Re: [Qemu-devel] Win2k mouse

["Mike Nordell" <tamlin@algonet.se>]

Hetz Ben Hamo wrote:

> Mike Nordell has send a keyboard/mouse fix for win2k as a guest,
> but I only see keyboard fix in the CVS.

Actually, the fix wasn't specifically for win2k guest. It was a deadlock
that would most probably have occured in any guest OS having both mouse and
keyboard input.

The problem was that (PS/2) mouse input was given priority when QEMU came to
choose between mouse and keyboard interrupts to report to the CPU, but when
the guest was reading I/O port 0x60 the keyboard queue had priority. Imagine
the deadlock when both mouse and keyboard messages were pending. :-)

The easiest way to see this bug in action was by grabbing the mouse and then
alt-tab (or whatever the kbd shortcut for switching to another window is in
your environment) to another window. Voila. Instant guest input lock.


I've got a feeling, though not yet any strong evidence, that since QEMU PC
emulation is yet so incomplete (it's basically like a 386 PC, with a 686
CPU) NT switches to some safety-mode for a lot of stuff. This could
potentially involve a lot of switching between protected mode and v86 mode,
which would slow down the emulation as seen. It's btw not only mouse - try
starting the Task Manager in the guest and watch the CPU pegged while
running it. Close that one and start PerfMon. Add e.g. interrupts/s or DPC
time or... anything. The numbers are off the chart (probably NT can't even
get them, but it might also be they are so insanely high they can't be
trusted), but it's no longer pegging the CPU (you'll notice it's no longer
using all available host CPU).

I'm right now on my way to add some profiling code to QEMU to see what's
going on in this area. While NT as guest behaves like this, just booting it
is a test of patience why it might take some days before I get any real
numbers.

/Mike