Dear,

forgive me if this question has already been answered or is plainly foolish but. Since some operating systems would only work as guest with processors using VT only (windows for instance), would it be possible to use an smp machine and dedicate one cpu for the host OS and use the other one only for guest OSes?
I just thought it could be a way around the ring permission problem.....

I'm not sure if that's possible, but I don't think it's necessary. The scheduler which deals with which thread get sent to what cpu should spread them roughly evenly, if the guest uses roughly equal resources to the host. Or maybe I don't understand the quesion. Are you asking if you can use this as a way of overcoming hardware incompatability. If that's your question - sorry, but I have no clue.

It is possible with VMware actually in Vmware 5.5 I am pretty sure there is an experimental multicore option.

I am not sure what you are asking either, either way the Kernel has to see both CPU's so the ring 0 problem will always exist because even the Vmware modules are kernel modules. If you don't enable SMP support in your kernel nothing can use the other CPU, (as I understand it anyways, i could be very wrong on this)

Ok my apologies if this was a bit confusing. I was actually referring to an article I read in a magazine recently:

Before VT and SVM, all x86 chips used four rings of privileges for execution. On ring 0 were the most privileged processes (usually the OS), and on ring 4 the less privileged processes (usually users applications). This forces secure separation of privileges at the hardware level: only ring 0 apps can have direct control over the hardware ....

Well basically I was just thinking if it would be possible for the host OS to only use 1 CPU and leave another CPU for the guest OS, but as you said the kernel has to see both CPU so my question is rubbish ^^ shame =)