Re: User Question

[Randy Broman]

Thanks Cam for the information, I've compiled and installed the kvm-84 
tarball,
I'm running modules KVM and KVM_AMD, and I can start my WinXP guest 
successfully
with qemu-system-x86_64. I've compiled and installed vde, but I can't 
get vde networking

working in the guest. My Kubuntu host is on 192.168.0 network, and I did:

% sudo vde_switch -t tap0 -daemon
%sudo ifconfig tap0 192.168.1.1 netmask 255.255.255.0

When I do an ifconfig -a, both my host eth0 and tap0 appear to show up 
correctly on
the host (?). When I start qemu-system-x86_64 with it's several options, 
I'm confused

as to how to specify the

-net 
vde[,vlan=n][,name=str][,sock-socketpath][,port=n][,group=groupname][,mode=octalmode]


options. I have only one guest on the system/network. The guest starts, 
and I've

set it's IP at 192.168.1.2 and gateway 192.168.1.1, but no connectivity.

Another question, should I use -net model=virtio, and if so where do I 
get the

WinXP driver for that?

Thanks, Randy



Cam Macdonell wrote:

I'm running Kubuntu Jaunty 9.04 on an AMD Phenom II 910, with a custom
2.6.28 kernel. I want to install KVM with a Windows XP guest. Apologies
I'm confused as to exactly what to install 

-I can (should?) apt-get install KVM and/or QEMU from the Jaunty 
archives.

-I can configure KVM into my custom kernel using CONFIG_KVM=m,
CONFIG_KVM_AMD=m and a couple other .config options.
-I can download, compile and install kvm-84 from source for my kernel
On this basis I would presumably invoke qemu-system-x86_64 from
the install directory.


Hi Randy,

I follow the third method.  Compiling the kvm-84 tarball will build both 
the kernel modules and the userspace qemu-system-x64_84 for you and 
install them for you.



This is a home not production system, and I'd like to get the best guest
performance possible. 


Getting the best performance possible will depend on your use of 
devices.  For network performance do not use the user network stack 
it's really slow; use vde or bridged networking.  Docs for this are here 
(http://www.linux-kvm.org/page/Networking).  VDE has no description 
(yet), but google will help.



I'm a little confused between KVM and QEMU ... I
know there's a KVM kernel module(s) plus the facility to run the virtual
guest, but I'm unsure which of the above choices to use. 


Qemu is an system emulator that emulate numerous architectures.  With 
KVM, Qemu is used in the userspace to manage virtual devices and 
allocate memory for the VMs (no processor emulation is done; Qemu is 
only used for x86 on x86 within KVM), but kernel modules are added to 
take advantage of hardware virtualization support.  It's well known that 
the names of executables can be confusing :)



Would appreciate recommendations and/or pointers to useful docs.


linux-kvm.org is the place to start.  Specifically the how-to section.

Good luck,
Cam
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Re: KVM performance

[Randy Broman]

After I submitted the initial question, I downloaded the latest kernel 
2.6.27.6, and compiled
with the following options, some of which are new since my previous 
kernel 2.6.24-21.


CONFIG_PARAVIRT_GUEST=y
CONFIG_XEN_SAVE_RESTORE=y
CONFIG_VMI=y
CONFIG_KVM_CLOCK=y
CONFIG_KVM_GUEST=y
# CONFIG_LGUEST_GUEST is not set
CONFIG_PARAVIRT=y
CONFIG_PARAVIRT_CLOCK=y

Using my existing kvm-62 and the following invocation:

$ aoss kvm -m 1024 -cdrom /dev/cdrom -boot c -net 
nic,macaddr=00:d0:13:b0:2d:32,model=rtl8139 -net tap -soundhw all 
-localtime /home/rbroman/windows.img


CPU usage went down and performance was much better (no skips), for my 
video/audio feeds.


I then downloaded, compiled, installed kvm-79, and invoked using the 
following options


$ aoss ~/kvm-79/kvm -m 1024 --cdrom /dev/cdrom --mac=00:d0:13:b0:2d:32 
--nictype=rtl8139 --smp=2 /home/rbroman/windows.img


Note I'm using the new kvm in the compile directory, and I've confirmed 
that the kvm and kvm-intel
modules from the kvm-79 compile are what's loaded. Some of the options 
from the kvm-62 invocation
are missing - because they give errors - I understand that the command 
syntax/options have changed,
and I've checked ~/kvm-79/kvm --help for the new syntax, but I can't 
figure out how to invoke the
remaining options. One of the missing options seems to be the tap 
network, and the kvm-79 WinXP

guest now has no networking.

I also tried the -vga vmware option below, as well as -vga=vmware and 
various other permutations,

and I can't get that to work either.

Can someone help me resolve the above? Are there any README's, HowTo's 
or other documentation

on compiling, installing and using kvm-79?

Thanks, Randy

Avi Kivity wrote:

Randy Broman wrote:


-I've tried both the default Cirrus adapter and the -std-vga 
option. Which is better?


Cirrus is generally better, but supports fewer resolutions.

I saw reference to another VMware-based adapter, but I can't figure 
out how to implement

it - would that be better?



-vga vmware (with the new syntax needed by kvm-79); it should be 
better, but is less will tested.  I'm not at all sure the Windows 
driver will like it.


-I notice we're up to kvm-79 vs my kvm-62. Should I move to the newer 
version? 


Yes.


Do I
have to custom-compile my kernel to do so


No.



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