linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 1/3] x86/tsx: Add feature bit for TSX control MSR support

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Date:   Tue, 8 Nov 2022 10:27:56 -0800
From:   Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@...el.com>
To:     Pawan Gupta <pawan.kumar.gupta@...ux.intel.com>,
        Thomas Gleixner <tglx@...utronix.de>,
        Ingo Molnar <mingo@...hat.com>, Borislav Petkov <bp@...en8.de>,
        Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@...ux.intel.com>, x86@...nel.org,
        "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...or.com>,
        "Rafael J. Wysocki" <rafael@...nel.org>,
        Pavel Machek <pavel@....cz>,
        Andrew Cooper <Andrew.Cooper3@...rix.com>, degoede@...hat.com
Cc:     linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, linux-pm@...r.kernel.org,
        Daniel Sneddon <daniel.sneddon@...ux.intel.com>,
        antonio.gomez.iglesias@...ux.intel.com
Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/3] x86/tsx: Add feature bit for TSX control MSR support

On 9/12/22 16:39, Pawan Gupta wrote:
> Support for TSX control MSR is enumerated in MSR_IA32_ARCH_CAPABILITIES.
> This is different from how other CPU features are enumerated i.e. via
> CPUID. Enumerating support for TSX control currently has an overhead of
> reading the MSR every time which can be avoided.

I only see tsx_ctrl_is_supported() getting called in three places:

> 1 tsx.c tsx_clear_cpuid       138 } else if (tsx_ctrl_is_supported()) {
> 2 tsx.c tsx_dev_mode_disable  161 if (!boot_cpu_has_bug(X86_BUG_TAA) || !tsx_ctrl_is_supported() ||
> 3 tsx.c tsx_init              194 if (!tsx_ctrl_is_supported()) {

Those all look like boot-time things to me.  Why does the overhead matter?