recommendations on virtualization software

Jerry Feldman gaf at blu.org
Thu Mar 19 14:51:29 EDT 2009


On 03/19/2009 12:12 PM, Jerry Feldman wrote:
> On 03/19/2009 11:55 AM, Mark Ellison wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> I am seeking recommendations and pros/cons of different 
>> virtualization software.
>>
>> The physical machine is a Intel T9400 quad core with 8GB ram, 2x500GB 
>> sata disks and 1Gb nic.  My current plan is to run 64 bit Fedora Core 
>> 10 (or 11 as available) as the host OS.  The guest OSes will include 
>> a mix vista, xp and other UNIX variants.
>>
>> I am aware of the commercially available VMware workstation, 
>> VirtualBox and Xen.  Any feedback and recommendations are appreciated.
>>
>>   
> Depends what you want to use it for. KVM/QEMU are distributed in the 
> Fedora 10 (Core is no longer used) distro. One advantage that I see 
> over Virtualbox is that you can virtualize CPUs. I've currently got 
> Vista and XP set up as guest OS (quad core AMD Opteron). Another 
> advantage is that the kernel will always contain the proper module. I 
> use Virtualbox on my Ubuntu laptop wth XP and Fedora 10 as the guests 
> (Turion 64 single core).  Both VMWare and Virtualbox have guest os 
> installed add ins (called Guest Additions in Virtualbox). Normally, 
> when you are working in the VM, your cursor is locked in the VM, and 
> you need a special key sequence to unlock it. With the guest add ons, 
> the cursor is integrated, so the VM cursor behaves like it does with a 
> normal window. I have not personally tried Xen.Virtualbox 2.1.4 is the 
> latest release and it is a free download.
>
I just want to add one more tidbit for KVM and USB. KVM does support 
USB, but the version of libvirt distributed with Fedora 10 does not, so 
if you need USB support with KVM, you can execute KVM from the command 
line. In my test, I specified the PCIID for my Blackberry. Newer 
versions of libvirt do have USB builtin, and should be available in the 
next Fedora spin. So, another advantage of KVM/QEMU is just this, that 
it can be run from a script.

-- 
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Boston Linux and Unix
PGP key id: 537C5846
PGP Key fingerprint: 3D1B 8377 A3C0 A5F2 ECBB  CA3B 4607 4319 537C 5846


-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 251 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
Url : http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/private/gnhlug-discuss/attachments/20090319/f5ef5973/attachment.bin 


More information about the gnhlug-discuss mailing list