Re: [RFC] Microcode Update Driver for AMD K8 CPUs

[Danny van Dyk <kugelfang@gentoo.org>]

richard.brunner@amd.com schrieb:
 >>Danny van Dyk <kugelfang@gentoo.org> writes:
 >>>I recently found some piece of code [1] to perform a microcode update
 >>>on AMD's K8 CPUs. It included some update blocks hardcoded into the
 >>>module.
 >>Several people found this code (including me). But I don't think
 >>it's a good idea right now to merge because it is better to leave
 >>these things to the BIOS. It's unlikely that AMD will regularly
 >>release "open" microcode updates anyways, and moving them
 >>between BIOSes seems a bit dangerous to me (often you likely
 >>need to change some magic MSRs too or you could have some
 >>side effects). Overall it seems to be too dangerous to
 >>do in a standard kernel.
 >>Also I suspect the driver won't work very well on SMP.
 >>-Andi
 > As usual, Andi is absolutely correct.
 > 	-Rich Brunner, AMD Fellow

Sigh. Well, that makes two *strong* votes against it.
Nevertheless, it's been a nice experience to work on that code.

Rich: Your CPUs are great ;-)

Andi: Can you explain to me, why you think that the module would not
work on SMP ? I don't know if this is still on topic: should we discuss
this off-list ? Vielleicht auf Deutsch *G ?

Danny

-- 
Danny van Dyk
Gentoo/AMD64 Developer
kugelfang@gentoo.org