VMware Help

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I was at work this afternoon and the light finally hit me! I need to get VMWare!

Im using a 600Mhz 192mb Pc as a server and 200mhz 128mb for xp as my 70-270 lab.. thats fine for now... having read through the posts and done some research i came up with some questions:

1) Is processing speed really needed for would 1Ghz be fine for my WHOLE mcse?

2) RAM? how much we looking at?

3) Im on a really tight budget so i have an idea and wonder if it would work... one machine with 2 VMS on it.. networked with another machine with another two VMs on it? does this work?

Im looking at this option as i dont have the space to have 3 or 4 PC's in my room...

thanks for the help in advance!

 

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How about One machine with 1gb of memory, an athlon 2500 processor and loads of virtual pc's on it.?

Host is XP Pro
VPC1 = Server 2003 DC, 256 mb
VPC2 = Server 2003 Member, 128 mb
VPC3 = w2k PC (not part of network)
VPC4 & 5 = W2k Domain Workstations, 128 mb each
VPC6 = Fedora (not part of network)
VPC7 = Longhorn Beta (not yet part of network)

Although I only run the four that I have identified memory to at once my host runs ok, and so do all of the VPC's.

 

Well I'm running an AMD XP2300 with 2 gigs of ram. I can run 2 servers and 4-6 desktops before I start noticing sluggishness.

 

so hang on... two VM with server = 512MB
and then upto 4 clients lets say of xp =512MB total 1GB?

EDIT: does the processor and HDD play a role?

 

The more RAM the better, zimbo. I run 1.25 GB of RAM and depending on how much RAM I've allocated my VMs, I can run several together before noticing a significant slowdown. Remember, your host machine requires RAM, too. In fact, I'm posting this from my Debian VM on my Windows XP Pro host. I've got it set to "full screen" so as far as I'm concerned, I might as well be on a "non-virtual" Debian box (perhaps the next step).

You can bridge your virtual network to your actual one to create one complete network segment. In other words, if you had two "real" machines and two VMs, you'd effectively be running a four computer network. As far as Windows VMs are concerned, you still are facing the licensing issues. Technically, for each Windows VM you create, you need a separate user license.

Having said that, VMs are really just a set of files in a folder sitting in your Documents and Settings directory. If you hose it, just delete the folder and reinstall. No muss, no fuss. I love VMware.

EDIT: Well...obviously, the more VMs you run, the more separate processes are running so yes, the CPU plays a part. If you plan on creating a lot of VMs (remember, you don't have to have them all up and running at the same time...you can mix and match), you need to have the room on your HDD. If you create 5 VMs, each with an HDD of 10 GB, you'll need 50 GB of space just for your VMs, not counting on the space you need for your host's OS and application software. I have a 200 GB HDD on my lab machine so I have plenty of room.

 

zimbo,

If you have limited financial resources you might want to look into Xen. It's open source, free, and you can do almost everything except run Windows on it. There is a port to Windows but it hasn't been released due to licensing restrictions.

Using this you only have to spend money on hardware, not both hardware and software. Anyway, it's another option for you. YMMV.

 

i got the OSes with books all 180 day including win xp so im okay..
look with that 600mhz machine i put 512mb and a 20GB... lets say i put server on it and another VM of server then use two seperate machines (real machines) - so effectivily three PC's running 4 OS- how would you n/work them?

NOW... has someone actually done the whole MCSE using VMs? this question aplies to people who havent as well BUT to complete the whole mcse and security section.. what will be the final machine count? someone told me 2 servers and 1 or 2 clients would be good?

 

Just so that you know Zimbo, with Virtual PC it it cust the image size back to that which is actually being used. e.g. the default hard disk size for a Virtual PC is 16gb, yet when I close it down it only uses about 2gb of disk space because it only uses that which has been written too.

Don't ask me how though as I havent got a clue.

I will just add though if yu want to be running linux get VMWare, not Virtual PC as it's support for linux is virtually non existant. (only version I have got to work is Fedora)

 

If you could try to get as powerfull a physical PC as you can get as VM's are make the processor constantly work.

In responce to your Q about the MCSE then yes it is totally possible to do it.

You could have a virtual setup of 6 servers and 20 clients if you had enough power in the pc to run them.

 

thanks simon! no im only looking to get the mcse done with this lab right now.. the problem i got im abit short on the green ones!


simon the Q about mcse was how many is the min machines ill need to complete the MCSE... right now all i know i need is a client and a server... for 293/294 or even 284 i know i will need more so how many machines either real or virutal will i need?

 

Given what's been said, you might be better off with Virtual PC. Xen doesn't support Windows clients and your goal is to get your MCSE. Virtual PC isn't quite as pricey as VMware so that should help. Keep in mind that if you buy or make one really tough host machine, you can create the rest of your study lab in software. Think of how much it would cost to actually purchase 2 servers and 20 PCs as hardware.

 

thanks for the help trip and simon...

so lets try get this together... i need a MEGA system to run my VM's BUT this is what i have in mind at the moment... 1GHZ, 1GB and 80GB... how we looking? enough for my MCSE or more HDD or processor?

 

More of all of them if you want to have them running at the same time.

For my main PC I have an Athlon XP2600 (approx 2GHz), 1.5 GB RAM, and a 200GB SATA/120 and 80 GB IDE drives and when I open up 4 servers the whole thing just about has a heart attack. This could be due to the RAM allocation though.

 

Depends on what else you want to use that system for. If you use it *only* for your virtual lab, I think the HDD size would be ok, depending on how much HDD space you plan on allocating your VMs (maybe I'm *greedy*, but I'd start out with 100 GB HDD minimum for the host). 1GB RAM should be good but you might want to make sure you can upgrade. As time goes by, you might come up with a little extra money that you could use to increase the RAM of your host system. That means you can run more VMs at once without experiencing significant paging.

 

IMHO You should preferably have at least three computers and they don't have to be mega spec unless you are running VMS on them. The reason I say three, is that for some configurations you need to practice with RRAS. To practice the routing side of things you really need two NICs in your server, so that you can configure it to route.

For example...

One NIC 192.168.0.1
Other NIC 10.0.0.1

Then you can have one client on the !0.x.x.x subnet and the other on the 192.168.x.x subnet.

It is also a good way to learn about DHCP and how that handles multiple subnets.

So, three cheap boxes verses one expensive box and some expensive software.

The bridging of NICs that Trip mentioned would be confusing on VMs with this set up. VMs are good but they are not giving you exactly the same experience as doing it for real.

 

Another question i would like to ask about VMWare is i want to do a RIS setup... because of my older machines this isnt quite possible.. Correct me if im wrong but with VMWare is it possible? I mean its all software so surely i can? As well is there a guide or something outthere? i looked at the trial and boy im impressed!

 

I wouldn't think so Zimbo. For RIS to work, you need Active Directory, functioning DNS and a DHCP server. All these could exist in a VM environment. However, you also need a PC that is equipped with network booting capability either as part of the MOBO (boot ROM) or a *NIC* that supports PXE and is on the Microsoft HCL (hardware compatibility list).

As virtual machines share the NIC (bridging) with the host machine, RIS won't work.

Feel free to shoot me down if I am wrong

 

so is there no way to do a RIS setup with VMWare?

 

zimbo, as a VMware customer, you should be able to create an account at the VMware forums here:

http://www.vmware.com/community/forum.jspa?forumID=19&start=0

I hate to say it, but some of these questions are best answered by the expert and this forum is where you'll find them. My beloved Debain VM install went toes up due in part to a VMware bug. There are other factors that I still don't understand, but other distros work just fine. The only way I found out what some of the issues were was to post the log files for that VM on the VMware boards. Give it a whirl and let us know what you find out.

 

I am willing to bet a beer token that I am right