[Qemu-ppc] PPC: Timer issues with git master

[Mark Cave-Ayland]

Hi all,

I've just upgraded my git repository from around the 1.6 release 
timeframe to git master and I'm seeing some strange timing issues 
running through my OpenBIOS test suite which weren't there before my git 
update.

The two most noticeable changes are in FreeBSD and HelenOS; the 
countdown timer in the FreeBSD bootloader used to count down in seconds 
whereas now it whizzes down to zero, and HelenOS now takes a very very 
long time to boot.

In order to reproduce from git master download the appropriate ISOs and 
launch QEMU like this:

./qemu-system-ppc -cdrom 
/home/build/src/qemu/image/ppc/FreeBSD-9.1-RC2-powerpc-release.iso -M 
mac99 -m 512 -boot d

./qemu-system-ppc -cdrom 
/home/build/src/qemu/image/ppc/HelenOS-0.4.2-ppc32.iso -m 512 -boot d

Paulo/Alex B - I know you've been working with timers, so wondered if 
this is related to some of the changes you've been making? I've also 
copied Alex Graf in case this is somehow related to how the timer code 
interacts with the PPC timebase-frequency.


Many thanks,

Mark.