RE: [PATCH] x86/mce/AMD: Fix partial SMCA bank init when CPU 0 != thread 0

From: Ghannam, Yazen
Date: Wed Jun 28 2017 - 14:00:44 EST


> -----Original Message-----
> From: themoken@xxxxxxxxx [mailto:themoken@xxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
> Jack Miller
> Sent: Wednesday, June 28, 2017 1:44 PM
> To: Borislav Petkov <bp@xxxxxxx>
> Cc: Jack Miller <jack@xxxxxxxxxxx>; linux-kernel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx;
> tglx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; Ghannam, Yazen <Yazen.Ghannam@xxxxxxx>;
> x86@xxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: [PATCH] x86/mce/AMD: Fix partial SMCA bank init when CPU 0 !=
> thread 0
>
> On Wed, Jun 28, 2017 at 4:22 AM, Borislav Petkov <bp@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> > On Tue, Jun 27, 2017 at 07:06:30PM -0500, Jack Miller wrote:
> >> After a call to firmware SwitchBSP(),
> >
> > What is that and who does that?
>
> SwitchBSP() is part of the UEFI MPServices Protocol which I believe is an
> extension but it is supported by all of the firmwares I've tested on.
>
> In this case, I'm using a bootloader to SwitchBSP() so that hardware thread 0
> (and thus core 0) can be offlined on AMD hardware (cpu0_hotplug
> unsupported). This is currently working by passing 'nomce' to the kernel, but
> obviously I'd prefer not to disable it.
>

Which core are you using as the BSP with SwitchBSP()?

> >
> >> Linux can be booted with a thread
> >> that isn't the first in the system. That thread automatically becomes
> >> CPU 0.
> >
> > Btw, you should be seeing other explosions too as a lot of code
> > assumes CPU 0 is the BSP.
>
> Actually, with 'nomce' or this patch applied the system seems to chug along
> merrily, no further errors in dmesg, no further BUGs. Linux still gets all of the
> topology correct (i.e. CPU 0's core/thread/siblings are correctly identified) so
> really, aside from userspace programs doing naive stuff with CPU affinity (like
> expecting even,odd CPUs to be SMT pairs), I think the overall result here is
> that most threads are interchangeable... except when probing certain
> features like these MCA types.
>

Do you see 23 banks named in the new BSP's /sys/devices/system/machinecheck/
folder? You should see non-core banks like l3_cache, umc, etc.

Thanks,
Yazen