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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
July 25, 2009 at 11:33 am
(July 25, 2009 at 8:23 am)leo-rcc Wrote: Does anyone here know of a tool where I can copy files straight from my pc into a VMware datastore?
WinSCP?
Kyu
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 4, 2009 at 2:46 pm
I'm beginning to wonder if Xen isn't the better product ... you can do templates and XenMotion ... for FREE!!!
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 4, 2009 at 8:53 pm
Yes, that was my impression as well. Only the companies decision was to go with VMware so I had to follow suit. Had it been up to me I would have chosen Xenserver, at least my tests show the hypervisor to be at least as fast and as solid as ESXi, and you get a lot more features for free.
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Leo van Miert
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 5, 2009 at 5:32 am
(August 4, 2009 at 8:53 pm)leo-rcc Wrote: Yes, that was my impression as well. Only the companies decision was to go with VMware so I had to follow suit. Had it been up to me I would have chosen Xenserver, at least my tests show the hypervisor to be at least as fast and as solid as ESXi, and you get a lot more features for free.
Yeah part of the reason I feel I have to go ESXi ... they use ESX in the company so there are similarities between the products and I am a VMWare certified.
Truth is ... had I not already configured several machines on the system (a 2008 DC, a 2003 F&P with about 700GB data and an XP client) I could probably swap but now I'm kinda committed ... I could still change my mind coz the system hasn't gone "live" yet (i.e. hasn't replaced my physical server) but I have to absolutely make my mind up soon. I guess what I would really like is a second similarly configured system to play with and perhaps migrate systems to ... it wouldn't be cheap (would cost me at least a new 1TB drive and 4Gb IBM server memory ... reckon that would be the minimum I could get away with) but it would be doable.
Kyu
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 6, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Here's a cool program for you Leo ... RD Tabs. It's a multiple window RDP client (lots of functions, it's free and very, very good!
Kyu
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 7, 2009 at 2:19 am
Interesting, thanks Kyu.
edit: that XS bap looks usefull too.
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 10, 2009 at 6:25 am
(August 7, 2009 at 2:19 am)leo-rcc Wrote: edit: that XS bap looks usefull too.
Yeah it does ...
OK ... so I killed my ESXi server and "embraced" Xen!
The reason I did so was that I was unable to create templates on ESXi ... you have to buy a license which costs something like $3000. This is understandable from VMWare's POV as they wish to charge for their enterprise class products but hardly suitable for a server used as a home server and test/dev/training and so on.
My first thoughts are as follows:
- Installed with no hardware issues (that wasn't true of ESXi but, to be fair to them, it took me 3 months to get the server to a good ESXi compatible spec and I fully expected Xen would run on kit like that).
- Lower footprint ... ESXI memory footprint is around 2Gb, Xen is under 1.
- ESXi is faster to power up but since it will typically be running all the time that's no great issue.
- Storing ISO images locally on an ESXi server is a doddle, on Xen it seems to require a major configuration change (see below).
- Virtual machines don't seem to be as configurable under Xen as ESXi.
- Connect as easily to the local client PC as ESXi does.
- Connects via XenCentre faster than ESXi (excepting first time when you have to connect the specific host).
- XenCentre works as well under Windows 7 as it does under XP ... getting VMWare's VI Client working under Windows 7 is an absolute nightmare (I still haven't succeeded).
- Xen requires specific Linux support (a second CD during install or run later via script) whilst ESXi appears to support Linux out-of-the-box.
Right now my particular issue is ISO image storage. With ESXi you can simply browse to wherever you've stored your ISO's and there appear to be no limits on what you can store outside of disk capacity. On Xen ISO's are selected by drop down list so (I presume) there is a fixed location for the ISO's (I think it's called the SR) ... I haven't been able to figure out where that is.
What's more there is some suggestion that the SR is limited to 4GB which, given that the full distro of some Linux ISO's are 4Gb or more, is a bit of an issue.
I don't suppose you know how to do this do you Leo?
Kyu
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 10, 2009 at 7:28 am
In Xen that is sort of quirky indeed.
If you want to upload an ISO image to the server and make it available for use with the installation of a VPS you can do so by creating a local ISO storage repository (SR).
You will find an ISO storage repository configured for the /iso_import/images directory.
Copy your ISO images to that directory and rescan the repository with this command:
xe sr-scan uuid=`xe sr-list | /usr/bin/perl -e \
'while (<STDIN>) { if (/^uuid.* ([^ ]*)$/) { $uuid = $1; } \
if (/name-label \( RW\): ISOs/) { last; } } print "$uuid";'`
Your ISO images should now be available to you in the XenCenter client.
I have not heard of a maximum limit on size though.
I have heard some prefer to mount an NFS volume and make that the SR.
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Leo van Miert
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 10, 2009 at 2:20 pm
(August 10, 2009 at 7:28 am)leo-rcc Wrote: You will find an ISO storage repository configured for the /iso_import/images directory.
Can't find it (I'm assuming that is off the root) ... any idea where?
Kyu
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RE: COMPUTING: Virtualisation
August 10, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Try /var/opt/xen/iso_import/
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Leo van Miert
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