Optimum Virtual Machine workstation

[VectraMan]

I have a load of VMs in VirtualBox on a Windows 7 x64 host.

Two notes of caution: 1. VB version 4 is flakey as hell. I'm a few revisions behind, so may have improved, but I'm glad that on the aforementioned machine I'd left it on version 3.

2. Backing up a VM is as simple as copying the disk image, but that may mean backing up a lot more than you need to. I.e. I have a VM with about a 20GB. If I just start it for a second and stop it again, the VDI is marked as changed and the backup software now has to backup 20GB.

I find performance wise it's the GUI that suffers the most, and disk and CPU performance are pretty good. So it really depends on what you're doing with the guest. On my setup at least I wouldn't want to use a VM for general web surfing for example.

[PAH]

Got my new PC up and running. Firefox isn't as sluggish now.

Sticking with Windows 7 Virtual PC for the moment as it has seamless VM integration, so the VM operates as if it's another window for copying/dragging files and mouse around the screen, plus USB support. Not sure if VirtualBox or the others offer all that, will look into it at some point.

Only thing it's missing that I may need is multi-core support. Going to set up my Dev VM later and see if one core is enough.

The main cause of sluggishness is mechanical HDs. Got one as a temp store for my VMs and it's already gotten on my nerves after being used to silent/fast SSD as a main drive.

Have created a VM of my old W7 system (using Disk2VHD) before the mobo/cpu upgrade in case I missed backing up anything. Just got to muster the courage to wipe the old SSD so I can reuse it for more VMs instead of the crappy mechanical HD.

[Sysman]

I have a load of VMs in VirtualBox on a Windows 7 x64 host.

Two notes of caution: 1. VB version 4 is flakey as hell. I'm a few revisions behind, so may have improved, but I'm glad that on the aforementioned machine I'd left it on version 3.

I too jumped back at one point, but it coincided with my trial of VMware plus a break doing other stuff. I've found V4 stable enough for my needs for quite a while now.

One thing you don't want to do is fire up Virtual PC / XP Mode while you are running a VBox instance. VBox will promptly keel over (logging out and in again gets VBox back again).

2. Backing up a VM is as simple as copying the disk image, but that may mean backing up a lot more than you need to. I.e. I have a VM with about a 20GB. If I just start it for a second and stop it again, the VDI is marked as changed and the backup software now has to backup 20GB.

It's a shame Windows 7 didn't get similar backup functionality to Server 2008. That addresses this problem nicely by only backing up the modified blocks. Meanwhile I set my backups to run overnight.

It's a shame the OP isn't interested in a Mac here, as I gather the latest OS does allow integration of VM disks with Time Machine.

I find performance wise it's the GUI that suffers the most, and disk and CPU performance are pretty good. So it really depends on what you're doing with the guest. On my setup at least I wouldn't want to use a VM for general web surfing for example.

Yep. I'm happy lobbing huge database loads and the like at a VM. My setup allows me to surf
happily too, but I quickly learned to do my surfing on the host system so that my history and bookmarks are in one place (yes, Firefox 4 has boomark sync built in, but I'm not sure about the history, and I'm not sure I want to allow a sandboxed instance to affect anything outside it).

I can forget playing any of the MS games in a VM. Way too slow, but the Linux games I have tried have been fine. Then again, I'm not really a games player...

[PAH]

It's a shame the OP isn't interested in a Mac here, as I gather the latest OS does allow integration of VM disks with Time Machine.

I prefer to build/upgrade my own PCs rather than buy off the shelf, though now Macs are Intel based can't I download a trial version of OS X (or whatever latest version is) and install it in a VM to see what all the fuss is about?

[doodab]

I prefer to build/upgrade my own PCs rather than buy off the shelf, though now Macs are Intel based can't I download a trial version of OS X (or whatever latest version is) and install it in a VM to see what all the fuss is about?

The OS is tied to apple hardware, but that can be got around. Google for Hackintosh.

[Clever Hans]

I'm not suggesting this is the optimum setup, but I haven't had problems with sluggishness with Virtual Box.

I had it running Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and MS Dynamics CRM 4 on a weedy little Samsung NC10 Netbook (enhanced to 2GB and SSD), just to muck about.

It was slow, but surprisingly useable.

On the backing up note, I've had issues restoring VB from snapshots taken when the machine is running, associated with attached stuff like shared folders. Not a problem when restoring a snapshot of a shut down machine though.

[doodab]

One thing in favour of Xeons is the support for ECC memory which allows you to have 32GB on the single socket ones.

[d000hg]

Not so keen on VMWare. Tried the free version a few years ago

Therefore past experience is not valuable. It might suck, but things have moved on a lot recently so it could be totally different.

It seems weird to have so many VMs to me. Not quite sure what you gain having dev, video on separate VMs.

[PAH]

The OS is tied to apple hardware, but that can be got around. Google for Hackintosh.

Thanks, will check it out later.

I suppose the reason they tie it down is so they don't have to worry about compatibility and driver development/support.

Shame though as allowing people to dual boot between Windows and OSX on people's own choice of hardware might get them a bigger foothold in the OS market if their OS is truly a lot better than Windows.

Maybe it's not that great, so they don't want people to find out too easily.

[PAH]

I'm not suggesting this is the optimum setup, but I haven't had problems with sluggishness with Virtual Box. I had it running Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and MS Dynamics CRM 4 on a weedy little Samsung NC10 Netbook (enhanced to 2GB and SSD), just to muck about.

The SSD will have made a massive difference. If anyone is still using a mechanical HD as their primary drive, give SSD a try. Everything feels far more responsive and snappier, plus they're silent and use less power.

It added a couple more years of life onto my 1st gen core2duo system, and only the 2gb ram mobo limit was a big enough reason for me to finally upgrade. Now have 16gb, which only cost 57 quid (plus vat, that I can reclaim ) for Kingston Value ram.