Bug 783921

Summary: libvirt cannot disable kvmclock
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Reporter: Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini>
Component: libvirtAssignee: Martin Kletzander <mkletzan>
Status: CLOSED ERRATA QA Contact: Virtualization Bugs <virt-bugs>
Severity: unspecified Docs Contact:
Priority: unspecified    
Version: 6.2CC: acathrow, dallan, dyuan, jdenemar, mzhan, rwu, yupzhang
Target Milestone: rc   
Target Release: ---   
Hardware: Unspecified   
OS: Unspecified   
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version: libvirt-0.9.10-1.el6 Doc Type: Bug Fix
Doc Text:
Story Points: ---
Clone Of: Environment:
Last Closed: 2012-06-20 06:47:00 UTC Type: ---
Regression: --- Mount Type: ---
Documentation: --- CRM:
Verified Versions: Category: ---
oVirt Team: --- RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team: --- Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description Paolo Bonzini 2012-01-23 09:22:30 UTC 
Description of problem:
kvmclock is disabled using a fake CPU feature, but this feature obviously does not appear in libvirt's cpuid data files.

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):
0.8.2-25.el5

None of these XML snippets work:

   <cpu mode='host-model'>
     <feature policy='disable' name='kvmclock'/>
   </cpu>

   <cpu mode='host-passthrough'>
     <feature policy='disable' name='kvmclock'/>
   </cpu>

   <cpu>
     <model>core2duo</model>
     <feature policy='disable' name='kvmclock'/>
   </cpu>

A better fit is anyway the <timer> element:

   <clock>
     <timer name='kvmclock' present='yes'/>
   </clock>
Comment 3 Jiri Denemark 2012-01-27 16:37:26 UTC 
This feature is now implemented upstream by v0.9.9-140-gb66d1be and v0.9.9-139-g5a137f3:

commit b66d1bef14739ab56ed9f430b4c4e5b89ed5ed12
Author: Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini>
Date:   Fri Jan 27 14:49:52 2012 +0100

    qemu: parse and create -cpu ...,-kvmclock
    
    QEMU supports a bunch of CPUID features that are tied to the kvm CPUID
    nodes rather than the processor's.  They are "kvmclock",
    "kvm_nopiodelay", "kvm_mmu", "kvm_asyncpf".  These are not known to
    libvirt and their CPUID leaf might move if (for example) the Hyper-V
    extensions are enabled. Hence their handling would anyway require some
    special-casing.
    
    However, among these the most useful is kvmclock; an additional
    "property" of this feature is that a <timer> element is a better model
    than a CPUID feature.  Although, creating part of the -cpu command-line
    from something other than the <cpu> XML element introduces some
    ugliness.

commit 5a137f3620af4f6fd4a4484c6d79af0748aec85e
Author: Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini>
Date:   Fri Jan 27 14:49:51 2012 +0100

    conf: add kvmclock timer
    
    Add kvmclock timer to documentation, schema and parsers.  Keep the
    platform timer first since it is kind of special, and alphabetize
    the others when possible (i.e. when it does not change the ABI).
Comment 6 Min Zhan 2012-02-15 02:58:49 UTC 
Verified this bug with libvirt-0.9.10-1.el6
Steps:
1. For a shutdown guest,
# virsh edit guest
...
  <clock offset='utc'>
    <timer name='kvmclock' present='yes'/>
  </clock>
...

2. # virsh start guest
   # ps -ef |grep kvm
   qemu     12826     1 43 04:56 ?        00:00:20 /usr/libexec/qemu-kvm -S -M rhel6.2.0 -cpu qemu64,+kvmclock -enable-kvm -m 1024 -smp 1,sockets=1,cores=1,threads=1 -name rhel62......

You can find '-cpu qemu64,+kvmclock' from qemu cmd. Also login the guest and check
# dmesg|grep kvm
kvm-clock: Using msrs 4b564d01 and 4b564d00
kvm-clock: cpu 0, msr 0:1c1df41, boot clock
kvm-clock: cpu 0, msr 0:2215f41, primary cpu clock
Switching to clocksource kvm-clock


3. # virsh destroy guest
   # virsh edit guest
...
  <clock offset='utc'>
    <timer name='kvmclock' present='no'/>
  </clock>
...

4. # virsh start guest
   # ps -ef |grep kvm
qemu     13115     1 13 04:58 ?        00:00:00 /usr/libexec/qemu-kvm -S -M rhel6.2.0 -cpu qemu64,-kvmclock -enable-kvm -m 1024 -smp 1,sockets=1,cores=1,threads=1 -name rhel62
......

You can find '-cpu qemu64,-kvmclock' from qemu cmd. Also login the guest and check
# dmesg|grep kvm
nothing return.
Comment 8 errata-xmlrpc 2012-06-20 06:47:00 UTC 
Since the problem described in this bug report should be
resolved in a recent advisory, it has been closed with a
resolution of ERRATA.

For information on the advisory, and where to find the updated
files, follow the link below.

If the solution does not work for you, open a new bug report.

http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2012-0748.html