Re: [PATCH 1/5] x86, mm, pat: Set WT to PA4 slot of PAT MSR

[Konrad Rzeszutek Wilk]

On Thu, Sep 04, 2014 at 04:34:43PM -0700, Andy Lutomirski wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 4, 2014 at 4:19 PM, Henrique de Moraes Holschuh
> <hmh@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > On Thu, 04 Sep 2014, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
> >> On 09/04/2014 01:11 PM, Henrique de Moraes Holschuh wrote:
> >> > I am worried of uncharted territory, here.  I'd actually advocate for not
> >> > enabling the upper four PAT entries on IA-32 at all, unless Windows 9X / XP
> >> > is using them as well.  Is this a real concern, or am I being overly
> >> > cautious?
> >>
> >> It is extremely unlikely that we'd have PAT issues in 32-bit mode and
> >> not in 64-bit mode on the same CPU.
> >
> > Sure, but is it really a good idea to enable this on the *old* non-64-bit
> > capable processors (note: I don't mean x86-64 processors operating in 32-bit
> > mode) ?
> >
> >> As far as I know, the current blacklist rule is very conservative due to
> >> lack of testing more than anything else.
> >
> > I was told that much in 2009 when I asked why cpuid 0x6d8 was blacklisted
> > from using PAT :-)
> 
> At the very least, anyone who plugs an NV-DIMM into a 32-bit machine
> is nuts, and not just because I'd be somewhat amazed if it even
> physically fits into the slot. :)

They do have PCIe to PCI adapters, so you _could_ do it :-)

> 
> --Andy
> 
> >
> > --
> >   "One disk to rule them all, One disk to find them. One disk to bring
> >   them all and in the darkness grind them. In the Land of Redmond
> >   where the shadows lie." -- The Silicon Valley Tarot
> >   Henrique Holschuh
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Andy Lutomirski
> AMA Capital Management, LLC
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/