Technical Advisory

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This Technical Advisory describes an issue which may or may not affect the customer’s product

Intel Technical Advisory TA-1039-3

5200 NE Elam Young Parkway

Hillsboro, OR 97124

April 04, 2014

Unexpected system behavior exhibited with Intel servers configured

with Intel

Xeon

processor E5-2600 or E5-2600 V2 product families,

and LRDIMMs

Products Affected

Intel

Server Board S2600xx product family

Intel

Server System R1000xx product family

Intel

Server System R2000xx product family

Intel

Server System P4000xx product family

Description

While performing memory validation testing of LRDIMMs, Intel experienced unexpected system behavior on some Intel

server systems configured with Intel

Xeon

processor E5-2600 or E5-2600 V2 product families:

 Some systems were seen to hang at POST or reset.

 Possible SEL entries associated with this issue may indicate a power issue due to over current protection (OCP) or

VR, CATERRs, and uncorrectable ECC errors. Examples of SEL entries may include:

 CRITICAL event: Pwr Unit Status reports the power unit has suffered a failure.

 CRITICAL event: Mmry ECC Sensor reports an uncorrectable error. There has been an uncorrectable ECC or

other uncorrectable memory error for the memory module RANK_2, CPU_2, Channel = F, DIMM_F1.

 CRITICAL event: CATERR reports it has been asserted.

Systems exhibiting these errors were configured as follows:

Using 1066MHz, 1333MHz, 1600MHz, or 1866MHz LRDIMMs populated as one DIMM per channel (1DPC), two DIMMs

per channel (2DPC), or three DIMMs per channel (3DPC).

Note: Error symptoms may differ between the systems configured with the Intel

Xeon

processor E5-2600 product

family and those configured with the Intel

Xeon

processor E5-2600 V2 product family.

Root Cause

1) System BIOS revisions up through R02.01.0002 added “Phase Shedding” option for the memory VR operation

which improves VR efficiency under lighter loading.

2) Certain larger capacity LRDIMMs may consume power levels that exceed Intel’s design assumptions, which may

result in stability issues with the “Phase Shedding” option enabled.

Corrective Action / Resolution

Intel has added a user configurable BIOS setting labeled as “Phase Shedding” to BIOS revisions starting from

02.02.0002, with the default set to “Disabled”. This will provide full VR power and alleviate instability with LRDIMMs.

Summary of content (2 pages)

PAGE 1
This Technical Advisory describes an issue which may or may not affect the customer’s product Intel Technical Advisory TA-1039-3 5200 NE Elam Young Parkway Hillsboro, OR 97124 April 04, 2014 Unexpected system behavior exhibited with Intel servers configured with Intel® Xeon® processor E5-2600 or E5-2600 V2 product families, and LRDIMMs Products Affected ® Intel Server Board S2600xx product family ® Intel Server System R1000xx product family ® Intel Server System R2000xx product family ® Intel Server Sys
PAGE 2
Customers should only “Enable” the “Phase Shedding” option for optimized power in 1DPC and 2DPC configurations and when using LRDIMMs sizes below 16GBs. Intel Recommendations Customers with server systems configured with LRDIMMs and experiencing the documented error symptoms above should update the system BIOS to revision 02.02.0002 or later. Workarounds Before installing LRDIMMs, update the BIOS to version 02.02.0002 or later.