Pkg xen devel - Jul 2021 - Bug#990717: xen-system-amd64: Microcode isn't loaded when booting in xen mode

Package: xen-system-amd64
Version: 4.11.4+107-gef32c7afa2-1
Severity: important

Dear Maintainer,

When booting in Xen mode my system doen't load microcode, I suposse this is
the reason I have a line in /var/log/kern.log saying:

|Jun 28 17:09:28 xuxa3 kernel: [    3.013020] Performance Events: unsupported p6
CPU model 79 no PMU driver, software events only

And perfomamce is degraded:

When booting the system in normal mode, no xen mode, the first two lines written
in  /var/log/kern.log say:
| Jul  5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [    0.000000] microcode: microcode updated
early to revision 0xb00003e, date = 202
1-02-06
| Jul  5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [    0.000000] Linux version 4.19.0-17-amd64
(debian-kernel at lists.debian.org) (gcc version 8.3.0 (Debian 8.3.0-6)) #1 SMP
Debian 4.19.194-1 (2021-06-10)

In xen mode the first line insn't written at all.

I can't remenber if the first time I installed xen the microcode was loaded
or not, but as long as I can check the microcode isn't loaded and the system
performance is clearly degraded.

  Yours,

    Jose L.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 10.10
  APT prefers stable
  APT policy: (500, 'stable')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 4.19.0-17-amd64 (SMP w/8 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=es_ES.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=es_ES.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8),
LANGUAGE=es_ES.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages xen-system-amd64 depends on:
ii  xen-hypervisor-4.11-amd64  4.11.4+107-gef32c7afa2-1
ii  xen-hypervisor-common      4.11.4+107-gef32c7afa2-1
ii  xen-utils-4.11             4.11.4+107-gef32c7afa2-1

xen-system-amd64 recommends no packages.

xen-system-amd64 suggests no packages.

-- no debconf information

Hello,

On Mon, Jul 05, 2021 at 03:13:17PM +0200, Jos? L. Fern?ndez Jambrina
wrote:
> When booting in Xen mode my system doen't load microcode,
It is my understanding that when booting the hypervisor it is the
hypervisor's job to load microcode, and it won't do so unless you
have something like:

    ucode=scan

in your hypervisor command line, e.g. by putting:

GRUB_CMDLINE_XEN="ucode=scan"

in /etc/default/grub.

Do you have something like that?

That will cause the hypervisor to scan the other boot files (kernel
and initramfs) for microcode to apply, like the kernel itself would
otherwise do.

It works for me, anyway.

Cheers,
Andy

OMG, I supposed it will enough to put a line like:
ucode=scan
As soon as I tried a line like:
GRUB_CMDLINE_XEN="ucode=scan"
The system behaviour changed I still have a couple de lines in 
/var/log/kern.log saying:
> Jul??5 19:38:19 xuxa3 kernel: [???22.487806] VPMU disabled by hypervisor.
> | Jul??5 19:38:19 xuxa3 kernel: [???22.488166] Performance Events: 
> unsupported p6 CPU model 79 no PMU driver, software events only. 
 ?But this seems another problem because while booting with standard 
kernel I got:
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837414] Performance Events: PEBS 
> fmt2+, Broadwell events, full-width counters, Broken BIOS detected, 
> complain to your hardware vendor.
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837427] [Firmware Bug]: the BIOS 
> has corrupted hw-PMU resources (MSR 38d is 330)
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837504] Intel PMU driver.
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837508] ... version:????????????????3
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837509] ... bit 
> width:??????????????48
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837510] ... generic registers:??????8
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837511] ... value 
> mask:?????????????0000ffffffffffff
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837512] ... max 
> period:?????????????00007fffffffffff
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837513] ... fixed-purpose events:???3
> Jul??5 14:05:17 xuxa3 kernel: [????0.837514] ... event 
> mask:?????????????00000007000000ff
I don't know if you could help me with this, but as long I see the 
microcode has been loaded and this bugs can be closed Thanks very 
much,El lun, 05-07-2021 a las 14:35 +0000, Andy Smith
escribi?:
> > Hello,
> > 
> > On Mon, Jul 05, 2021 at 03:13:17PM +0200, Jos? L. Fern?ndez
Jambrina>
> wrote:
>> > > When booting in Xen mode my system doen't load microcode,
> > 
> > It is my understanding that when booting the hypervisor it is the
> > hypervisor's job to load microcode, and it won't do so unless
you
> > have something like:
> > 
> > ????ucode=scan
> > 
> > in your hypervisor command line, e.g. by putting:
> > 
> > GRUB_CMDLINE_XEN="ucode=scan"
> > 
> > in /etc/default/grub.
> > 
> > Do you have something like that?
> > 
> > That will cause the hypervisor to scan the other boot files (kernel
> > and initramfs) for microcode to apply, like the kernel itself would
> > otherwise do.
> > 
> > It works for me, anyway.
> > 
> > Cheers,
> > Andy
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Your message dated Thu, 5 Aug 2021 23:33:50 +0200
with message-id <ebaddb64-24c4-014f-e62c-12b65f55f4bf at knorrie.org>
and subject line Re: Bug#990717: xen-system-amd64: Microcode isn't loaded
when booting in xen mode
has caused the Debian Bug report #990717,
regarding xen-system-amd64: Microcode isn't loaded when booting in xen mode
to be marked as done.

This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with.
If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the
Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith.

(NB: If you are a system administrator and have no idea what this
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misconfiguration somewhere. Please contact owner at bugs.debian.org
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-- 
990717: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=990717
Debian Bug Tracking System
Contact owner at bugs.debian.org with problems
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Subject: Re: Bug#990717: xen-system-amd64: Microcode isn't loaded when
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