn't regress, however we all know that's not always the case :) If you notice any regressions regarding this issue please reopen this by setting the status back to "New". Thanks.