[PATCH] ArmVirtPkg: clear PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask PCD

[PATCH] ArmVirtPkg: clear PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask PCD

[Ard Biesheuvel]

The only observeable effect of having PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask
set to 1 is that a EfiReservedMemory region of 4 pages is allocated right
below the 4 GB mark. This region is out of bounds for the OS, which means
it is not even allowed to map it, to avoid speculative loads from it.

On Linux, this may prevent the kernel from using a 1 GB block mappings for
this region, and instead it has to carve up the block as follows:

  0xffffffff80000000-0xffffffffbe000000         992M PMD CON BLK
  0xffffffffbe000000-0xffffffffbfe00000          30M PMD     BLK
  0xffffffffbfe00000-0xffffffffbfff0000        1984K PTE CON
  0xffffffffbfff0000-0xffffffffbfffc000          48K PTE

where it would otherwise use a single 1 GB mapping (*), i.e.,

  0xffffffff80000000-0xffffffffc0000000           1G PGD

To clarify, the latter is a single 8 byte entry in the top level page
table, whereas in the former case, we have two additional levels of
paging, requiring two extra 4 KB pages (on a 4 KB pagesize kernel).

The real cost, however, is the TLB footprint, which goes up from a
single entry to a value between 90 and 1020, depending on whether
contiguous hints are honoured by the hardware.

So let's set PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask to zero until we find
a reason why we shouldn't.

(*) provided that no other allocations were deliberately located right
    below the 4 GB mark, and that we are running with more than 3 GB of
    memory, in which case most allocations will be over 4 GB, given EDK2's
    default top-down allocation policy.

Contributed-under: TianoCore Contribution Agreement 1.0
Signed-off-by: Ard Biesheuvel <ard.biesheuvel@linaro.org>
---
 ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc b/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
index 61d4a6642eb7..ca0a4d31a03d 100644
--- a/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
+++ b/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
@@ -295,7 +295,7 @@ [PcdsFixedAtBuild.common]
   gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdMaximumLinkedListLength|1000000
   gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdSpinLockTimeout|10000000
   gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdDebugClearMemoryValue|0xAF
-  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|1
+  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|0
   gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPostCodePropertyMask|0
   gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdUefiLibMaxPrintBufferSize|320
 
-- 
2.7.4

Re: [PATCH] ArmVirtPkg: clear PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask PCD

[Laszlo Ersek]

On 02/24/17 19:16, Ard Biesheuvel wrote:
> The only observeable effect of having PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask
> set to 1 is that a EfiReservedMemory region of 4 pages is allocated right
> below the 4 GB mark. This region is out of bounds for the OS, which means
> it is not even allowed to map it, to avoid speculative loads from it.
> 
> On Linux, this may prevent the kernel from using a 1 GB block mappings for
> this region, and instead it has to carve up the block as follows:
> 
>   0xffffffff80000000-0xffffffffbe000000         992M PMD CON BLK
>   0xffffffffbe000000-0xffffffffbfe00000          30M PMD     BLK
>   0xffffffffbfe00000-0xffffffffbfff0000        1984K PTE CON
>   0xffffffffbfff0000-0xffffffffbfffc000          48K PTE
> 
> where it would otherwise use a single 1 GB mapping (*), i.e.,
> 
>   0xffffffff80000000-0xffffffffc0000000           1G PGD
> 
> To clarify, the latter is a single 8 byte entry in the top level page
> table, whereas in the former case, we have two additional levels of
> paging, requiring two extra 4 KB pages (on a 4 KB pagesize kernel).
> 
> The real cost, however, is the TLB footprint, which goes up from a
> single entry to a value between 90 and 1020, depending on whether
> contiguous hints are honoured by the hardware.
> 
> So let's set PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask to zero until we find
> a reason why we shouldn't.
> 
> (*) provided that no other allocations were deliberately located right
>     below the 4 GB mark, and that we are running with more than 3 GB of
>     memory, in which case most allocations will be over 4 GB, given EDK2's
>     default top-down allocation policy.
> 
> Contributed-under: TianoCore Contribution Agreement 1.0
> Signed-off-by: Ard Biesheuvel <ard.biesheuvel@linaro.org>
> ---
>  ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc | 2 +-
>  1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
> 
> diff --git a/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc b/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
> index 61d4a6642eb7..ca0a4d31a03d 100644
> --- a/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
> +++ b/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
> @@ -295,7 +295,7 @@ [PcdsFixedAtBuild.common]
>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdMaximumLinkedListLength|1000000
>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdSpinLockTimeout|10000000
>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdDebugClearMemoryValue|0xAF
> -  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|1
> +  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|0
>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPostCodePropertyMask|0
>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdUefiLibMaxPrintBufferSize|320
>  
> 

The value 1 dates back to ancient commit 6f5872b1f401 ("ArmPlatformPkg/ArmVirtualizationPkg: Add ArmVirtualizationQemu platform", 2014-09-18).

The default is zero in "MdePkg/MdePkg.dec":

  ## The mask is used to control PerformanceLib behavior.<BR><BR>
  #  BIT0 - Enable Performance Measurement.<BR>
  # @Prompt Performance Measurement Property.
  # @Expression  0x80000002 | (gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask & 0xFE) == 0
  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|0|UINT8|0x00000009

Shouldn't we just remove the line?

Thanks
Laszlo

Re: [PATCH] ArmVirtPkg: clear PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask PCD

[Ard Biesheuvel]

On 24 February 2017 at 23:17, Laszlo Ersek <lersek@redhat.com> wrote:
> On 02/24/17 19:16, Ard Biesheuvel wrote:
>> The only observeable effect of having PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask
>> set to 1 is that a EfiReservedMemory region of 4 pages is allocated right
>> below the 4 GB mark. This region is out of bounds for the OS, which means
>> it is not even allowed to map it, to avoid speculative loads from it.
>>
>> On Linux, this may prevent the kernel from using a 1 GB block mappings for
>> this region, and instead it has to carve up the block as follows:
>>
>>   0xffffffff80000000-0xffffffffbe000000         992M PMD CON BLK
>>   0xffffffffbe000000-0xffffffffbfe00000          30M PMD     BLK
>>   0xffffffffbfe00000-0xffffffffbfff0000        1984K PTE CON
>>   0xffffffffbfff0000-0xffffffffbfffc000          48K PTE
>>
>> where it would otherwise use a single 1 GB mapping (*), i.e.,
>>
>>   0xffffffff80000000-0xffffffffc0000000           1G PGD
>>
>> To clarify, the latter is a single 8 byte entry in the top level page
>> table, whereas in the former case, we have two additional levels of
>> paging, requiring two extra 4 KB pages (on a 4 KB pagesize kernel).
>>
>> The real cost, however, is the TLB footprint, which goes up from a
>> single entry to a value between 90 and 1020, depending on whether
>> contiguous hints are honoured by the hardware.
>>
>> So let's set PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask to zero until we find
>> a reason why we shouldn't.
>>
>> (*) provided that no other allocations were deliberately located right
>>     below the 4 GB mark, and that we are running with more than 3 GB of
>>     memory, in which case most allocations will be over 4 GB, given EDK2's
>>     default top-down allocation policy.
>>
>> Contributed-under: TianoCore Contribution Agreement 1.0
>> Signed-off-by: Ard Biesheuvel <ard.biesheuvel@linaro.org>
>> ---
>>  ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc | 2 +-
>>  1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
>>
>> diff --git a/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc b/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
>> index 61d4a6642eb7..ca0a4d31a03d 100644
>> --- a/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
>> +++ b/ArmVirtPkg/ArmVirt.dsc.inc
>> @@ -295,7 +295,7 @@ [PcdsFixedAtBuild.common]
>>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdMaximumLinkedListLength|1000000
>>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdSpinLockTimeout|10000000
>>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdDebugClearMemoryValue|0xAF
>> -  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|1
>> +  gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|0
>>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPostCodePropertyMask|0
>>    gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdUefiLibMaxPrintBufferSize|320
>>
>>
>
> The value 1 dates back to ancient commit 6f5872b1f401 ("ArmPlatformPkg/ArmVirtualizationPkg: Add ArmVirtualizationQemu platform", 2014-09-18).
>
> The default is zero in "MdePkg/MdePkg.dec":
>
>   ## The mask is used to control PerformanceLib behavior.<BR><BR>
>   #  BIT0 - Enable Performance Measurement.<BR>
>   # @Prompt Performance Measurement Property.
>   # @Expression  0x80000002 | (gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask & 0xFE) == 0
>   gEfiMdePkgTokenSpaceGuid.PcdPerformanceLibraryPropertyMask|0|UINT8|0x00000009
>
> Shouldn't we just remove the line?
>

Sure, even better!