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  • 1.  Recommend grub_cmdline_linux_default values for host and guest

    Posted Jun 16, 2026 09:45 AM
    Edited by kasper Jun 16, 2026 09:46 AM

    What are the recommend / suggested values for the Linux grub_cmdline_linux_default setting for host/physical machine and guest/virtual machine?   I am seeing 'preempt=full nohz_full=all' as a possibility but does it apply to both host and guest?  I also see 'threadirqs' and others.   What are the recommended values?



  • 2.  RE: Recommend grub_cmdline_linux_default values for host and guest

    Posted Jun 16, 2026 02:07 PM

    preempt=full nohz_full=all ("realtime" kernel features) have never made a difference for me on Fedora 43/44.  That said, I haven't experimented with modified kernels -- there might be value here.  Let us know what happens if you try these.  I also plan to try the BORE scheduler at some point.

    I've also tried setting SCHED_RR and SCHED_FIFO on host VMware processes (eg vmx-vcpu, main-svga, main-mks, etc) to no avail.  In a heavily-loaded system with processes fighting for a CPU timeslice I reckon they could be helpful.  But in my case they did little or nothing.  Same goes for renice and setting process priority level.

    init_on_alloc=0 init_on_free=0are security-related and deal with ensuring memory pages are zeroed-out before+after use.  Some feel this is belt-and-suspenders overkill and are fine with disabling.  For most workloads it seems to make no difference but there's a handful of corner cases (OpenZFS is one) where they definitely move the needle.  I've benchmarked this setting on the host but never in a guest.  Older nVidia GPU drivers would malfunction with this -- I believe it was fixed ~6mos. ago.

    mitigations=off is a blanket disable for a heap of processor mitigations including Spectre, Meltdown, RetBleed, L1TF, and many others. It matters less with newer CPUs but even with my AMD Zen 4 I can show significant benefit given the right workload.  For me it's more effective as a host setting.  Useful but smaller benefit in a guest.  You'll have to make the call on security vs. performance here.