I was doing some research on Xeon X5460 and was wondering what the instruction set  (-XSAVE/XRESTORE states, -XSETBV/XGETBV are enabled ) are for or what they do ?

 

Thank you

 

This says -

http://www.emulators.com/docs/nx34_2011_avx.htm

 

the XSAVE and XRESTORE instruction were introduced which deprecate the older FNSAVE/FXSAVE mechanism

Search XSAVE for more info in that link.

FXSAVE - http://x86.renejeschke.de/html/file_module_x86_id_128.html

 

Sounds like the "Save" is to save a State (?) and the "Restore" is to "put it back".

 

This nifty utility will tell you all about a CPU's abilities -

http://technet.microsoft.com/pt-pt/sysinternals/cc835722

 

This makes it -appear- (and that seems like other finds about the instruction sets) that it's/they're related to x64 and Hyper-V (VM's) -

http://books.google.com/books?id=crZaAwAAQBAJ&pg=PT126&lpg=PT126&dq=%22XSETBV/XGETBV%22&source=bl&ots=I-cE5EvmRN&sig=486gHMwrDMoha3qmvFb9iYABrTM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=TXLAU-m1MYSryATXoICwCA&ved=0CDoQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=%22XSETBV%2FXGETBV%22&f=false

Note the Book Name is titled "Mastering Hyper-V 2012 R2 with System Center and Windows Azure".
 

Why would you care? It's strictly related to the OS/SOftware utilization of said Instructions. I will -assume- it means that the MoBo/CPU is capable of running Hyper-V (VM's), i.e. separately running OS's (with one as the "controller") simultaneously. Try researching that instead.

 

HTH

Edited July 11, 201412 yr by submix8c

Thank you for the info.