Extensions to operating systems or software applications can be hosted in
virtual environments to fault isolate the extension. The virtual
environment in which extensions designed to control hardware devices can
safely execute can be efficiently created during an initial startup
sequence of a host environment by indicating to the host environment that
a second processing unit is present in the computing system allowing the
host environment to create a coherent state. A virtual process,
especially a virtual operating system process running on a virtual
machine, can be efficiently started by the created coherent state. A
coherent state can be created when an operating system starts up and the
appropriate parameters are observed and saved. Alternatively, an
operating system of the host environment can create the coherent state by
receiving indication of the second processing unit during the boot
process.