Re: [RFC] x86-64: Use SSE for copy_page and clear_page

From: Jeff Garzik
Date: Mon May 30 2005 - 13:48:08 EST


Benjamin LaHaise wrote:
Hello Andi,

Below is a patch that uses 128 bit SSE instructions for copy_page and clear_page. This is an improvement on P4 systems as can be seen by running the test program at http://www.kvack.org/~bcrl/xmm64.c to get results like:

SSE test program $Id: fast.c,v 1.6 2000/09/23 09:05:45 arjan Exp $ buffer = 0x2aaaaaad6000
clear_page() tests clear_page function 'warm up run' took 25444 cycles per page
clear_page function 'kernel clear' took 6595 cycles per page
clear_page function '2.4 non MMX' took 7827 cycles per page
clear_page function '2.4 MMX fallback' took 7741 cycles per page
clear_page function '2.4 MMX version' took 6454 cycles per page
clear_page function 'faster_clear_page' took 4344 cycles per page
clear_page function 'even_faster_clear' took 4151 cycles per page
clear_page function 'xmm_clear ' took 3204 cycles per page
clear_page function 'xmma_clear ' took 6080 cycles per page
clear_page function 'xmm2_clear ' took 3370 cycles per page
clear_page function 'xmma2_clear ' took 6115 cycles per page
clear_page function 'kernel clear' took 6583 cycles per page

copy_page() tests copy_page function 'warm up run' took 9770 cycles per page
copy_page function '2.4 non MMX' took 9758 cycles per page
copy_page function '2.4 MMX fallback' took 9572 cycles per page
copy_page function '2.4 MMX version' took 9405 cycles per page
copy_page function 'faster_copy' took 7407 cycles per page
copy_page function 'even_faster' took 7158 cycles per page
copy_page function 'xmm_copy_page_no' took 6110 cycles per page
copy_page function 'xmm_copy_page' took 5914 cycles per page
copy_page function 'xmma_copy_page' took 5913 cycles per page
copy_page function 'v26_copy_page' took 9168 cycles per page

The SSE clear page fuction is almost twice as fast as the kernel's current clear_page, while the copy_page implementation is roughly a third faster. This is likely due to the fact that SSE instructions can keep the 256 bit wide L2 cache bus at a higher utilisation than 64 bit movs are able to. Comments?

Sounds pretty darn cool to me. I can give it a test on athlon64 and em64t here.

I have some codingstyle whining to do though...


:r public_html/patches/v2.6.12-rc4-xmm-2.diff
diff -purN v2.6.12-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_clear_page.c xmm-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_clear_page.c
--- v2.6.12-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_clear_page.c 1969-12-31 19:00:00.000000000 -0500
+++ xmm-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_clear_page.c 2005-05-26 11:16:09.000000000 -0400
@@ -0,0 +1,45 @@
+#include <linux/config.h>
+#include <linux/preempt.h>
+#include <asm/page.h>
+#include <linux/kernel.h>
+#include <asm/string.h>

preferred ordering:

linux/config
linux/kernel
linux/preempt
asm/*


+typedef struct { unsigned long a,b; } __attribute__((aligned(16))) xmm_store_t;

space between "a,b"


+void c_clear_page_xmm(void *page)
+{
+ /* Note! gcc doesn't seem to align stack variables properly, so we + * need to make use of unaligned loads and stores.
+ */
+ xmm_store_t xmm_save[1];
+ unsigned long cr0;
+ int i;
+
+ preempt_disable();
+ __asm__ __volatile__ (
+ " mov %%cr0,%0\n"
+ " clts\n"
+ " movdqu %%xmm0,(%1)\n"
+ " pxor %%xmm0, %%xmm0\n"
+ : "=&r" (cr0): "r" (xmm_save) : "memory"
+ );
+
+ for(i=0;i<PAGE_SIZE/64;i++)

exercise that spacebar :)


+ {
+ __asm__ __volatile__ (
+ " movntdq %%xmm0, (%0)\n"
+ " movntdq %%xmm0, 16(%0)\n"
+ " movntdq %%xmm0, 32(%0)\n"
+ " movntdq %%xmm0, 48(%0)\n"
+ : : "r" (page) : "memory");
+ page+=64;
+ }
+
+ __asm__ __volatile__ (
+ " sfence \n "
+ " movdqu (%0),%%xmm0\n"
+ " mov %1,%%cr0\n"
+ :: "r" (xmm_save), "r" (cr0)
+ );
+ preempt_enable();
+}
diff -purN v2.6.12-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_copy_page.c xmm-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_copy_page.c
--- v2.6.12-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_copy_page.c 1969-12-31 19:00:00.000000000 -0500
+++ xmm-rc4/arch/x86_64/lib/c_copy_page.c 2005-05-30 14:07:28.000000000 -0400
@@ -0,0 +1,52 @@
+#include <linux/config.h>
+#include <linux/preempt.h>
+#include <asm/page.h>
+#include <linux/kernel.h>
+#include <asm/string.h>
+
+typedef struct { unsigned long a,b; } __attribute__((aligned(16))) xmm_store_t;

ditto

+void c_copy_page_xmm(void *to, void *from)
+{
+ /* Note! gcc doesn't seem to align stack variables properly, so we + * need to make use of unaligned loads and stores.
+ */
+ xmm_store_t xmm_save[2];
+ unsigned long cr0;
+ int i;
+
+ preempt_disable();
+ __asm__ __volatile__ (
+ " prefetchnta (%1)\n"
+ " prefetchnta 64(%1)\n"
+ " prefetchnta 128(%1)\n"
+ " prefetchnta 192(%1)\n"
+ " prefetchnta 256(%1)\n"
+ " mov %%cr0,%0\n"
+ " clts\n"
+ " movdqu %%xmm0, (%1)\n"
+ " movdqu %%xmm1,16(%1)\n"
+ : "=&r" (cr0): "r" (xmm_save) : "memory"
+ );
+
+ for(i=0;i<PAGE_SIZE/32;i++) {

ditto

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