Dave Feustel
2006-Apr-15 22:39 UTC
[Xen-devel] Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
AMD Pacifica and Intel''s VT make possible the virtualization of unmodified operating systems. Is it still necessary to add code to the hypervisor to support specific operating systems, or can Xen, as written, support any arbitrary OS that successfully boots on a PC? (I''m thinking of the BSDs here). Thanks, Dave Feustel -- Lose, v., experience a loss, get rid of, "lose the weight" Loose, adj., not tight, let go, free, "loose clothing" _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Anthony Liguori
2006-Apr-15 22:53 UTC
[Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
On Sat, 15 Apr 2006 17:39:10 -0500, Dave Feustel wrote:> AMD Pacifica and Intel''s VT make possible the virtualization of unmodified > operating systems. Is it still necessary to add code to the hypervisor to > support specific operating systems, or can Xen, as written, support any > arbitrary OS that successfully boots on a PC? (I''m thinking of the BSDs > here).This sort of thing has been addressed here before. While theoritically, VT and SVM ought to allow any OS to run under Xen, in practice, if an OS hasn''t been tested as a guest under Xen, it is likely to turn up some bugs or incompleteness. Over time, this will certainly be a less of an issue. The problem has to do with the fact that different OS''s will use different instructions when accessing things like page tables. Right now, Xen only emulates the instructions that we know are used by the systems we test with (things like Linux and certain versions of Windows). Regards, Anthony Liguori> Thanks, > Dave Feustel_______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Dave Feustel
2006-Apr-16 01:30 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
On Saturday 15 April 2006 17:53, Anthony Liguori wrote:> On Sat, 15 Apr 2006 17:39:10 -0500, Dave Feustel wrote: > > > AMD Pacifica and Intel''s VT make possible the virtualization of unmodified > > operating systems. Is it still necessary to add code to the hypervisor to > > support specific operating systems, or can Xen, as written, support any > > arbitrary OS that successfully boots on a PC? (I''m thinking of the BSDs > > here). > > This sort of thing has been addressed here before.I know this and I appreciate your patience. I definitely don''t pick things up or figure things out as quickly now as I did when I was younger.> While theoritically, > VT and SVM ought to allow any OS to run under Xen, in practice, if an OS > hasn''t been tested as a guest under Xen, it is likely to turn up some bugs > or incompleteness. Over time, this will certainly be a less of an issue. > > The problem has to do with the fact that different OS''s will use different > instructions when accessing things like page tables. Right now, Xen only > emulates the instructions that we know are used by the systems we test > with (things like Linux and certain versions of Windows).Xen and OpenBSD running under Xen are rapidly rising to the top of my list of things to work with as general availability of AM2-socket motherboards and revision F AMD64 chips approaches. Xen and hardware virtualization have been for a while now at the very top of the list of topics I follow in the news. Dave Feustel> Regards, > > Anthony Liguori > > > Thanks, > > Dave Feustel > > > > _______________________________________________ > Xen-devel mailing list > Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com > http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel >-- Lose, v., experience a loss, get rid of, "lose the weight" Loose, adj., not tight, let go, free, "loose clothing" _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
M.A. Williamson
2006-Apr-16 13:14 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
>AMD Pacifica and Intel''s VT make possible the virtualization of >unmodified operating systems. Is it still necessary to add code >to the hypervisor to support specific operating systems, or can >Xen, as written, support any arbitrary OS that successfully boots >on a PC? (I''m thinking of the BSDs here).Shouldn''t be necessary to add special support usually... However, if an OS makes use of particularly esoteric hardware features that other OSes do not use then it''s possible those will not be emulated in Xen yet. In these cases, one would add the emulation to Xen and then that OS (and any others which used those features) would be able to run unmodified. x86 is full of little "tricks", of the "whoa, people (can) do that?" variety ;-) Cheers, Mark _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Ronald G Minnich
2006-Apr-16 20:31 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
Is there a VT or pacifica laptop out there? Or is that technology just "assumed" for later CPUs? I''d like to get such a laptop. It seems to me that I could boot Plan 9 unmodified, and from there, develop the xenfront drivers I need, thus making test/debug much easier. thanks ron _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Bastian Blank
2006-Apr-16 21:01 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
On Sun, Apr 16, 2006 at 02:31:50PM -0600, Ronald G Minnich wrote:> Is there a VT or pacifica laptop out there? Or is that technology just > "assumed" for later CPUs? I''d like to get such a laptop.Yes. The new ThinkPads includes Core Duo CPUs with VT enabled. Bastian -- Each kiss is as the first. -- Miramanee, Kirk''s wife, "The Paradise Syndrome", stardate 4842.6 _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Rolf Neugebauer
2006-Apr-17 21:19 UTC
RE: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
Someone recently confirmed the IBM thinkpad t60p has a BIOS option to enable VT. Mac Mini''s (and presumably the Apple notebooks) also have VT enabled, at least the linux live cd has shows the VMX CPU flag Rolf> -----Original Message----- > From: xen-devel-bounces@lists.xensource.com [mailto:xen-devel- > bounces@lists.xensource.com] On Behalf Of Bastian Blank > Sent: 16 April 2006 22:02 > To: Ronald G Minnich > Cc: xen-devel@lists.xensource.com; Dave Feustel > Subject: Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating > Systems > > On Sun, Apr 16, 2006 at 02:31:50PM -0600, Ronald G Minnich wrote: > > Is there a VT or pacifica laptop out there? Or is that technology just > > "assumed" for later CPUs? I''d like to get such a laptop. > > Yes. The new ThinkPads includes Core Duo CPUs with VT enabled. > > Bastian > > -- > Each kiss is as the first. > -- Miramanee, Kirk''s wife, "The Paradise Syndrome", > stardate 4842.6_______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Randy Thelen
2006-Apr-18 17:48 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
Ronald G Minnich wrote:> Is there a VT or pacifica laptop out there? Or is that technology > just "assumed" for later CPUs? I''d like to get such a laptop. > > It seems to me that I could boot Plan 9 unmodified, and from there, > develop the xenfront drivers I need, thus making test/debug much > easier.All Apple Intel based Macintosh computers have VT-x capability (as of April, 2006; I can''t speak for future products). However, on some Mac Mini''s a procedure is needed to enable VT-x. I have followed the procedure ''documented'' (I use that word in the loosest of meanings, I assure you) with correct results: http://forum.parallels.com/thread577.html However, I do not know of anyone who has run Xen on top of EFI based Intel machines. EFI is Intel''s replacement for BIOS. The acronym expands to Extended Firmware Interface. It''s a much more powerful boot mechanism than BIOS and the tools for it are open sourced with the BSD license: https://edk.tianocore.org/ In addition, in order to get Xen to work with Mac OS X as dom0, much work would have to go into porting the device drivers used for pciback, console, and other event channels; as well as porting the user applications. It''s a non-trivial porting effort, but I''m quite sure there are those who have contemplated it. (Maybe there''s a brave soul -doing- it?!) -- Randy _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Stefan Kaltenbrunner
2006-Apr-21 16:10 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
Dave Feustel wrote:> On Saturday 15 April 2006 17:53, Anthony Liguori wrote: > >>On Sat, 15 Apr 2006 17:39:10 -0500, Dave Feustel wrote: >> >> >>>AMD Pacifica and Intel''s VT make possible the virtualization of unmodified >>>operating systems. Is it still necessary to add code to the hypervisor to >>>support specific operating systems, or can Xen, as written, support any >>>arbitrary OS that successfully boots on a PC? (I''m thinking of the BSDs >>>here). >> >>This sort of thing has been addressed here before. > > > I know this and I appreciate your patience. I definitely don''t > pick things up or figure things out as quickly now as I did > when I was younger. > > >>While theoritically, >>VT and SVM ought to allow any OS to run under Xen, in practice, if an OS >>hasn''t been tested as a guest under Xen, it is likely to turn up some bugs >>or incompleteness. Over time, this will certainly be a less of an issue. >> >>The problem has to do with the fact that different OS''s will use different >>instructions when accessing things like page tables. Right now, Xen only >>emulates the instructions that we know are used by the systems we test >>with (things like Linux and certain versions of Windows). > > > Xen and OpenBSD running under Xen are rapidly rising to the top of my list > of things to work with as general availability of AM2-socket motherboards and > revision F AMD64 chips approaches. Xen and hardware virtualization have been > for a while now at the very top of the list of topics I follow in the news.OpenBSD 3.9 works quite fine (installed using the native installer in the virtualized environment!) as an unmodified guest on my Intel VT box, with following caveats: *) pcn(4) - aka AMD Pcnet does not seem to work well with the emulated one (send works - receive does not) *) ne(4) does work but is complaining about corrupted nic memory under heavy traffic (does not seem to affect it much other than logging th errors) Stefan _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Ian Pratt
2006-Apr-21 18:24 UTC
RE: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
> > Xen and OpenBSD running under Xen are rapidly rising to the > top of my > > list of things to work with as general availability of AM2-socket > > motherboards and revision F AMD64 chips approaches. Xen and > hardware > > virtualization have been for a while now at the very top of > the list of topics I follow in the news. > > OpenBSD 3.9 works quite fine (installed using the native > installer in the virtualized environment!) as an unmodified > guest on my Intel VT box, with following caveats: > > *) pcn(4) - aka AMD Pcnet does not seem to work well with the > emulated one (send works - receive does not) > > *) ne(4) does work but is complaining about corrupted nic > memory under heavy traffic (does not seem to affect it much > other than logging th errors)Thanks for the success report. We haven''t been testing OpenBSD so its useful to hear it works OK. I''d be interested to hear whether pcnet32 works under the latest version of qemu, in which case it should be easy to fix on xen/vt. Also, are you using a 32, 32p, or 64 bit hypervisor? Have you tried other combinations? (I''m guessing you''re using a 32b guest, but do you have pae enabled?) Have you tried other combinations? Are there any stress tests you can run to give it a good workout? Thanks, Ian _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Stefan Kaltenbrunner
2006-Apr-21 19:53 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
Ian Pratt wrote:>>>Xen and OpenBSD running under Xen are rapidly rising to the >> >>top of my >> >>>list of things to work with as general availability of AM2-socket >>>motherboards and revision F AMD64 chips approaches. Xen and >> >>hardware >> >>>virtualization have been for a while now at the very top of >> >>the list of topics I follow in the news. >> >>OpenBSD 3.9 works quite fine (installed using the native >>installer in the virtualized environment!) as an unmodified >>guest on my Intel VT box, with following caveats: >> >>*) pcn(4) - aka AMD Pcnet does not seem to work well with the >>emulated one (send works - receive does not) >> >>*) ne(4) does work but is complaining about corrupted nic >>memory under heavy traffic (does not seem to affect it much >>other than logging th errors) > > > Thanks for the success report. We haven''t been testing OpenBSD so its > useful to hear it works OK.heh - I actually tried to install NetBSD and FreeBSD too but both crash very early in their installer routines.> > I''d be interested to hear whether pcnet32 works under the latest version > of qemu, in which case it should be easy to fix on xen/vt.will try that during the next few days> > Also, are you using a 32, 32p, or 64 bit hypervisor? Have you tried > other combinations? (I''m guessing you''re using a 32b guest, but do you > have pae enabled?)32bit hypervisor currently - but I plan to change that and will test with a 64b guest too.> Have you tried other combinations? Are there any stress tests you can > run to give it a good workout?it successfully completes a full recompile of kernel & userspace which is usually quite a good test for "working hardware" :-) Stefan _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Stefan Kaltenbrunner
2006-Apr-23 07:34 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
Ian Pratt wrote:>>>Xen and OpenBSD running under Xen are rapidly rising to the >> >>top of my >> >>>list of things to work with as general availability of AM2-socket >>>motherboards and revision F AMD64 chips approaches. Xen and >> >>hardware >> >>>virtualization have been for a while now at the very top of >> >>the list of topics I follow in the news. >> >>OpenBSD 3.9 works quite fine (installed using the native >>installer in the virtualized environment!) as an unmodified >>guest on my Intel VT box, with following caveats: >> >>*) pcn(4) - aka AMD Pcnet does not seem to work well with the >>emulated one (send works - receive does not) >> >>*) ne(4) does work but is complaining about corrupted nic >>memory under heavy traffic (does not seem to affect it much >>other than logging th errors) > > > Thanks for the success report. We haven''t been testing OpenBSD so its > useful to hear it works OK. > > I''d be interested to hear whether pcnet32 works under the latest version > of qemu, in which case it should be easy to fix on xen/vt. > > Also, are you using a 32, 32p, or 64 bit hypervisor? Have you tried > other combinations? (I''m guessing you''re using a 32b guest, but do you > have pae enabled?) > Have you tried other combinations? Are there any stress tests you can > run to give it a good workout?played a bit with various combinations (after upgrading to a 64 bit hypervisor) and it looks like I''m hitting some issues (not too surprising): *) a 32b guest seems to continue to work though starting more than one (either another OpenBSD instance or WindowsXP) seems to completely freeze the whole box (no logs or errors - just freezes). Starting a single unmodified guest does not seem to trigger that issue ... *) trying to install a 64bit guest segfaults qemu-dm when the installer tries to boot the initial kernel: qemu-dm[5117]: segfault at 00002ab60f896008 rip 00002ab5efa21040 rsp 00007fffffcb8f48 error 4 this on should be quite easy to reproduce by downloading ftp://ftp.openbsd.org/pub/OpenBSD/snapshots/amd64/cd39.iso (4MB) and using that as "cdrom" in the configfile. Boot from there and watch the VNC connection dying a few seconds later :-) all this testing is with a checkout of the xen-unstable tree from a day ago or so on a Pentium D920 box. Stefan _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Ian Pratt
2006-Apr-23 22:13 UTC
RE: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
> > Thanks for the success report. We haven''t been testing > OpenBSD so its > > useful to hear it works OK. > > heh - I actually tried to install NetBSD and FreeBSD too but > both crash very early in their installer routines.I expect that the crash is in some grotty real mode code, as a result of the ''vmxassist'' code being incomplete. This code isn''t used on AMD-V (it has h/w support for real mode virtualziation), so it might work. There are already plans to enhance vmxassist so that it''s more complete. Ian _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Yinghai Lu
2006-Jun-04 08:19 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
You can get Laptop from HP with turion X2. It will be amd64 with SVM support and dual core. YH On 4/16/06, Ronald G Minnich <rminnich@lanl.gov> wrote:> Is there a VT or pacifica laptop out there? Or is that technology just > "assumed" for later CPUs? I''d like to get such a laptop. > > It seems to me that I could boot Plan 9 unmodified, and from there, > develop the xenfront drivers I need, thus making test/debug much easier. > > thanks > > ron > > _______________________________________________ > Xen-devel mailing list > Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com > http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel >_______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
George Dunlap
2006-Jun-05 13:12 UTC
Re: [Xen-devel] Re: Vertualization of Unmodified Operating Systems
I was pleasantly surprised when "cat /proc/cpuinfo" on new Dell laptop w/ a Core Duo listed ''vmx'' as one of the features. Haven''t tested it yet, tho... -George On 4/16/06, Ronald G Minnich <rminnich@lanl.gov> wrote:> Is there a VT or pacifica laptop out there? Or is that technology just > "assumed" for later CPUs? I''d like to get such a laptop. > > It seems to me that I could boot Plan 9 unmodified, and from there, > develop the xenfront drivers I need, thus making test/debug much easier. > > thanks > > ron > > _______________________________________________ > Xen-devel mailing list > Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com > http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel >_______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel