AMD to launch virtualization platform in H1 2006

Following Intel's announcement of a virtualization technology for its processors, AMD today announced that it will make its virtualization approach available for Opteron processors next month.

The project, code-named "Pacifica", is not based on a proprietary technology, but represents a port of the open-source package Xen to the AMD64 platform. According to a statement, the specification will be released next month. Users will see the virtualization feature available in both desktop, mobile and server processors during the first half of 2006, AMD said.

Further details of Pacifica were not provided besides the fact that AMD will provide a hardware virtualization feature for software companies to build on. Virtualization will enable users to run multiple operating systems and applications in independent partitions of a system. (THG)

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