[mdlug] Creating virtual machines

[Joe Doehler]

I have experience with VM's with both 32-bit Linux and 64-bit Win7 
hosts. Guest OS on the Linux host was Win2K. Guests on the Win7 host are 
32-bit WinXP, 32-bit Win2K, 64-bit Ubuntu desktop, and 32-bit Ubuntu 
Server 10.04.

In all cases, I used VMWare ("Workstation" for the Linux host, "Player" 
for the Win7 host). I tried VirtualBox in Win7, but it hung up during 
installation every time I tried while looking for a video card. I gave 
up on it. I think that the VMWare products are simply more mature; they 
have all been rock-stable for me.

I have had no problems otherwise. Once hardware-assisted virtualization 
is enabled in the CPU's, the guests run amazingly fast (at least, it 
amazes me).

Yes, you can create a VM from a "hard" XP machine. I have not tried it 
yet. However, as I understand the  process spelled out by VMWare, the 
"hard" box needs to be running at the time the virtual image is created. 
Let us know if and how you get it done with a dd'd copy.

I have had no problem mixing 32/64-bit host/guest. That, too, amazes me...

Yes, you can dedicate one or several CPU cores to both the VM envelope 
and to the guest OS. Be aware, however, that allowing the guest OS to 
use more than one core may be a one-way street: you may not be able to 
switch the guest back to using fewer cores. This could be a problem is 
you intend to migrate the VM image to a machine with fewer cores.

Joe.

___________________________________________
On 2/28/2011 1:44 PM, David McMillan wrote:
>
>       So, here's my situation:  a few weeks ago, my company-issued laptop
> (a multi-boot system with Ubuntu and XP Pro SP3) was stolen from my
> vehicle (in Canada, no less -- and they say Canada is safer, hah!).
> Fortunately for me, I had recently made a complete copy of the hard
> drive to an external USB drive using dd.  I should note that this was a
> straight of=if copy, with no compression or conversion of the original
> to a file.
>       Now, the WinXP side of this laptop had quite a bit of setup work
> done on it that would be tiresome to repeat, not to mention quite a bit
> of software that can be expected not to run well (or at all) on my new
> laptop, which (when it arrives) will be running Windows 7 (but will be a
> dual-boot Win/Linux machine as soon as I get my hands on it).
>       So, my thought is, I *ought* to be able to create a VM from the
> copy of the stolen laptop's WinXP partition.  But aside from a bit of
> messing about with VMWare, I haven't got any experience in this area.
> Ideally, I'd like to create a VM that can be stored in my multi-access
> partition, and run from inside either Win7, or from Linux, so I don't
> have to reboot to access the VM when I need it.  So a multi-platform VM
> hosting system is essential, and of course the more Open-Source the better.
>       So, before I start thrashing about blindly, here's my list of
> questions:
>
>       1.  What's the best (loaded question, I know) open-source VM
> hosting system that runs under XP, Win7, and Linux well, and doesn't
> have any trouble hosting any of those OSs?
>       2.  How does one go about creating a VM from a drive image of an
> existing "hard" WinXP computer?  My only experience with VMs previously
> has been creating fresh VMs from scratch using an OS install disk.  I
> know that XP can mulish over being transferred to new hardware, but I'm
> hoping there's a howto of sorts for getting around this.
>       3.  Are there any known problems running 32-bit VMs under a 64bit
> host OS?  My new machine will be my first foray into 64bit operations.
>       4.  The new machine will have a quad-core processor.  Any
> experiences to relate regarding optimizing VMs for running on
> multi-core?  I've heard that cores can be "dedicated" to VMs to avoid
> bogging the system down, but it's not a subject I've researched yet in
> any degree of detail.