[Xen-users] PCI passthrough to Windows XP

["Daniel E. Shub" <daniel.shub@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I am trying to run Windows XP in a Xen DomU virtual machine with a PCIe 
device, for which there are no Linux drivers, being passed through from a 
Debian Squeeze Dom0. My hardware supports virtualization and it is active in 
the bios. If I run 
grep -E "(vmx|svm)" --color=always /proc/cpuinfo
 
when I boot from the standard kernel I can see my processor supports vmx, 
although when I boot the Xen kernel, vmx doesn't show up. 
I have followed the setup in http://wiki.xen.org/wiki/Xen_Beginners_Guide. The 
guide basically creates a minimal Debain Squeeze install as Dom0, a PV Debian 
Squeeze DomU and a HVM Windows DomU running on an LVM volume. I have followed 
the guide essentially to the letter with the only differences being my network 
bridge is different and I didn't install a Debian PV DomU. 
I currently have a DomU on an LVM volume that is running a fully updated 
version of Windows XP with the GPLPV drivers. I am now trying to pass the PCI 
device, but am running into problems. If I compare the output of lspci with 
and without the PCIe card that I am trying to pass I see the following two new 
entries: 
05:00.0 PCI bridge: PLX Technology, Inc. PEX 8111 PCI Express-to-PCI Bridge 
(rev 21) 
06:04.0 Bridge: Device 4550:9054 (rev 01) 
I also see that another entry has changed its address from 
06:00.0 IDE interface: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE6121 SATA II 
Controller (rev b2) 
to 
07:00.0 IDE interface: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE6121 SATA II 
Controller (rev b2) 
I modified /etc/default/grub to include either 
GRUB_CMDLINE_XEN="xen-pciback.hide=(05:00.0)(06:04.0)"
 
or 
GRUB_CMDLINE_XEN="pciback.hide=(05:00.0)(06:04.0)"
 
and run update-grub and update-grub2 after making the change and then fully 
powered down and rebooted. This doesn't appear to do anything and nothing 
shows up with 
xm pci-list-assignable-devices
 
Looking at the Xen wiki guide http://wiki.xen.org/wiki/Xen_PCI_Passthrough I 
have tried things like 
echo 0000:05:00.0 > /sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:05:00.0/driver/unbind
echo 0000:05:00.0 > /sys/bus/pci/drivers/pciback/new_slot
echo 0000:05:00.0 > /sys/bus/pci/drivers/pciback/bind
 
and some other stuff related to pci-stub. Sometimes my random fiddling results 
in 
xm pci-list-assignable-devices
 
listing 05:00.0 and 06:04.0. If I modify my .cfg file to include 
pci = ['05:00.0', '06:04.0']
 
I get an error about pci-stub not owning the 05:00.0 device. If I only try and 
pass 06:04.0 the DomU won't boot. 
Any ideas how to get pci passthrough working?


Dan


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