Modify BIOS settings on r6525

[江立中]

Dear Cloudlab admin,

I'm conducting experiments on r6525 (https://www.cloudlab.us/status.php?uuid=547e7a54-3538-11ef-9f39-e4434b2381fc). I need to make some changes in BIOS settings, but I don't have the privilege to do that. Would it be possible for you to help me change it?

First, please enable SEV-SNP as mentioned in this post: https://groups.google.com/g/cloudlab-users/c/FdUFfwI0Tb0/m/Tk2JB2yNAQAJ

Second, please modify the settings below:
Memory Settings ->
    Memory Interleaving: Disable
Processor Setting ->
    “All Prefetchers”: Disable
System Profile Settings ->
    System Profile: Custom
    CPU Power Management: OS DBPM
    Memory Frequency: Maximum Performance
    Turbo Boost: Disable
    C States: Disable

    Memory Patrol Scrub: Disable
    Determinism Slider: Performance Determinism
    Algorithm Performance Boost Disable (ApbDis): Enable
    ApbDis Fixed Socket P-State: P2

The machine is currently idle, so you can make the changes at any time.
Thank you in advance.

Sincerely,
Li-Chung

[Mike Hibler]

Before I do this, can you reinstantiate your profile using the
UBUNTU22-64-STD image instead of the UBUNTU22-64-BETA image? The latter
is actually quite old and not supported. You were probably misled by the
"BETA" name thinking it was the cutting edge image, but it is not. It is
actually the first Ubuntu 22 image we got working 18 months ago. You should
always use the -STD version of an image if it is available.

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[江立中]

Sure. 

I just launched another experiment that uses the UBUNTU22-64-STD image (https://www.cloudlab.us/status.php?uuid=1dbbd97e-374c-11ef-9f39-e4434b2381fc). 

Please modify the BIOS settings for this one. I will use this machine to do my work.

Thanks!

[Mike Hibler]

I think the BIOS is fixed for this node (clnode286). There may have been
other issues we ran into related to Grub in the system image, but give it
a try and see if SEV is enabled now.

> cloudlab-users/21531a7b-4a3f-4f02-b0d8-d89783c2e048n%40googlegroups.com.

[江立中]

I tried to install the new kernel image to test SEV-SNP, but the machine got stuck during the reboot.
The issue seems to be the same as in the previous post https://groups.google.com/g/cloudlab-users/c/FdUFfwI0Tb0/m/SjL-SLi7BgAJ, where I saw you recommended using the UBUNTU22-64-BETA image. 
I'm wondering if it is feasible to use the BETA image instead of the STD one.

[Mike Hibler]

It looks like your experiment terminated before we could look at it.
If you run into this again, let us know.

We tried with our UBUNTU22-64-STD image and it does work with a larger
initramfs, which was the issue in that thread. If it is still failing,
it could be something else.

> cloudlab-users/a855e712-07d2-4c0d-8a09-63b77b951a2dn%40googlegroups.com.

[江立中]

Hi Mike,

I just launched a new experiment with STD image (https://www.cloudlab.us/status.php?uuid=9094336c-40e9-11ef-9f39-e4434b2381fc#) and successfully rebooted the machine with my Linux kernel with 22MB initramfs. (in my experience, a 132MB initramfs was too large and would cause the abovementioned issue.)

However, I encountered another issue. While I was able to launch SEV and SEV-ES VMs, I failed to launch the SEV-SNP VM. I checked the MSR and found that the Secure Nested Paging is not enabled. Specifically, the output of MSR 0xC0010010 is 0x2f40000. Note that the bit 24 in the output is 0. According to the AMD manual, the bit should be 1 if Secure Nested Paging is enabled, so I’m wondering if Secure Nested Paging is set up correctly.

Unfortunately, I could not check the BIOS settings by myself. I tried to check the BIOS settings using the console, but I could not enter the BIOS setup page during the reboot even if I pressed F2. Could you please help me check if Secure Nested Paging is set up correctly?

Thanks,
Li-Chung

[Mike Hibler]

SNP is on in the BIOS. I will try to look at this further on Monday.

> cloudlab-users/55bc40ce-e110-4d68-9d38-8bb9ab4cc8a3n%40googlegroups.com.

[江立中]

Hi Mike and other Cloudlab Admin,

I have fixed the issue (my previous kernel used too much memory.) and successfully launched the SEV-SNP VM on clnode286.

However, by checking the MSRs, I found some BIOS settings (e.g., disable Turbo Boost) did not match the setup I mentioned in my first message:

Memory Settings ->
    Memory Interleaving: Disable
Processor Setting ->
    “All Prefetchers”: Disable
System Profile Settings ->
    System Profile: Custom
    CPU Power Management: OS DBPM
    Memory Frequency: Maximum Performance
    Turbo Boost: Disable
    C States: Disable

    Memory Patrol Scrub: Disable
    Determinism Slider: Performance Determinism
    Algorithm Performance Boost Disable (ApbDis): Enable

    ApbDis Fixed Socket P-State: P2 

Now I have a new experiment on another R6525 machine (clnode311): https://www.cloudlab.us/status.php?uuid=5f9d5f6b-620b-11ef-a601-e4434b2381fc

Could you enable SEV-SNP and configure the abovementioned BIOS setup for this machine?

Thanks!

Li-Chung