Linux host purely for running virtualbox

Jarobata · Post by **Jarobata** » 10. Feb 2009, 08:17

I've been searching around but its very difficult because everything gives me discussions of lightweight linux distros to be guests. I want the most lightweight and fast linux installation to be used purely to run virtualbox and the virtual os's. I also need it to be 64-bit. Can someone please point me in the right direction?

Post by **chungy** » 10. Feb 2009, 09:47

I'd just go with a minimal Debian install. Simply don't select "Desktop environment" during the installation process and you're half way there (the other half is installing VirtualBox).

Another good choice IMO is RHEL/CentOS, although it tends to use up a ton of disk space even without X11.

Post by **fixedwheel** » 10. Feb 2009, 11:36

chungy wrote:minimal Debian install. Simply don't select "Desktop environment" during the installation process and you're half way there

+1

Post by **TerryE** » 10. Feb 2009, 13:31

+1 or Ubuntu Server. However a caveat: you must be comfortable with doing all your VM and server admin from a command terminal session.

Post by **fixedwheel** » 10. Feb 2009, 14:48

TerryE wrote:and server admin from a command terminal session.

nevertheless much of the X11 stuff will come with the virtualbox dependencies.

in fact i run a slimmed down gnome environment but i dont install that with the "desktop" install option. My preferred way is apt-get install dselect and using dselect toggle some packages important to me like xserver-xorg-video-intel (replace intel with the one you need and if you dont know take xserver-xorg-video-all) gdm gnome-volume-manager nautilus-gksu nautilus-open-terminal ... and the minimal gnome environment will be selected through the dependencies.

Post by **chungy** » 11. Feb 2009, 01:59

You don't actually need to install the X11 stuff; VirtualBox simply won't have a GUI without Qt installed, and won't have the SDL interface either without SDL installed. VirtualBox's VRDP server will run fine without either of those libraries.

Post by **TerryE** » 11. Feb 2009, 05:52

+1, though you need to repackage the distro leaving out the Qt4 based components, but it's quite straight forward to do so.

chronoboy · Post by **chronoboy** » 12. Feb 2009, 21:04

+1, a minimal install of Debian will only comsume roughly 20MB of RAM when booted with minimal services and no X11.

I personally prefer Debian because of this, since there is lots of RAM to space, and disk space is fairly cheap. I tend to use icewm for my Xsession, as it is very customizable, easy and efficent. icewm also does not depend on GTK+ or QT libraries, and VirtualBox running nicely inside.

icewm sort of reminds me of the Novell Netware days, which it was basically just a taskbar and desktop icons.

btw, even with this icewm setup, there is still tons of RAM left for VirtualBox, I do also run the mpd service in the background so that I can enjoy some music while I work. mpd is a must have if you need a slimmed down system and still want some music to listen to. It even supports shoutcast streams