linux-kernel - [PATCH] KVM: SVM: obey guest PAT

lists.openwall.net		lists / announce owl-users owl-dev john-users john-dev passwdqc-users yescrypt popa3d-users / oss-security kernel-hardening musl sabotage tlsify passwords / crypt-dev xvendor / Bugtraq Full-Disclosure linux-kernel linux-netdev linux-ext4 linux-hardening linux-cve-announce PHC
Open Source and information security mailing list archives

Hash Suite: Windows password security audit tool. GUI, reports in PDF.

[<prev] [next>] [thread-next>] [day] [month] [year] [list]

Date:   Thu, 26 Oct 2017 09:13:27 +0200
From:   Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini@...hat.com>
To:     linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, kvm@...r.kernel.org
Cc:     stable@...r.kernel.org
Subject: [PATCH] KVM: SVM: obey guest PAT

For many years some users of assigned devices have reported worse
performance on AMD processors with NPT than on AMD without NPT,
Intel or bare metal.

The reason turned out to be that SVM is discarding the guest PAT
setting and uses the default (PA0=PA4=WB, PA1=PA5=WT, PA2=PA6=UC-,
PA3=UC).  The guest might be using a different setting, and
especially might want write combining but isn't getting it
(instead getting slow UC or UC- accesses).

Thanks a lot to geoff@...tfission.com for noticing the relation
to the g_pat setting.  The patch has been tested also by a bunch
of people on VFIO users forums.

Fixes: 709ddebf81cb40e3c36c6109a7892e8b93a09464
Fixes: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=196409
Cc: stable@...r.kernel.org
Signed-off-by: Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini@...hat.com>
---
 arch/x86/kvm/svm.c | 7 +++++++
 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+)

diff --git a/arch/x86/kvm/svm.c b/arch/x86/kvm/svm.c
index af256b786a70..af09baa3d736 100644
--- a/arch/x86/kvm/svm.c
+++ b/arch/x86/kvm/svm.c
@@ -3626,6 +3626,13 @@ static int svm_set_msr(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu, struct msr_data *msr)
 	u32 ecx = msr->index;
 	u64 data = msr->data;
 	switch (ecx) {
+	case MSR_IA32_CR_PAT:
+		if (!kvm_mtrr_valid(vcpu, MSR_IA32_CR_PAT, data))
+			return 1;
+		vcpu->arch.pat = data;
+		svm->vmcb->save.g_pat = data;
+		mark_dirty(svm->vmcb, VMCB_NPT);
+		break;
 	case MSR_IA32_TSC:
 		kvm_write_tsc(vcpu, msr);
 		break;
-- 
2.14.2