Hi everybody!
I would like to run 8 xp pro (with applications such as photoshop cs3) simultaneously on a debian server with virtual box 2. Thin-clients would access their desktops via VRDP. Do you think it is technically feasible? in that case, what should be the minimum hardware configuration in order to keep good performances ?
Many thanks you for your answers !!
max vm running simultaneously...
Hi,
>Do you think it is technically feasible?
Yes, even more WinXP VMs are feasible with VBox.
>in that case, what should be the minimum hardware
>configuration in order to keep good performances ?
Well, that is another topic. It depends on what your
VMs do. Having 8 VMs running M$ Word and 8 people
typing requires less horse power for the server
than having 8 VMs running Photoshop, rendering
stuff, doing video editing.
I for example have Debian Edge 64 Bit running on a
simple Core2 Duo T7500@2.2GHz
With 4 GB RAM this machine can easily run a Windows XP
VM as database server and three other WinXP VMs as
client PCs for automated tests of a Java-Application.
The Databaseserver has 512 MB RAM assigned and the
client VMs 768MB.
For average applications I would calculate roughly with
1GB per VM and 1 physical core per client for maximum
performance.
I like those AMD Opteron 2350 (Socket F) since you get
4x2GHz for 240€.
Using an Xeon 3220 Processor with 4x2.4 GHz can be
an option as well. They currently cost around 180€.
All this of course with budget in mind. Otherwise
one can easily buy a beefy VMWare Server.
For storage I would go for three (or more) big SATA
drivers and use them in a "stripped" LVM. This gives
good performance. The only disadvantage I see in
using VBox though it the number of cores you can
assign to a VM. This is limited to 1. So you will
not able to run a multithreaded app within a VM
to get the most out of 2-4 CPUs.
You would have to switch over to Xen or VMWare
to assign more than one core to the VM.
Based on my experiences I have with my current
"VBox" Server and our other Xen machine (using
8 GB RAM and an Opteron 2222) I would say that
Xen is a bit more performant but not that much.
In your case (8 VMs) I would target a machine
with at least 8 GB RAM (better 16 GB) and two
quadcore CPUs (as fast as you can buy).
Storage can be internal (running multiple 1TB
SATA HDD) or as a typical SAN or iSCSI Target.
Oh yes, and good network bandwidth is also
important. You should consider using more
than one network card and bundle them to
one device in Linux.
All depending on your requirements and the
amount of money you have to spent :)
One final note in managing multiple VMs using VBox:
I feel that Sun should only invest a bit more time
in a frontend for cloning / exporting / importing
VMs and VBox could be a big player in the free
solutions for entry to mid level application servers.
The free version of VMWare is still not easier to
work with than Xen. Commercial Xen Versions such
as VirtualIron are often crippled to the max and
pretty much unusable. Enomalism as frontend for
Xen is cool but IMO still needs some work to do.
Cheers,
Holger
>Do you think it is technically feasible?
Yes, even more WinXP VMs are feasible with VBox.
>in that case, what should be the minimum hardware
>configuration in order to keep good performances ?
Well, that is another topic. It depends on what your
VMs do. Having 8 VMs running M$ Word and 8 people
typing requires less horse power for the server
than having 8 VMs running Photoshop, rendering
stuff, doing video editing.
I for example have Debian Edge 64 Bit running on a
simple Core2 Duo T7500@2.2GHz
With 4 GB RAM this machine can easily run a Windows XP
VM as database server and three other WinXP VMs as
client PCs for automated tests of a Java-Application.
The Databaseserver has 512 MB RAM assigned and the
client VMs 768MB.
For average applications I would calculate roughly with
1GB per VM and 1 physical core per client for maximum
performance.
I like those AMD Opteron 2350 (Socket F) since you get
4x2GHz for 240€.
Using an Xeon 3220 Processor with 4x2.4 GHz can be
an option as well. They currently cost around 180€.
All this of course with budget in mind. Otherwise
one can easily buy a beefy VMWare Server.
For storage I would go for three (or more) big SATA
drivers and use them in a "stripped" LVM. This gives
good performance. The only disadvantage I see in
using VBox though it the number of cores you can
assign to a VM. This is limited to 1. So you will
not able to run a multithreaded app within a VM
to get the most out of 2-4 CPUs.
You would have to switch over to Xen or VMWare
to assign more than one core to the VM.
Based on my experiences I have with my current
"VBox" Server and our other Xen machine (using
8 GB RAM and an Opteron 2222) I would say that
Xen is a bit more performant but not that much.
In your case (8 VMs) I would target a machine
with at least 8 GB RAM (better 16 GB) and two
quadcore CPUs (as fast as you can buy).
Storage can be internal (running multiple 1TB
SATA HDD) or as a typical SAN or iSCSI Target.
Oh yes, and good network bandwidth is also
important. You should consider using more
than one network card and bundle them to
one device in Linux.
All depending on your requirements and the
amount of money you have to spent :)
One final note in managing multiple VMs using VBox:
I feel that Sun should only invest a bit more time
in a frontend for cloning / exporting / importing
VMs and VBox could be a big player in the free
solutions for entry to mid level application servers.
The free version of VMWare is still not easier to
work with than Xen. Commercial Xen Versions such
as VirtualIron are often crippled to the max and
pretty much unusable. Enomalism as frontend for
Xen is cool but IMO still needs some work to do.
Cheers,
Holger
@JshWright:
Who are you targeting with your comment ?
To quote the licensing FAQ:
In my company I would be free to use a commercial licensed version of VMWare Workstation as well any time I need it.
Xen would be the other option as well. So buying a commercial license of VBox does not come to my mind in the very first place.
In regard to mp your comment is not very nice as well since you do not know if mp is currently doing
evaluation only to decide wether VBox is good for his purposes or not. Other free options are available
as well.
Who are you targeting with your comment ?
To quote the licensing FAQ:
I consider myself as an individual end user. Even if I was describing my PC configuration at work this is not very different from my home development PC where I use VBox to experiment with different OSes.If you are an individual end user, there is generally no need to purchase a commercial license, provided that you respect, in the case of VirtualBox OSE, the terms and conditions of the GPL, or, in the case of the full VirtualBox package, those of the Personal Use and Evaluation License.
In my company I would be free to use a commercial licensed version of VMWare Workstation as well any time I need it.
Xen would be the other option as well. So buying a commercial license of VBox does not come to my mind in the very first place.
In regard to mp your comment is not very nice as well since you do not know if mp is currently doing
evaluation only to decide wether VBox is good for his purposes or not. Other free options are available
as well.