AMD Confirms It's Issuing a Fix To Stop New Ryzen Processors From Crashing Desktops (digitaltrends.com)

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AMD Confirms It's Issuing a Fix To Stop New Ryzen Processors From Crashing Desktops (digitaltrends.com)

Posted by msmash on Tuesday March 21, 2017 @08:00AM from the what's-happening dept.

AMD says the company has been able to figure out why FMA3 code is causing system hangs on PCs using a new Ryzen desktop processor. From a report: Although AMD didn't provide a detailed report on the problem's root cause, the company said that BIOS changes will be distributed to motherboard manufacturers to resolve the issue. Customers are encouraged to keep an eye on their motherboard vendor's website for an update. "We are aware of select instances where FMA code can result in a system hang," the company said. "We have identified the root cause." AMD released three Ryzen-branded desktop processors at the beginning of March that plug into motherboards based on AMD's new AM4 socket. The trio of processors include the Ryzen 7 1800X, the Ryzen 7 1700X, and the Ryzen 7 1700. However, all three reportedly cause a hard system lock when running certain FMA3 workloads. The problem was replicated across all three processors and a variety of motherboards.

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Re:This is why you should use APPS. by ZorinLynx · 2017-03-21 08:09 · Score: 1

I knew it would be a bad idea to install that laptop logged into Slashdot at collapsed-drunkard level in the pub restroom.
w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Penguinisto · 2017-03-21 08:11 · Score: 3, Interesting

Kidding, but I'm old enough to remember when running Windows 95 on the old AMD K6 boxen was a no-go...
That said, does this fix affect performance any (no matter the OS)?

--
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
1. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Shinobi · 2017-03-21 08:23 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  K5 had a bug like that too. And let's not forget Athlon/Athlon XP era and AGP issues. The Piledriver Opterons required a patch to fix a bug in the hypervisor system which allowed for escape from a VM. AMD has had just as many horrible bugs as Intel, which can be summed up like this: Making flawless high-performance chips is difficult.
2. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Moof123 · 2017-03-21 08:24 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Look at an intel errata list some time. There are huge numbers of bugs in all CPU's in recent times. Bios patches trap the errant instructions and use a work around. Nothing really to see here. I've had several intel instabilities get resolved with a bios flash. It is yet another reminder to always wait a few months after major revisions for the dust to settle unless your goal is to actually be an early adopter for the hell of it.
3. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by phorm · 2017-03-21 09:15 · Score: 1
  
  I remember it working but needing some weird patch of config change on Win95.
  On Win98 it worked without any special hacking needed.
4. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Carewolf · 2017-03-21 09:46 · Score: 1
  
  Kidding, but I'm old enough to remember when running Windows 95 on the old AMD K6 boxen was a no-go...
  That said, does this fix affect performance any (no matter the OS)?
  I never had any issue or quirks with Win95 on my K6. Though that might have been second stepping.
5. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by twistedcubic · 2017-03-21 10:00 · Score: 1
  
  Since there are no X370 motherboards available, we're going to have to wait a few months anyway.
6. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Anonymous Coward · 2017-03-21 10:09 · Score: 1
  
  Just a microcode update
7. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by RogueyWon · 2017-03-21 11:05 · Score: 2
  
  AMD's issue here isn't necessarily that they have more of these problems or that the problems are more serious. It's that they have a reputation for having more of these problems and for them being more serious when they happen.
  A lot of people, self included to a degree (though I do try to counter it) have picked up trust issues around AMD products over the years. In many cases, including mine, that may well be because we tried running AMD CPUs which just run a bit hotter than the Intel equivalents with cooling that would have been acceptable (but no more) in an Intel system, and ran into stability/longevity problems as a result. So it's more of a user-error than something innate in AMD's hardware. But the reputation is there and it's very easily reinforced by stories like this, even if it's a bit unfair.
8. Re: w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by dfeifer · 2017-03-21 12:47 · Score: 1
  
  Don't remember the agp issue, but vesa local bus was a pain in the butt
9. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Highdude702 · 2017-03-21 14:18 · Score: 1
  
  I've had multiple in my hands at my local Frys Electronics here in las vegas. I would have to say their available. The Asus x370 Prime, and the white MSI board with the dual m.2 are in stock as we speak.
10. Re: w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Anonymous Coward · 2017-03-21 19:01 · Score: 1
  
  It doesn't matter how hoy the CPUs get. AMD has damn critical bugs in their chip microcode. They have a long history of failing to catch microcode issues in emulation before chip tape out. It must be horribly embarrassing for the engineers that work there.
11. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by robvdl · 2017-03-21 20:44 · Score: 1
  
  And lets not forget the Bulldozer bug, I have been putting up with bluescreens and freezing for years because Gigabyte failed to produce a BIOS update for something that had a fix from AMD also: https://scalibq.wordpress.com/... I have a new system now so not longer have this issue, but it surely was frustrating to get it blue screen several times a day.
12. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by TheRaven64 · 2017-03-21 22:44 · Score: 1
  
  And some of them were security critical. Remember having to disable hyperthreading because it let one thread snoop on another's cache? Or having to disable transactional memory because it allowed arbitrary physical memory manipulation from an untrusted process.
  
  --
  I am TheRaven on Soylent News
13. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Shinobi · 2017-03-22 00:13 · Score: 1
  
  That's been the case on the AMD side too, like the hypervisor bug in Piledriver Opterons for example.
14. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by wbr1 · 2017-03-22 01:09 · Score: 1
  
  I have been running 3-5 AMD FX series (various revisions, bulldozer, and up) at slight overclocks (100 to 200mhz), on stock AMD coolers for years. The only stability problems I have had were related to buggy drivers and bad RAM, not the CPU/overclock. Have not had a single one die either. Not sure what you are doing but in my experience that is pretty abnormal.
  
  --
  Silence is a state of mime.
15. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by ausekilis · 2017-03-22 01:47 · Score: 1
  
  Sage advice for nearly every industry.
  Never buy the first model year of a new car design. You're bound to get engine or transmission issues at a higher rate than after they've worked things out a bit.
  Never buy the first release of a new game console. Just look at the XB360 RROD, or the PS1's CD-ROM issues.
  Never pre-order or buy day-one titles. Look at Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed (Brotherhood?) issues. Or Batman Arkham Knight on PC - with 2 stop sales and recalls/refunds. Or really any release that sells half the game, then another half as DLC. Just wait for the GOTY edition to come out that has all the stuff.
  I'm sure there's other stuff you don't want to buy the first of.
16. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by robinsc · 2017-03-22 18:37 · Score: 1
  
  Remember intel inside can't divide ....
  
  --
  Linkedin http://in.linkedin.com/in/robinsaikatchatterjee
17. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by cheesybagel · 2017-03-23 01:09 · Score: 1
  
  AFAIK Athlon/Athlon XP had no such bugs, the issues were bugs in the VIA chipsets. AMD's chipsets worked fine.
  I don't remember any bugs on Piledriver. I do remember that Bulldozer had a TLB bug though. The workaround was to disable the TLBs and it significantly hampered performance.
18. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by cheesybagel · 2017-03-23 01:11 · Score: 1
  
  Really? How about using the damned stock cooler? That's what I've done and had no issues.
19. Re: w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by cheesybagel · 2017-03-23 01:13 · Score: 1
  
  So you forgot the Intel TSX bug, the Intel F00F bug, the Intel FDIV bug, etc.
20. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by lsatenstein · 2017-03-23 01:29 · Score: 1
  
  A+BxC in one instruction is the fix. Apparently this instruction fails when the Ryzen is at some power saving stage.
  I believe it is a bug in the Ryzen Microcode, that can be changed by modifying the motherboard. In otherwords, fix the MB for now and fix the instruction in the Ryzen ASAP. I believe there will be a microcode patch for Windows and Linux and whatever to fix the CPU at some near distant future.
  By the way, my CPU has an INTEL patch to correct faulty instructions. It should not happen, but it does. And by the way, the NSA has not explored the effect of modifying cpu instructions. I hope they do not go to that extreme.
  
  --
  Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
21. Re:w00t - the K6 bug all over again! by Shinobi · 2017-03-23 02:24 · Score: 1
  
  The AMD 761 held fixes for the bug, but VIA and nVidia had problems due to AMD withholding information of the bug. Ugh, I can still remember all that annoying AGPGART messing about...
  As for Piledriver: https://lists.debian.org/debia...
What the fuck is FMA? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-03-21 08:11 · Score: 1

C'mon Slashdot, give us at least some clue instead of simply copying and pasting someone else's article.
1. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by gander666 · 2017-03-21 08:22 · Score: 1
  
  Apparently, I had to look into the forum posts that the FA referenced, and FMA instructions are Fused Multiply Add, whatever the fuck that is.
  
  --
  Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress ... but I repeat myself. - Mark T
2. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by thegreatbob · 2017-03-21 08:33 · Score: 1
  
  It's like a teleporter accident gone horribly right.
  
  --
  There is no XUL, only WebExtensions...
3. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by Baloroth · 2017-03-21 08:41 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Apparently, I had to look into the forum posts that the FA referenced, and FMA instructions are Fused Multiply Add, whatever the fuck that is.
  After looking at Wikipedia for 5 seconds, FMA instructions perform round(a+b*c) in a single operation, so you can a) speed up and b) get more accurate results whenever you need such a mathematical operation (which is actually reasonably frequently, in numerical computing).
  
  --
  "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
4. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by godrik · 2017-03-21 08:50 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  FMA instructions are Fused Multiply Add instruction. Usually their are on SIMD registers and allow you to do "a += b *c". Modern cores can do that on a vector in a single cycle. Actually, they may be able to do more than one FMA on a vector register in a single cycle.
  FMA are most commonly used to compute dot product, and are therefore very helpful in linear algebra. (And so they are useful in a ton of data mining algorithms.)
5. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by tlhIngan · 2017-03-21 09:53 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  FMA are most commonly used to compute dot product, and are therefore very helpful in linear algebra. (And so they are useful in a ton of data mining algorithms.)
  Also known as the Multiply-Accumulate (MAC) instruction in DSPs. MAC is an extremely common instruction in signal processing kernels (the inner loop that does the calculations). It is vital to be able to do a lot of them per clock cycle. In fact, it's often why DSPs have special looping registers so you can do zero-overhead loops and thus doing a sequence of MACs without incurring branch (and branch prediction) times thus being able to do nothing but this instruction for very little overhead
6. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by UnknownSoldier · 2017-03-21 12:52 · Score: 1
  
  > FMA instructions are Fused Multiply Add, whatever the fuck that is.
  Really? You're posting on /. and you can't google it?
  * Multiply-Accumulate
  This commonly shows up when you are lerping (linear interpolating) between two values, a and b, you have a interpolation parameter usually called t:
  
  x = a + (b-a)*t
  
  Compilers will see this pattern and generate a FMA instruction for it, or you can write your own.
  Copying the code snippet from this StackOverflow Question: How to use Fused Multiply-Add (FMA) instructions with SSE/AVX
  
  float mul_add(float a, float b, float c) { return a*b + c; } __m256 mul_addv(__m256 a, __m256 b, __m256 c) { return _mm256_add_ps(_mm256_mul_ps(a, b), c); }
  
  The compiler will emit this instruction:
  
  vfmadd
  
  /voice = "Nick Burns"
  Now, was that so hard?
  But I guess it's easier to bitch about not understanding something then ask for help.
7. Re:What the fuck is FMA? by Anonymous Coward · 2017-03-21 13:46 · Score: 1
  
  The point isn't 'can I google it'. It's 'why the fuck should I have to?' I doubt more than a tiny minority of Slashdot readers already knew what FMA meant, so defining it in the summary would have taken 5 seconds and saved lots of aggravation.
8. Re: What the fuck is FMA? by Zero__Kelvin · 2017-03-22 01:39 · Score: 1
  
  No it won't. You'll get a link error.
  
  --
  Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Re:This is why you should use APPS. by Penguinisto · 2017-03-21 08:13 · Score: 1

s'okay; at least it's still out of the reach of the old GNAA trolls...

--
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Really? by 110010001000 · 2017-03-21 08:26 · Score: 1

So no one noticed this during testing? A system hang? Really? This isn't FDIV, you might not notice that.
1. Re:Really? by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 08:55 · Score: 1
  
  Yes that was exactly what I was wondering too. It seems to be clear evidence of AMD conducting only superficial testing prior to release.
2. Re:Really? by gl4ss · 2017-03-21 14:32 · Score: 1
  
  ...haha.
  if by a complex problem that occurs in combination of different states you mean BENCHMARKING said feature, then sure. yeah. very complex. just hammering that instruction seems to be the cause. doesnt matter which core inside either. ..basically, benchmarking one of the new features of their new cpu makes the bug appear.
  
  --
  world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Why I wait before buying.. by evolutionary · 2017-03-21 08:41 · Score: 1

Most products released these days aren't really ready to be released. (A trend made popular by our friends at Microsoft). It's sad that AMD in all likelihood rushed this CPU release. I'm going to way 3-6 months before trying out this CPU.

--
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
1. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 08:52 · Score: 1
  
  Why bother? Just do what time and again I've found works best for a trouble-free life: totally avoid any/all AMD CPUs or GPUs.
2. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by mark-t · 2017-03-21 08:59 · Score: 2
  
  That's only trouble-free for people for whom the price of Intel compared to AMD is already not a concern.
  So in other words, what you really mean is that what works best for a trouble-free life is to just be rich enough that you can buy your way past any problems.
  And who can argue with that?
  
  --
  File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
3. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by Nkwe · 2017-03-21 09:24 · Score: 2
  
  I guess having a patch within a week is pretty good though.
  Assuming that the patch actually fixed the problem and just doesn't disable the instruction (or feature set) on the CPU. Disabling CPU functionality would "solve" the problem, but then you would be effectively getting a reduced capacity CPU and not what you were paying for.
4. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 09:24 · Score: 1
  
  I've personally found time and again that buying cheap is nearly always a false economy, since you need to service it far more often and/or replace it far sooner (Sometimes even immediately) compared to a quality/reliable product. Espcially one with some headroom to meet future needs.
  It reminds me of a (Discworld) story of a poor Policeman (Sam Grimes) who could only ever afford $1 boots on his salary, and he got through 3 pairs a year. He married into a rich family so could finally afford a pair of $5 boots that lasted 3 years, so not only did it work out cheaper over time, they were much more comfortable. His conclusion was that buying quality products is how rich people keep their money.
5. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 09:40 · Score: 1
  
  Actually, I have. A 308 GTS to be exact. And it was one of the most reliable cars I've ever owned.
6. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by Carewolf · 2017-03-21 09:48 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Why bother? Just do what time and again I've found works best for a trouble-free life: totally avoid any/all AMD CPUs or GPUs.
  Heh, if you want to avoid bugs, better stay away from Intel also. They have a 1000 page errata list with every single processor.
7. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by Carewolf · 2017-03-21 10:24 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  But I can use FMA3 instructions on multiple Intel microarchitectures without it ever causing my system to freeze up. That's the kind of "quality" only AMD can provide.
  Try TSX instruction in a Haswell or Broadwell.. Well if your bios haven't been updated by Intel to disabled the instructions completely.
  Errata is unfortunately pretty common in CPUs these days. I hope this one is fixed without having to disable the entire extensions like Intel does.
8. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by mark-t · 2017-03-21 10:31 · Score: 1
  
  Nice analogy.... except it doesn't apply here. The amount of time that I go before upgrading my CPU, which in my experience tends to amount to buying virtually an entirely new computer system (CPU, Mobo, memory, and often a video card, and sometimes even a new case and power supply), is about 2 to 3 years. While you might conjecture that I could upgrade slightly less frequently if I were to buy Intel, I doubt somehow doubt I'd be slowing down my upgrading to every 6 to 10 years, which is about how long I'd have to go without upgrading before the cost difference between AMD and Intel would typically pay for itself.
  
  --
  File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
9. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by Shinobi · 2017-03-21 10:35 · Score: 1
  
  The Sam Vimes theory of economy has a lot of basis in reality.
  Look at real quality furniture for example. I inherited a kitchen work table that's been in the family for over 120 years. It's been sanded down and re-polished a number of times, but it's still a large thick slab of wood on REALLY sturdy legs. Great for baking or cooking in large batches etc(like say 10 plates of various rolls, bisquits and cookies. At the time it was made, it would have cost a working class family more than a year and a half's income to buy the table. Sure, I could buy something that would last us maybe 20-25 years at best with regular use fairly cheap, but it would still be more expensive in the long run, especially since with proper care, this table I have now could probably last another 100-150 years.
10. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by klui · 2017-03-21 10:42 · Score: 1
  
  "Reliable" is relative. The cost of ownership of a Ferrari, and even a 308 requires dedication and planning. http://www.birdman308.com/tuto...
  The 308 is one of my all-time favorite cars but if I don't have the time to perform the maintenance myself I would not own one. Especially if it's a steel body prior to 1984. Another favorite is the F355 but that has maintenance headaches, too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
11. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 10:50 · Score: 1
  
  I can only talk about mine. It was the quad carb (ie. not even injected) version and always started almost immediately even after weeks of not starting it, and it literally never had any mechanical problems in maybe 5 years of owning it. That said you don't normally use a car like that as an everyday driver either (although i did for a while), so it only had like 70k miles on it when I sold it.
12. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 11:03 · Score: 2
  
  >> Sure, I could buy something that would last us maybe 20-25 years at best
  It seems to me that even expensive furniture (at least in the US) is made with well-disguised cheapest possible materials such as composites and laminates, so actually only good for about 10 years at most.
13. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by JustNiz · 2017-03-21 11:12 · Score: 1
  
  > "Reliable" is relative.
  True. Compared to several German brand cars I've also had, it was much more reliable.
14. Re: Why I wait before buying.. by dfeifer · 2017-03-21 13:16 · Score: 1
  
  You must be doing some hard core.. something? I have only bought amd for decades and my personal upgrade path is every 6-10 years.. I may upgrade my video card every 3-4 years, but beyond that it just seems like a total waste of money.. but then.. I abhor first person shooters and pvp..
15. Re: Why I wait before buying.. by dfeifer · 2017-03-21 13:18 · Score: 1
  
  Hmm, 90% of the systems I have to work with in a corporate environment with no budget...
16. Re: Why I wait before buying.. by Highdude702 · 2017-03-21 14:47 · Score: 1
  
  i upgrade often, i choose AMD because im not rich and its my hobby. Intel until now has has a better product. Ryzen has caught AMD up, Hopefully VEGA does the same. I honestly dont have the money right now for a full Ryzen upgrade, so im not worried. But its a new architecture so we already knew there would be problems on the motherboard and cpu side. so im kind of glad that i have to wait. Its stupid to be biased. You make stupid decisions.
17. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by Anonymous Coward · 2017-03-21 17:13 · Score: 1
  
  Here's an interesting quote from someone who apparently worked at intel:
  
  As someone who worked in an Intel Validation group for SOCs until mid-2014 or so I can tell you, yes, you will see more CPU bugs from Intel than you have in the past from the post-FDIV-bug era until recently.
  Why?
  Let me set the scene: It’s late in 2013. Intel is frantic about losing the mobile CPU wars to ARM. Meetings with all the validation groups. Head honcho in charge of Validation says something to the effect of: “We need to move faster. Validation at Intel is taking much longer than it does for our competition. We need to do whatever we can to reduce those times we can’t live forever in the shadow of the early 90’s FDIV bug, we need to move on. Our competition is moving much faster than we are” - I’m paraphrasing. Many of the engineers in the room could remember the FDIV bug and the ensuing problems caused for Intel 20 years prior. Many of us were aghast that someone highly placed would suggest we needed to cut corners in validation - that wasn’t explicitly said, of course, but that was the implicit message. That meeting there in late 2013 signaled a sea change at Intel to many of us who were there. And it didn’t seem like it was going to be a good kind of sea change. Some of us chose to get out while the getting was good. As someone who worked in an Intel Validation group for SOCs until mid-2014 or so I can tell you, yes, you will see more CPU bugs from Intel than you have in the past from the post-FDIV-bug era until recently.
  (Copied from https://danluu.com/cpu-bugs/ )
18. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by TheRaven64 · 2017-03-21 22:51 · Score: 1
  
  It won't disable it, because that would break a load of existing code, but it may modify the microcode to replace a single FMA micro op with a sequence of slower micro ops.
  
  --
  I am TheRaven on Soylent News
19. Re:Why I wait before buying.. by PingSpike · 2017-03-22 00:57 · Score: 1
  
  That theory works great until Really Good Quality Boot company decides to juice up its quarterly profits by outsourcing production to dumpy boot company, effectively selling their reputation for short term profit. And then after you spend $100 on two pairs of Not actually Really Good Quality Boot Company boots before figuring it out you move to Really Good Boot Comapny's closest competitor. Only they instituted the same changes to compete and suck just as bad.
  End Result is you've spent $150 for 3 pairs of $10 boots and since reputations don't seem to mean anything anymore you just start buying $10 boots because while they're crap at least they're cheap.
20. Re: Why I wait before buying.. by Desler · 2017-03-22 01:00 · Score: 1
  
  90% of your systems are Pentium 2s and 3s? Bullshit...
Re:No Big Deal by Pascoea · 2017-03-21 09:20 · Score: 4, Informative

Here ya go I mean it doesn't say, "WONTFIX, LOL" verbatim, but there are 128 items in there labeled "No Fix", so they may as well say LOL after it.
platform security processor by Anonymous Coward · 2017-03-21 10:59 · Score: 1

Hey AMD, it's because of your Platform Security Processor (PSP) backdoor, aka Intel's equivalent of Intel Management Engine. You know, you should really get rid of it. You really should.
Re:No Big Deal by Highdude702 · 2017-03-21 14:33 · Score: 1

no he was just being a fanboy asshole, and would prefer AMD die so he could pay $20,000 for intels next generation CPU.