Re: [PATCH v9 02/10] x86/bhi: Make clear_bhb_loop() effective on newer CPUs

[Pawan Gupta <pawan.kumar.gupta@linux.intel.com>]

On Fri, Apr 03, 2026 at 07:21:02PM -0700, Jim Mattson wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 3, 2026 at 5:22 PM Pawan Gupta
> <pawan.kumar.gupta@linux.intel.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Fri, Apr 03, 2026 at 04:39:54PM -0700, Jim Mattson wrote:
> > > > Since cloud providers have greater control over userspace, the decision to
> > > > use BHI_DIS_S or not can be left to them. KVM would simply follow what it
> > > > is asked to do by the userspace.
> > >
> > > I feel like we've gone over this before, but if userspace tells KVM
> > > not to enable BHI_DIS_S, how do we inform Windows that it needs to do
> > > the longer clearing sequence, despite the fact that the virtual CPU is
> > > masquerading as Ice Lake?
> >
> > IMO, if an OS is allergic to a hardware mitigation, and is also aware that
> > it is virtualized, it should default to a sw mitigation that works everywhere.
> 
> Agreed. So, without any information to the contrary, VMs should assume
> the long BHB clearing sequence is required.
> 
> Returning to my earlier comment, the test should be:
> 
> +       if (cpu_feature_enabled(X86_FEATURE_BHI_CTRL) ||
> cpu_feature_enabled(X86_FEATURE_HYPERVISOR)) {
> +               bhb_seq_outer_loop = 12;
> +               bhb_seq_inner_loop = 7;
> +       }

To be clear, my comment was for an OS that doesn't want BHI_DIS_S
under-the-hood with virtual-SPEC_CTRL. Linux doesn't have that problem,
hardware mitigation on Linux is perfectly okay.

Without virtual-SPEC_CTRL, the problem set is limited to guests that
migrate accross Alder Lake generation CPUs. As you mentioned the change in
MAXPHYADDR makes it unlikely.

With virtual-SPEC_CTRL support, guests that fall into the subset that
migrate inspite of MAXPHYADDR change would also be mitigated. Then, on top
of hardware mitigation, deploying the long sequence in the guest would
incur a significant performance penalty for no good reason.