linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH] intel-iommu: Work around yet another BIOS bug

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Date:	Thu, 20 Aug 2009 22:54:58 +0100
From:	David Woodhouse <dwmw2@...radead.org>
To:	Grant Grundler <grundler@...isc-linux.org>
Cc:	Ray Lee <ray-lk@...rabbit.org>, torvalds@...ux-foundation.org,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Faidon Liambotis <paravoid@...ian.org>,
	Matt Domsch <Matt_Domsch@...l.com>,
	"Siddha, Suresh B" <suresh.b.siddha@...el.com>,
	"H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...or.com>,
	Jesse Barnes <jbarnes@...tuousgeek.org>,
	bugzilla-daemon@...zilla.kernel.org,
	bugme-daemon@...zilla.kernel.org, bero@...linux.org,
	linux-pci@...r.kernel.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH] intel-iommu: Work around yet another BIOS bug

On Thu, 2009-08-20 at 15:47 -0600, Grant Grundler wrote:
> 
> Could that be to reserve address space that the "disabled" IOMMU
> might still be responding to?
> 
> Ie the BIOS hides the control registers so the OS won't talk to the
> device but the IOMMU might still attempt to lookup certain address
> ranges.
> 
> I'm more inclined to believe it's sloppiness on the part of the BIOS
> writers but thought this might be an alternative explanation.

Nah, this is just the normal story: "We smoked too much crack and fried
our brains, and we don't do any QA on the crap we write because that
would leave fewer hours in the day for us to service our crack habit".

We _really_ need open source firmware.

Or at _least_ firmware written by competent engineers -- but I think
we've all fairly much given up on that happening by now?

-- 
dwmw2

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