Enhanced VMotion Compatibility (EVC) processor support

To use EVC, you must be running ESX Server 3.5 Update 2 or higher with Virtual Center 2.5 Update 2 or higher and have compatible processors in your servers. EVC does not allow for migration with VMotion between Intel and AMD processors. Note the following restrictions:

1. VMware cannot verify whether all processor models listed are capable of EVC support. For more information on supported servers and processors models, see the Systems Compatibility Guide for your ESX version.

2. You must ensure the BIOS settings for these processors enable Hardware Virtualization (if available) and Execute Protection. Default BIOS settings may not always enable these features. Hardware Virtualization is Intel VT on Intel processors and AMD-V on (supported) AMD processors. Execute Protection is Intel eXecute Disable (XD) on Intel processors and AMD No eXecute (NX) on AMD processors.
   

   EVC capabilities of your server are based on two factors:

   1. The version of vCenter Server that manges the host
   2. The underlying CPU architecture of the host processor
      
      Tables 1.1 and 1.2 lists the available EVC baselines their description. Table 2 describes EVC baselines supported by different vCenter Server versions.
      Tables 3.1 and 3.2 describe EVC baselines supported by different CPU architectures.

   This section contains the following subjects:

   • Table 1.1: Description of Intel EVC Baselines
   • Table 1.2: Description of AMD EVC Baselines
   • Table 2: EVC Baselines supported in ESX releases
   • Table 3.1: EVC Baselines on Intel CPUs
   • Table 3.2: EVC Baselines on AMD CPUs
   • References

   Table 1.1: Description of Intel EVC Baselines

   EVC Baseline	Description
   Intel® Xeon® Core™ 2	Applies baseline feature set of Intel® Xeon® Core™2 (Merom) processors to all hosts in the cluster.
   Intel® Xeon® 45nm Core™ 2	Applies baseline feature set of Intel® Xeon® 45nm Core™2 (Penryn) processors to all hosts in the cluster. Compared to the Intel® Xeon® Core™2 EVC mode, this EVC mode exposes additional CPU features including SSE4.1
   Intel® Xeon® Core™ i7	Applies baseline feature set of Intel® Xeon® Core™i7 (Nehalem) processors to all hosts in the cluster. Compared to the Intel® Xeon® 45nm Core™2 EVC mode, this EVC mode exposes additional CPU features including SSE4.2 and POPCOUNT

   Table 1.2: Description of AMD EVC Baselines

   EVC Baseline	Description
   AMD Opteron™ Generation 1	Applies baseline feature set of AMD Opteron™ Generation 1 (Rev. E) processors to all hosts in the cluster.
   AMD Opteron™ Generation 2	Applies baseline feature set of AMD Opteron™ Generation 2 (Rev. F) processors to all hosts in the cluster. Compared to the AMD Opteron™ Generation 1 EVC mode, this EVC mode exposes additional CPU features including CPMXCHG16B and RDTSCP.
   AMD Opteron™ Generation 3	Applies baseline feature set of AMD Opteron™ Generation 3 (Greyhound) processors to all hosts in the cluster. Compared to the AMD Opteron™ Generation 2 EVC mode, this EVC mode exposes additional CPU features including SSE4A, MisAlignSSE, POPCOUNT and ABM (LZCNT)

   Table 2: EVC Baselines supported in vCenter Server releases

   	EVC Cluster Baseline
   vCenter Server Release	AMD Opteron™ Generation 1	AMD Opteron™ Generation 2	AMD Opteron™ Generation 3	Intel® Xeon® Core™2	Intel® Xeon® 45nm Core™2	Intel® Xeon® Core™ i7
   vCenter Server 2.5 U2 and later updates	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No
   vCenter Server 4.0	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes

   Table 3.1: EVC Baselines on Intel CPUs