Discusses one source of kernel panic: CPU context corrupt - Machine Check ExceptionKernel prints one or both of the following messages:
CPU 0: Machine Check Exception
Kernel panic: CPU context corrupt
The following additional information may be displayed between the above messages:
Machine Check Exceptions may be caused by any of the following conditions
· System bus errors (error communicating between the processor and the motherboard).
· Memory errors that may include parity / Error correction code (ECC) problems. Error checking ensures that data is stored correctly in the RAM; if information is corrupted, then random errors occur.
· Cache errors in the processor; the cache stores important data and code. If this is corrupted, errors often occur.
· Computer software can also cause errors in this way (normally by corrupting data they are reading or writing). For example, software performing read or write operations to non-existent memory regions which leads to confusion for the processor and/or the system bus.
· An overloaded internal or external power supply, which can be fixed by upgrading.
Additional information can be found on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_Check_Exception
Due to the nature of the issue, environmental parameters such as temperature and the voltage level provided by PSU should be checked before deciding it is a real hardware issue with the board.
Assuming that there is no corruption of the software binaries, a board exhibiting the above problems might need to swapped.