[PATCH 2/5] KVM: SVM: Skip OSVW MSR reads if KVM is treating all errata as present

From: Sean Christopherson

Date: Thu Nov 13 2025 - 18:14:26 EST


Don't bother reading the OSVW MSRs if osvw_len is already zero, i.e. if
KVM is already treating all errata as present, in which case the positive
path of the if-statement is one giant nop.

Opportunistically update the comment to more thoroughly explain how the
MSRs work and why the code does what it does.

Signed-off-by: Sean Christopherson <seanjc@xxxxxxxxxx>
---
arch/x86/kvm/svm/svm.c | 14 ++++++++++++--
1 file changed, 12 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/arch/x86/kvm/svm/svm.c b/arch/x86/kvm/svm/svm.c
index 5612e46e481c..0101da1a3c26 100644
--- a/arch/x86/kvm/svm/svm.c
+++ b/arch/x86/kvm/svm/svm.c
@@ -539,15 +539,25 @@ static int svm_enable_virtualization_cpu(void)


/*
- * Get OSVW bits.
+ * Get OS-Visible Workarounds (OSVW) bits.
*
* Note that it is possible to have a system with mixed processor
* revisions and therefore different OSVW bits. If bits are not the same
* on different processors then choose the worst case (i.e. if erratum
* is present on one processor and not on another then assume that the
* erratum is present everywhere).
+ *
+ * Note #2! The OSVW MSRs are used to communciate that an erratum is
+ * NOT present! Software must assume erratum as present if its bit is
+ * set in OSVW_STATUS *or* the bit number exceeds OSVW_ID_LENGTH. If
+ * either RDMSR fails, simply zero out the length to treat all errata
+ * as being present. Similarly, use the *minimum* length across all
+ * CPUs, not the maximum length.
+ *
+ * If the length is zero, then is KVM already treating all errata as
+ * being present and there's nothing left to do.
*/
- if (cpu_has(&boot_cpu_data, X86_FEATURE_OSVW)) {
+ if (osvw_len && cpu_has(&boot_cpu_data, X86_FEATURE_OSVW)) {
u64 len, status = 0;
int err;

--
2.52.0.rc1.455.g30608eb744-goog