On Aug 19, 2009, at 7:52 AM, Bernhard Gschaider <bgschaid_lists@ice-sf.at
wrote:
Thanks for the replies so far.
On Wed, 19 Aug 2009 11:06:08 +0100 "MMG" == Marcelo M Garcia marcelo.maia.garcia@googlemail.com wrote:
MMG> Bernhard Gschaider wrote:
Hi!
I have the following problem: I have a server (CentOS 5.3 x86_64) on which I want to install a virtual Xen-machine (CentOS 5.3 x86_64), I ssh from my workstation (Centos 5.3 x86_64 .... do you see the pattern ;) ) to that server and start the virt-manager. I create a new Guest (Paravirtualiuzed) and point it to the server with the installation files (CentOS 5.3, but I already said that). The manager creates the disk image an then opens the Graphical console for installation. Sometime around the point where the installation program wants me to select the keyboard the graphical console it freezes. The server is completely dead (no console, no disk activity, no ping, only a reset will "repair" it)
My question: am I doing something stupid? But I figured "They're all the same system, this must work"
I don't want to play around with it too much as the server is also our file-server and people start complaining.
So any hint will be greatly appreciated (otherwise I'll have to setup another machine for the guests)
MMG> I use the virt-manager, but I always use a kickstart to do MMG> the installation and I never had problems.
This (and other replies) lead me to two possible culprits:
- either the graphical console over X11 is not a good idea (but I can't imagine that, it shouldn't shoot the kernel)
- I always installed as a paravirtualized machine, Could it be that the install-kernel on the 5.3-media is not aware of this and somehow manages to shot the host (because I noticed that most recipies on
the net, including http://wiki.centos.org/HowTos/Xen/ InstallingCentOSDomU never talk about paravirtualized (so I assume they use a fully virtualized guest)
I will try these later today (when people left the office and no one will complain about server downtimes)
Bernhard
BTW: Just one fundamental question: as the upstream OS vendor is switching his virtualization to KVM anyway, is it a good idea to forget Xen and use KVM (in other words: is it stable enough for production)?
Xen still has it's place as it's fully paravirtualized domains are still way faster then any fully virtualized setups.
Plus it's the only hypervisor I know of that let's you pass-through just about any PCI device to a domU.
Once VMware gets their pass-through generalized and Intel gets their next generation hardware virtualization technology mainstreamed, Xen won't have such an edge in those areas.
I still have yet to see a VMware/KVM framework for cloud computing where VMs can be seemlessly transferred between hosts or even to an off-site virtualization provider.
-Ross