Intel 64 and IA-32 Architectures Software Developers Manual Volume 3B, System Programming Guide Part 2

Table Of Contents
Vol. 3 20-21
VIRTUAL-MACHINE CONTROL STRUCTURES
20.7.2 VM-Exit Controls for MSRs
A VMM may specify lists of MSRs to be stored and loaded on VM exits. The following
VM-exit control fields determine how MSRs are stored on VM exits:
VM-exit MSR-store count (32 bits). This field specifies the number of MSRs to
be stored on VM exit. It is recommended that this count not exceed 512 bytes.
1
Otherwise, unpredictable processor behavior (including a machine check) may
result during VM exit.
VM-exit MSR-store address (64 bits). This field contains the physical address
of the VM-exit MSR-store area. The area is a table of entries, 16 bytes per entry,
where the number of entries is given by the VM-exit MSR-store count. The format
of each entry is given in Table 20-10. If the VM-exit MSR-store count is not zero,
the address must be 16-byte aligned.
See Section 23.4 for how this area is used on VM exits.
The following VM-exit control fields determine how MSRs are loaded on VM exits:
VM-exit MSR-load count (32 bits). This field contains the number of MSRs to
be loaded on VM exit. It is recommended that this count not exceed 512 bytes.
Otherwise, unpredictable processor behavior (including a machine check) may
result during VM exit.
2
VM-exit MSR-load address (64 bits). This field contains the physical address of
the VM-exit MSR-load area. The area is a table of entries, 16 bytes per entry,
where the number of entries is given by the VM-exit MSR-load count (see
Table 20-10). If the VM-exit MSR-load count is not zero, the address must be
16-byte aligned.
See Section 23.6 for how this area is used on VM exits.
1. Future implementations may allow more MSRs to be stored reliably. Software should consult the
VMX capability MSR IA32_VMX_MISC to determine the number supported (see Appendix G.6).
Table 20-10. Format of an MSR Entry
Bit Position(s) Contents
31:0 MSR index
63:32 Reserved
127:64 MSR data
2. Future implementations may allow more MSRs to be loaded reliably. Software should consult the
VMX capability MSR IA32_VMX_MISC to determine the number supported (see Appendix G.6).