Machine Check Architecture
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In computing, Machine Check Architecture (MCA) refers to a mechanism in which the CPU reports hardware errors to the operating system.
The Pentium 4, Intel Xeon, and P6 family processors implement a machinecheck architecture that provides a mechanism for detecting and reporting hardware (machine) errors, such as: system bus errors, ECC errors, parity errors, cache errors, and TLB errors. It consists of a set of model-specific registers (MSRs) that are used to set up machine checking and additional banks of MSRs used for recording errors that are detected. [1]
See also