[coreboot] dell server BIOS setting insanity

[Ward Vandewege]

Hi all,

I thought I'd point out this little gem from the linux-poweredge list

http://lists.us.dell.com/pipermail/linux-poweredge/2010-January/041170.html

Apparently several lines of Dell servers have a BIOS setting called
"Cores-per-processor".

It seems they ship these machines with the setting configured to 'dual',
regardless of what CPUs are in the system.

The poor guy who reported this to the list just took delivery of 300 of those
machines - with quad core CPUs. They show up as dual core until he goes into
the BIOS and changes the setting. That's also the 'official' solution for the
problem from the Dell rep.

Seriously.

Thanks,
Ward.