system clock is too slow

[Murry McEntire]

--- Erik Hemdal <ehemdal at townisp.com> wrote:

> The larger question, beyond use of ntpd, is why the clock
> runs slow. 
> I've only seen this happen on systems that are extremely
> heavily
> loaded.  When the system runs near 100% load all the time,
> the real-time
> clock interrupt gets starved, and the clock drifts back.  And
> the only
> time I've seen this occur is with a computer running a heavy
> compute
> load, like the SETI at Home daemon or the Folding at Home program. 
> I'd
> investigate this if you are running programs like this and
> your computer
> sits otherwise idle for a long time.

I've seen strange clock behavior when the battery on the
motherboard is failing. Very slow when the machine is on, and
typically a reset to the past when powered off for any length
of time.

-- Murry