[dpdk-dev] AVX512 bug on SkyLake

[Thomas Monjalon]

09/11/2018 10:49, Ferruh Yigit:
> On 11/9/2018 6:27 AM, Christian Ehrhardt wrote:
> > On Fri, Nov 9, 2018 at 12:01 AM Yongseok Koh <yskoh at mellanox.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>> On Nov 8, 2018, at 9:21 AM, Ferruh Yigit <ferruh.yigit at intel.com> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> On 11/8/2018 3:59 PM, Thomas Monjalon wrote:
> >>>> Hi,
> >>>>
> >>>> We need to gather more information about this bug.
> >>>> More below.
> >>>>
> > 
> > Thanks Thomas for looping us in!
> > 
> >>>> 07/11/2018 10:04, Wiles, Keith:
> >>>>>> On Nov 6, 2018, at 9:30 PM, Yongseok Koh <yskoh at mellanox.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>> On Nov 5, 2018, at 6:06 AM, Wiles, Keith <keith.wiles at intel.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>>> On Nov 2, 2018, at 9:04 PM, Yongseok Koh <yskoh at mellanox.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> This is a workaround to prevent a crash, which might be caused by
> >>>>>>>> optimization of newer gcc (7.3.0) on Intel Skylake.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Should the code below not also test for the gcc version and
> >>>>>>> the Sky Lake processor, maybe I am wrong but it seems it is
> >>>>>>> turning AVX512 for all GCC builds
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I didn't want to check gcc version as 7.3.0 is very new. Only gcc 8 is newly up since then (gcc 8.2).
> >>>>>> Also, I wasn't able to test every gcc versions and I wanted to be a bit conservative for this crash.
> >>>>>> Performance drop (if any) by disabling a new (experimental) feature would be less risky than unaccountable crash.
> >>>>>> And, it does disable the feature only if CONFIG_RTE_ENABLE_AVX512=n. Please refer to v3.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Are you not turning off all of the GCC versions for AVX512.
> >>>>> And you can test for range or greater then GCC version and
> >>>>> it just seems like we are turning off every gcc version, is that true?
> >>>>
> >>>> Do we know exactly which GCC versions are affected?
> >>>>
> >>>>>>> Also bug 97 seems a bit obscure reference, maybe you know
> >>>>>>> the bug report, but more details would be good?
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I sent out the report to dev list two month ago.
> >>>>>> And I created the Bug 97 in order to reference it
> >>>>>> in the commit message.
> >>>>>> I didn't want to repeat same message here and there,
> >>>>>> but it would've been better to have some sort of summary
> >>>>>> of the Bug, although v3 has a few more words.
> >>>>>> However, v3 has been merged.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Still this is too obscure if nothing else give a link to
> >>>>> a specific bug not just 97.
> >>>>
> >>>> The URL is
> >>>>      https://emea01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fbugs.dpdk.org%2Fshow_bug.cgi%3Fid%3D97&data=02%7C01%7Cyskoh%40mellanox.com%7C90ff6c361faf422b976108d6459eb490%7Ca652971c7d2e4d9ba6a4d149256f461b%7C0%7C0%7C636772945282345908&sdata=2o%2Fg203aWrKCYg16S6oI4BcS41igpLu1DloS%2FrRnknc%3D&reserved=0
> >>>> The bug is also pointing to an email:
> >>>>      https://emea01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fmails.dpdk.org%2Farchives%2Fdev%2F2018-September%2F111522.html&data=02%7C01%7Cyskoh%40mellanox.com%7C90ff6c361faf422b976108d6459eb490%7Ca652971c7d2e4d9ba6a4d149256f461b%7C0%7C0%7C636772945282345908&sdata=NCFKxaREd69iZ8eyFKg%2FWBP73CLTXkxrNQQeii%2Bbsao%3D&reserved=0
> >>>>
> >>>> Summary:
> >>>>      - CPU: Intel Skylake
> >>>>      - Linux environment: Ubuntu 18.04
> >>>>      - Compiler: gcc-7.3 (Ubuntu 7.3.0-16ubuntu3)
> >>>
> >>> Is it possible to test a few other gcc versions to check if the issue is
> >>> specific to this compiler version?
> >>
> >> Nothing's impossible but even with my quick search in gcc.gnu.org,
> >> I could find the following documents mention mavx512f support:
> >>
> >> GCC 4.9.0
> >> April 22, 2014 (changes, documentation)
> >>
> >> GCC 5.1
> >> April 22, 2015 (changes, documentation)
> >>
> >> GCC 6.4
> >> July 4, 2017 (changes, documentation)
> >>
> >> GCC 7.1
> >> May 2, 2017 (changes, documentation)
> >>
> >> GCC 8.1
> >> May 2, 2018 (changes, documentation)
> >>
> >> We altogether have to put quite large resource to verify all of the versions.
> >>
> >> I assumed older than gcc 7 would have the same issue. I know it was a speculation
> >> but like I mentioned I wanted to be more conservative. I didn't mean this is a permanent fix.
> >> For two months, we couldn't have any tangible solution (actually nobody cared including myself),
> >> so I submitted the patch to temporarily disable mavx512f.
> >>
> >> I'm still not sure what the best option is...
> > 
> > What I wonder in all of this as I don't understand that part of it yet is this.
> > I assume you are building on Ubuntu as that is your gcc reference.
> > FYI: as people asked for bug references, there also is [1] which seems
> > pretty much the same issue.
> > 
> > It builds with mostly defaults, that means per
> > mk/machine/default/rte.vars.mk and similar it sets -march=corei7
> > 
> > But when I look at what that implies all avx512 is disabled
> > $ gcc -Q --help=target -m64 -march=corei7 | grep avx512f
> >  -mavx512f                             [disabled]
> 
> This is output is the "corei7" architecture. Defect is for "native" build on
> Skylake.
> 
> For "native" arch:
> gcc -Q --help=target -m64 -march=native | grep avx512f
>   -mavx512f                             [enabled]

I confirm.


> Also I can confirm from disassembly output that avx512 instructions are used
> without '-mno-avx512f' provided.
> 
> > So I wonder what/why -mno-avx512f should help at all.
> > I used the full list of gcc args we have for the build (e.g. [2] of a
> > 18.05 build), but that doesn't change that (mostly -W, -I and -D).
> > So I wonder, did people do a custom build and bump up march or enable
> > -mavx512f on their own to hit that?
> > Or are we facing a real gcc issue where " -mavx512f [disabled]" is not
> > the same as -mno-avx512f ?
> > Maybe someone who hit the bug could clarify that please?
> > 
> > BTW: per reports I've seen it also seems to apply to the latest
> > compiler update of the same series - at least it was said to be fully
> > updated, that would be 7.3.0-27ubuntu1~18.04
> > But this is 2nd grade information as I don't have a system with the
> > right combo MLX5+Skylake available atm, so I can't confirm for sure
> > :-/

I tried latest gcc 7.3.0-27ubuntu1~18.04, and the bug is still there.