Machine Check Exception support allows the processor to notify the
kernel if it detects a problem (e.g. overheating, component failure).
The action the kernel takes depends on the severity of the problem,
ranging from a warning message on the console, to halting the machine.
Your processor must be a Pentium or newer to support this - check the
flags in /proc/cpuinfo for mce. Note that some older Pentium systems
have a design flaw which leads to false MCE events - hence MCE is
disabled on all P5 processors, unless explicitly enabled with "mce"
as a boot argument. Similarly, if MCE is built in and creates a
problem on some new non-standard machine, you can boot with "nomce"
to disable it. MCE support simply ignores non-MCE processors like
the 386 and 486, so nearly everyone can say Y here.