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  • SIG_Fiend

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    I'm on XP right now. I'm about to setup my system with VMWare so I can run XP, and Ubuntu virtual machines to more fully utilize all my hardware effectively.
     

    ducksps

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    uh-oh

    I'm an old Solaris guy who had to embrace windows then linux. So far I think Sun was on the money but Linux is where things have arrived and should start to focus. My virtualization certification is with Citrix but I still run the VM virtual machine for personal use to support my Ubuntu Linux distro. I hate computers but they are paying for NFA toys and Law school. Leave me a diesel land rover, M1a, 1911, and a tempermental Ducati and I will survive.

    Chris
    MCSE
    CCA "Citrix"
    CCSA "Checkpoint"
    CNA "Novell"
    KCE "Kace"
    SCSAS
    SubmachineGun Operator/Instructor "H&K" (in keeping things gun friendly)
     

    SIG_Fiend

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    Does anyone have an opinion on the efficacy of running virtual machines for typical home use? I kind of like the idea. I don't know whether it would be any more efficient than what I have now, though I can never leave anything alone. ;) I'm mainly curious if there is any potential performance benefit in dividing tasks with major system loads over multiple VM's. What I mean by that is, instead of multitasking on one system, dividing up the tasks between individual VM's. I'm just not sure if there is any worthwhile performance benefit on a typical home system. I'm sure with a serious server setup it's much more beneficial. I was planning on having at least 2 VM's setup, one on XP and the other on Linux. The XP VM would be for games and other software compatibility requirements. I was planning on using the Linux VM for all the internet stuff. Other than that, I can't really think of any reason I'd need/want to run any other OS' other than that.
     

    ducksps

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    I run it on my laptop and desktop

    I run a VM session on my tiny laptop for testing and connectivity issues. My laptop OS is Vista64 (would be mac or linux but I need to stay current for work) but no Checkpoint VPN client was in existance last I checked so I would use the VM to keep a 32bit client running allowing me to connect those sites using that VPN product. Checkpoint was not compatible in any way the 64bit so I had no other choice. I've also run a small domain on that very laptop when testing script distributions with great success. Just limit the machine sizes and be stingy allocating memory and you would be surprised what can be gotten away with. Don't forget VMware server is also a free product.

    Give it a shot and you should be fairly happy. The machine isolation does a good job of keeping resources restrained to the machine meant to have them.
     

    SIG_Fiend

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    I'm posting from my newly installed VMWare Ubuntu virtual machine. This is pretty cool! Watching Modern Marvels on my XP main machine while browsing the net through the Linux VM, and it's running pretty well so far. I can see I need more ram though. ;) lol
     

    Starker

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    Ubuntu is the only desktop distribution I have used. I have also used Ubuntu and a few other Linux server distributions.

    Does anyone have an opinion on the efficacy of running virtual machines for typical home use? I kind of like the idea. I don't know whether it would be any more efficient than what I have now, though I can never leave anything alone. ;) I'm mainly curious if there is any potential performance benefit in dividing tasks with major system loads over multiple VM's. What I mean by that is, instead of multitasking on one system, dividing up the tasks between individual VM's. I'm just not sure if there is any worthwhile performance benefit on a typical home system. I'm sure with a serious server setup it's much more beneficial. I was planning on having at least 2 VM's setup, one on XP and the other on Linux. The XP VM would be for games and other software compatibility requirements. I was planning on using the Linux VM for all the internet stuff. Other than that, I can't really think of any reason I'd need/want to run any other OS' other than that.

    I'm posting from my newly installed VMWare Ubuntu virtual machine. This is pretty cool! Watching Modern Marvels on my XP main machine while browsing the net through the Linux VM, and it's running pretty well so far. I can see I need more ram though. ;) lol

    I don't think you will get any performance benefit. Generally, the resources in your computer are the resources you have to work with. The only possible benefit I could see would be limiting the resources for your Windows VM so that Windows does not continue to hog more and more of them. However, whatever you are doing on the Windows VM will be limited by the resources allocated to it.

    The main reason for running VMs is to limit the number of physical machines needed. It is very reasonable to use VMs for home or personal use, especially if you have certain applications that run better on a different OS than your primary OS. Generally speaking, applications will run slower in a VM than in a native install of the OS.
     

    SIG_Fiend

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    I don't think you will get any performance benefit. Generally, the resources in your computer are the resources you have to work with. The only possible benefit I could see would be limiting the resources for your Windows VM so that Windows does not continue to hog more and more of them. However, whatever you are doing on the Windows VM will be limited by the resources allocated to it.

    The main reason for running VMs is to limit the number of physical machines needed. It is very reasonable to use VMs for home or personal use, especially if you have certain applications that run better on a different OS than your primary OS. Generally speaking, applications will run slower in a VM than in a native install of the OS.

    The main thing is I would like to start multi-tasking a bit more effectively. Multi-tasking as in, burning a cd, browsing the net while burning, running a game server in the background while all that is going on, etc etc. Why? Just because. I don't know. ;) I will end up with a multi processor server and 16gb of ram if I have to. I just always have to tweak stuff for some darn reason. ;) lol
     

    Texas1911

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    I'm posting from my newly installed VMWare Ubuntu virtual machine. This is pretty cool! Watching Modern Marvels on my XP main machine while browsing the net through the Linux VM, and it's running pretty well so far. I can see I need more ram though. ;) lol

    Running pretty flawless?

    You running it on a single screen?

    Ubuntu uses considerably less resources I find.
     

    SIG_Fiend

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    Running pretty flawless?

    You running it on a single screen?

    Ubuntu uses considerably less resources I find.

    It's not running bad so far. I'm still learning the OS as I have almost no experience with Linux. The only times I've ever used Linux was years ago, and it was different systems like Mandrake and Redhat I think. So far, I have my VM set for only 500mb of ram usage, and it doesn't run too bad. There's just a bit of lag.

    I'm still on a single screen. What I want to eventually do is get 2-3 other monitors so I can run one VM per monitor and truly multi-task. I have absolutely no real reason I need to, I just think it would be cool to do. ;)
     

    Starker

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    It's not running bad so far. I'm still learning the OS as I have almost no experience with Linux. The only times I've ever used Linux was years ago, and it was different systems like Mandrake and Redhat I think. So far, I have my VM set for only 500mb of ram usage, and it doesn't run too bad. There's just a bit of lag.

    I'm still on a single screen. What I want to eventually do is get 2-3 other monitors so I can run one VM per monitor and truly multi-task. I have absolutely no real reason I need to, I just think it would be cool to do. ;)

    Whether it works well or not, it should look cool!
     

    Major Woody

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    I've beem using Linux for 4 yrs now, time to upgrade to Xandros or Ubuntu. Need the new flash player to get YouTube videos. How do you burn an ISO disc?
     

    Major Woody

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    Funny you posted this. I just rebuilt my computer today and had Ubuntu 8.10 installed with Fire Fox. I'm running the AMD Black box at 2.8 x2 dual with an MCI mother board and it rocks! Try this: Go to Startpage Metasearch and set it as your web browser. It is very secure, it does not make a record of your ISP adresses as you browse. You may have to re enter your name and passwords for your forums but it even has a setting in it that will let you accept or deny cookies sites try to install when you visit. Makes it even faster. I highly recommend this set up due to the new cybersecurity rules that give Barry the right to cut off the internet in case of a cyber emergengy. Like the treat levels, yuk.
    Bill left too many Gates open and the govt has all the codes. Go Linux. Xandros or Ubuntu, it gives you the edge. A 90 % chance Windows will be hacked to a 5% chance the Linux will be. Just do it. Stop getting observed by the all seeing eyes.:patriot:
     

    crossfire

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    Switched from Win 98 SE to Ubuntu 6.06 when it first came out. Presently operating with Ubuntu 8.04 on a 2.2G P4 with 500 Mb RAM. My wife's computer runs XP Home SP-2 on a 2.4G AMD with 2G RAM.
     

    Cyberlink

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    Does anyone have an opinion on the efficacy of running virtual machines for typical home use? I kind of like the idea. I don't know whether it would be any more efficient than what I have now, though I can never leave anything alone. ;) I'm mainly curious if there is any potential performance benefit in dividing tasks with major system loads over multiple VM's. What I mean by that is, instead of multitasking on one system, dividing up the tasks between individual VM's. I'm just not sure if there is any worthwhile performance benefit on a typical home system. I'm sure with a serious server setup it's much more beneficial. I was planning on having at least 2 VM's setup, one on XP and the other on Linux. The XP VM would be for games and other software compatibility requirements. I was planning on using the Linux VM for all the internet stuff. Other than that, I can't really think of any reason I'd need/want to run any other OS' other than that.

    Ill chime in on this one. First a little background that some may understand.
    I switched from windows to Linux as my full time desktop when windows 95 was released. I went directly from windows 3.1 to Slackware, then over to redhat where I am still. I am a Sr. Linux engineer with a background in Linux, Solaris (Starting with SunOS 4.1.4), AIX, HPUX, and SCO. So I do know a little about the subject of VM's and Linux/Unix based OS's.
    For the following I am just talking about VM's and not Virtual Partitioning or Account Rooting.

    To answer your first question on the efficiency for typical home use, You are loosing not gaining efficiency. Think of it this way, if you dived your garage in half, and put in a wall with a locked door, is the garage more efficient for less efficient? You have lost the space in the middle (about 6") and now have a second door to go through to get to one of your cars. It is the same concept, When you create a VM the software that manages the VM's (Hypervisor) takes up CPU and memory time. Add to that the fact that no VM will run as fast as the host machine and you are looking at a net loss. The same is true for servers, there is no net gain of efficiency in using a VM in a server environment.

    This almost always leads to the question as to why it is deployed if there is no efficiency gain. VM's strong points are in the ability to separate systems network functions and to allow the deployment of older OS's.
    For example, many companies have old NT4.0 boxes running software that has become mission critical to there company. This software has no upgrade path to newer OS's and many times the company that made it is out of business. Add to this the fact that NT4.0 will not run on newer hardware due to the closed source nature of NT and the fact that no one is making drivers for it. This is where you see the biggest benefit from VM's. You can deploy NT into the VM as the VM emulates older hardware.
    As to the separation of network functions. A web server, a DNS, server, and mail server, all use little to no system resources on there own and can all be placed on a single box and put on the internet. However, if there is a vulnerability in any one of them then all could be compromised. By deploying each to a separate VM you isolate them and should any of them be compromised the others could still be safe. Add to this the fact that A slammed Web Server or a run away DNS server could take down all services on a single machine. where as through the use of VM you can restrict the memory and CPU available It becomes evident that it is much better to run them in VM's.
    For standard home use you have the advantage of running and testing different OS's within virtual machines. In and of it self that can be useful but remember that you are using a small part of your computer and you can not expect the same performance as your main desktop.

    BTW, last time I ran VMware there was an issue with the time synchronization, Linux VM's would not keep time properly. Dont know if they have fixed it yet.

    My desktop, 2X dual core 64bit AMD 5500's, 4g ram, 2.5Tb hard Drive space, dual NVIDIA GForce 9500's , and Dual 19" wide screen LCD monitors
     
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