What is VM ware?

[demonic]

Yeah running on WinXP here with the server edition and no problems at all.

One question tho, what are the problems with using the physical disk of the local machine in the virtual machine?

i.e Local Machine Drive E: > Virtual Machine Drive F:

Are there problems with more than 1 Virtual Machine using a Local Machines Drive?

Cheers

I must say, using VM Ware has solved my problem. Now I can understand why you need 4x Cores on 1 CPU

Also, is it supposed to be sluggish when you are using the virtual envirnoment? Do I put this down to memory resources not being there or my CPU maxing out?

 

[chavvdarrr]

Yeah running on WinXP here with the server edition and no problems at all.

One question tho, what are the problems with using the physical disk of the local machine in the virtual machine?

i.e Local Machine Drive E: > Virtual Machine Drive F:

Are there problems with more than 1 Virtual Machine using a Local Machines Drive?

Cheers

I must say, using VM Ware has solved my problem. Now I can understand why you need 4x Cores on 1 CPU

Also, is it supposed to be sluggish when you are using the virtual envirnoment? Do I put this down to memory resources not being there or my CPU maxing out?

I never use physical drive in VM, usually 8GB statically alocated are more than enough for testing purposes... and for production servers there is SAN...
Starting more than 1 VM at same time and doing something with them WILL be sluggish. Basicly you need enough system RAM - by enough I assume 512MB for host (if it is Windows) + enough for all VMs you'll start at same time , + a bit more (overhead is 54MB for 512, and 8 more MB per every other 512 Mb "virtual" memory). So 2 2003 Servers under XP/2003 you need 2GB ... and also to set in VMware settings that VMs should have access to 1GB RAM, mark it as "Fit all virtual machine memory into reserved host RAM".

And make sure your HDD is fast enough to handle all requests

 

[demonic]

Thanks for the reply...

Lets just say that Im at home. LOL, theres no SAN or anything else and this is being done on a budget. Im not that fussed when it comes to performance, but if I can make it better than I will.

Now if I want to run a physical drive in VM, what are the foreseen problems?

Before, I shared drives in the local machine and then network mapped them in the virtual drive. But if the wireless network crapped out, the connection would be lost and so would any data that was trying to be written.

Its no big deal if there is a big problem, as the drive being used is just for the VM servers.

 

[chavvdarrr]

of course you can use HDD only for VMs
main HDD with host, and second dedicated to VMs will be just fine.
Problems... well, if you start at same time 2 VMs, both with exclusive "direct" access to same HDD... but you can create 2 partitions and use 1 partition from VM.
and say share a folder for data exchange

 

[demonic]

Wait LOL.... Just noticed the new VM network adapters in my Networking Area.

I will revert back to Networking the Shares from the Local Machine, by the Virtual Machines. This way, its using the "Internal" Network and they wont ever disconnect and thus have any writing problems.

Also, I can have a drive that everyone is safe to use, its the actual directories that will be used by the VM.

Is that safe to assume? Hope so, looks like VM has done all that pretty much wanted

 

[demonic]

Is there anyway of knowing how much bandwidth (internet downstream/upstream) is being taken from the collection of VMs?

I would have thought I could install NetLimiter on the XP machine, but its not reading anything.

My router is pretty much next to useless. Anyone have any idea?

Thanks

 

[demonic]

Well, my 1GB ram stick still isnt here. Damn ebay!

Anyway, I went ahead in installing VM Server as I wanted to how it was. I installed the RC 2 on this machine.

Pentium 2.8 Northwood
Asus IT7
768MB Ram
1x 10GB
1x 40GB
1x 60GB
1x 200GB
1x DVD-RW
ATI 9800PRO

Windows XP is the base, with LooknStop for the firewall, Nod32 for the AV, Uptodate with all Service Packs, Critical Updates and everything else.

The Virtual Image is just Windows 2003 Server EE. Service Pack 1 and Critical Updates. Latest Java VM, Azureus and Emule. As the main purpose is to leech of the Internet . Secondary was to have another Image of W2K3 EE to run when I wanted to study (when I get around to creating and using that Image).

The VM would only have access to 256MB of Ram and 6GB HD for its virtual Drive.

Ok, so how did it run? Very very slow. Even before starting into Windows 2003, the HD would be thrasing around. Trying to move the mouse was like going through sludge. When Emule and Azureus were running, things were even worse.

When starting up another VM machine of the exact same spec. Things just got slower, although still workable.

One curious point to make. Was that Emule on Virtual Machine 1 would get 80 to 120k in download. Emule VM2, would never go above 15k in download.

So in order to fix things, I did this.

- Tell my AV to exclude emule temp and incoming dirs, azureus folder and VM's folders.
- To add in the config file for each VM.. (.vmx)
- MemTrimRate=0
- sched.mem.pshare.enable=FALSE option

Can find why here : http://www.virtualization.info/2005/11/how-to-improve-disk-io-performances.html

But still the performance was bad. The thrashing of HD's did die down abit. But still noticable.

Stopped everything. Uninstalled VM Server and then Installed VM Workstation 5.5.1.

Difference here, is like night and DAY!

Firstly, with VM Server on the XP Host. My memory usage would be around 427MB. Now its not even over 300MB.

I can have 2 VM machines of Windows EE with no problems at all. The mouse pointer glides across the screen like its a real session. I have also replaced Azureus with uTorrent. Just to save a bit of memory.

Finally, both emules are downloading as the speeds they are supposed too. I.e both were doing around the 90k when I last saw them.

At this point, only adding another 1GB will allow me to run another 2x Windows 2003 EE servers hopefully this time at 384MB to make the experience better.

So yeah, VM Server 2003 is free and its a good entry point to start off from. But I recommend whole-heartedly the Workstation variant. Well worth the money