Enabling Watchdog in Ubuntu

Step 1 - Remove the watchdog module from modprobe blacklists:

grep -r sp5100_tco /lib/modprobe.d/c

And comment out every "blacklist sp5100_tco".

Step 2 - Create a new modprobe.d entry:

echo "options sp5100_tco heartbeat=30 nowayout=1" > /etc/modprobe.d/sp5100_tco.conf

Step 3 - Install the watchdog package

apt install -y watchdog

Step 4 - Update the watchdog config

Open the /etc/watchdog.conf file.

Uncomment the following line:

#watchdog-device = /dev/watchdog

Uncomment and replace the following line:

#watchdog-timeout = 60

With:

watchdog-timeout = 30

Step 5 - reboot the system

reboot

That’s it, it can be tested by triggering a kernel crash with the following command:

echo c > /proc/sysrq-trigger

The kernel will crash, and the system will reboot after up to 30 seconds.