topic Re: time drift in Operating System - Linux

time drift

ScottLClement — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 17:14:12 GMT

I have a GL580 with 4 xeon proc running RHEL 4 AS. The system clock is unable to maintain it's time correctly. It actually runs really fast. Without ntpd resyncing the time frequently we have a 5 minute drift every 1 hour give or take. Does anyone have a solution for this?

Re: time drift

Andrew Cowan — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 03:32:54 GMT

Scott,

The normal cause of this is when the battery on your motherboard needs replacing, or in extreme cases it can be down to a corrupt BIOS.

Re: time drift

ScottLClement — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 12:09:21 GMT

This motherboard was recently replaced for a problem with a onboard nic. So I would think that the Bio and battery are good. How do I validate if this is the issue?

Re: time drift

Andrew Cowan — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 14:05:52 GMT

I think you need to talk to the people that did the work. The only way I know to test a battery is to completely detach your computer from the mains overnight, then boot up to BIOS level and see whether the clock has kept time.

Re: time drift

Steven E. Protter — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 15:29:53 GMT

Shalom,

Dirty little secret. System clocks are useless. They can't tell time.

Unless they are totally broken they should be ignored.

ntp.con or xntp.conf or whatever they call it this week should be configured to point to a valid time server inside or outside your network if firewall permits.

chkconfig ntpd on
# sets it to auto start at boot
service ntpd on
service ntpd status
# check that its running.

You need to have system time adjusted to within an hour of reality before doing the above steps.

SEP

Re: time drift

ScottLClement — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 17:19:52 GMT

I agree about having ntpd running and do have it. But to have a 5 minute per hour drift is rediculous.