NTP issue on N4000 server (lost 90mins of time)

[Bill Hassell]

Actgually, it doesn't matter whether the internal clock is running during a shutdown. When your server boots up, the xntpd startup script will 'jump' the time to match the NTP server listed in the netdaemons config file. If this server is broken, the time could be set to any value as there is no reference to compare. That's why your ntp.conf file has 3 to 5 different NTP servers listed. Look at your /etc/rc.log file for any errors related to NTP. Then find the bootup NTP server:

grep NTPDATE /etc/rc.config.d/netdaemons

Now test the server:

ntpq -p ntp_server_name

If this fails (server not responding, blocked, wrong name, etc), then this is why the time jumped so much. It's possible that the internal clock isn't working correctly and the failure of the bootup NTPDATE server has exposed this problem. If the startup NTP server was working, the internal clock's value would not matter and your machine could reboot several times with exact time at startup.