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Running VirtualBox VM host on ReadyNAS Pro
What is VirtualBox?
So, I got bored while laundry was going... and decided to see how well a virtual OS would run on the Pro. My first choice of VM was VirtualBox, just cause I'm familiar with it after using it for ages, plus its open and free :) Eventually, I may look into VMWare as well.
After a bit of messing around, got it installed. Since the system is based off of Debian, was easy to get VirtualBox itself there (deb package). The trickiest part was getting the kernel modules required installed (see end of post).
In the end, I've got Windows 2003 R2 running on my Pro, interacting with it via RDP, and I am happy with the performance. I've added an extra 1GB memory (for a total of 2GB). I assigned 1GB of ram to my virtual OS, which still leaves the default configuration of 1GB for the NAS itself (which is more than enough still, 800MB+ is always cached).
I made a 10GB virtual disk to install the OS on. If I need more space later for extra applications, I can just add another virtual drive to that installation. And since I always like a bit extra security, I went a bit beyond the usual, and also have TrueCrypt running full disk encryption in the virtual OS. So no one can even boot and read the data in that OS without my bootup password.
I don't really have any screenshots to show, just a standard Windows installation. Here is a few of the steps I used while creating the VM on the console:
VirtualBox 3.1 has changed the CLI configuration. Until I update this how-to, please reference this: http://www.uhleeka.com/blog/2009/12/vir ... 9-04-host/
With the OS booted up and just sitting at the desktop, top reports:
Ad-hoc installation of VirtualBox. Should work for RAIDiator 4.2.4. Download links for the kernel modules, for those who don't want to go through the mess of compiling them.
So, I got bored while laundry was going... and decided to see how well a virtual OS would run on the Pro. My first choice of VM was VirtualBox, just cause I'm familiar with it after using it for ages, plus its open and free :) Eventually, I may look into VMWare as well.
After a bit of messing around, got it installed. Since the system is based off of Debian, was easy to get VirtualBox itself there (deb package). The trickiest part was getting the kernel modules required installed (see end of post).
In the end, I've got Windows 2003 R2 running on my Pro, interacting with it via RDP, and I am happy with the performance. I've added an extra 1GB memory (for a total of 2GB). I assigned 1GB of ram to my virtual OS, which still leaves the default configuration of 1GB for the NAS itself (which is more than enough still, 800MB+ is always cached).
I made a 10GB virtual disk to install the OS on. If I need more space later for extra applications, I can just add another virtual drive to that installation. And since I always like a bit extra security, I went a bit beyond the usual, and also have TrueCrypt running full disk encryption in the virtual OS. So no one can even boot and read the data in that OS without my bootup password.
I don't really have any screenshots to show, just a standard Windows installation. Here is a few of the steps I used while creating the VM on the console:
VirtualBox 3.1 has changed the CLI configuration. Until I update this how-to, please reference this: http://www.uhleeka.com/blog/2009/12/vir ... 9-04-host/
# Creating the Virtual Machine.
$ VBoxManage createvm -name "Windows2003" -register
$ VBoxManage modifyvm "Windows2003" -memory "1024MB" -acpi on -boot1 dvd -nic1 nat
$ VBoxManage createvdi -filename "/c/backup/VirtualBox/Windows2003.vdi" -size 10000 -register
$ VBoxManage modifyvm "Windows2003" -hda "/c/backup/VirtualBox/Windows2003.vdi"
$ VBoxManage registerimage dvd /c/backup/VirtualBox/Windows2003Ent.iso
$ VBoxManage modifyvm "Windows2003" -dvd /c/backup/VirtualBox/Windows2003Ent.iso
$ VBoxHeadless -startvm "Windows2003" &
# Connected via Remote Desktop at this point.
# After the installation, first page requires Ctrl-Alt-Del, so I sent the keycodes.
$ VBoxManage controlvm "Windows2003" keyboardputscancode 1d 38 53
# System is up and running, time to install GuestAdditions for better video, etc.
$ wget http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/2.2.2/VBoxGuestAdditions_2.2.2.iso
$ VBoxManage registerimage dvd /c/backup/VirtualBox/VBoxGuestAdditions_2.2.2.iso
$ VBoxManage controlvm "Windows2003" dvdattach /c/backup/VirtualBox/VBoxGuestAdditions_2.2.2.iso
With the OS booted up and just sitting at the desktop, top reports:
top - 16:17:10 up 1 day, 17:58, 1 user, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.00
Tasks: 93 total, 1 running, 92 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 0.7%us, 0.2%sy, 0.0%ni, 99.2%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st
Mem: 2072432k total, 2020100k used, 52332k free, 6120k buffers
Swap: 1048536k total, 144k used, 1048392k free, 784620k cached
PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
10297 root 20 0 1104m 1.0g 4720 S 4 52.5 57:31.53 VBoxHeadless
12792 root 20 0 46092 9520 1720 S 1 0.5 59:54.51 motion
12196 root 20 0 9196 7688 980 S 0 0.4 0:57.72 wastesrv
1 root 20 0 1948 600 508 S 0 0.0 0:01.30 init
Ad-hoc installation of VirtualBox. Should work for RAIDiator 4.2.4. Download links for the kernel modules, for those who don't want to go through the mess of compiling them.
$ mkdir /lib/modules/`uname -r`/miscOr, if you want to compile the kernel modules yourself:
$ cd /lib/modules/`uname -r`/misc
$ wget http://www.readynas.com/contributed/chirpa/modules/virtualbox/pro/vboxdrv.ko
$ wget http://www.readynas.com/contributed/chirpa/modules/virtualbox/pro/vboxnetflt.ko
$ echo "deb http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian etch non-free" >> /etc/apt/sources.list
$ wget -q http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian/sun_vbox.asc -O- | apt-key add -
$ apt-get update
$ apt-get install virtualbox-2.1
$ /etc/init.d/vboxdrv start
envyious:/c/backup# echo "deb http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian etch non-free" >> /etc/apt/sources.listInstall of VirtualBox 2.2.2, before Sun updates the Debian Repository...
envyious:/c/backup# wget -q http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian/sun_vbox.asc -O- | apt-key add -
envyious:/c/backup# apt-get update && apt-get install build-essential
...
Setting up build-essential (11.3) ...
envyious:/c/backup# wget -q http://www.readynas.com/download/GPL/RNDP6xxx_4.2.4_WW_src.zip
envyious:/c/backup# unzip -q RNDP6xxx_4.2.4_WW_src.zip -d ./GPL
envyious:/c/backup# cd GPL/linux-x86-2.6/
envyious:/c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6# make && make prepare
...
envyious:/c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6# ln -s /c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6/ /usr/src/linux
envyious:/c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6# KERN_DIR=/usr/src/linux
envyious:/c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6# apt-get install virtualbox-2.1
...
Setting up virtualbox-2.1 (2.1.4-42893_Debian_etch) ...
Adding group `vboxusers' (GID 101) ...
Done.
Messages emitted during module compilation will be logged to /var/log/vbox-install.log.
Success!
Starting VirtualBox kernel module: done.
envyious:/c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6# cd
envyious:/c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6# VBoxManage list vms
VirtualBox Command Line Management Interface Version 2.1.4
(C) 2005-2009 Sun Microsystems, Inc.
All rights reserved.
# wget -q http://www.readynas.com/download/GPL/RNDP6xxx_4.2.4_WW_src.zip
# unzip -q RNDP6xxx_4.2.4_WW_src.zip -d ./GPL
# cd GPL/linux-x86-2.6/
# make && make prepare
# ln -s /c/backup/GPL/linux-x86-2.6/ /usr/src/linux
# export KERN_DIR=/usr/src/linux
# apt-get install libfontconfig1 libglib2.0-0 libice6 libsdl1.2debian libsm6 libx11-6 libxcursor1 libxext6 libxi6 libxmu6 libxrandr2 libxrender1 libxslt1.1 libxt6 python2.4
# wget -q http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/2.2.2/virtualbox-2.2_2.2.2-46594_Debian_etch_i386.deb
# dpkg -i virtualbox-2.2_2.2.2-46594_Debian_etch_i386.deb
Setting up virtualbox-2.2 (2.2.2-46594_Debian_etch) ...
Recompiling VirtualBox kernel module: done.
Starting VirtualBox kernel module: done.
441 Replies
Replies have been turned off for this discussion
- Hey !!! Mac !
Glad to see you here!
That's right, we tried to install Win7 Pro x64 and after installation, when the VM restarts to boot on the HDD we had got an error message saying that Windows cannot start. (Dont really remeber the exact problem but it was related to 64bit boot process).
Saturday, I'll try to install my own VM Win7 64bit edition on the Pro to get the exact message.
We followed the process described by Chirpa @page 9 and installed this version of VirtualBox: VirtualBox-3.1.2-56127-Linux_amd64.run found @ http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualb ... _amd64.run
Edit:
We have paid attention to activate "I/O APIC" for the VM as mentionned in the VirtualBox user guide page 45 and Hardware virtualisation support enabled by default. (The VT-x VPID was disabled, that's the default statement).
I'll try on my RNDP to clarify the situation.
@++
Dwarf - I'm trying to install Windows 2008 R2 (which appears to only be available as 64 bit)...
Just after it boots to the DVD image, it starts loading files, then gets to the point where it's starting Windows. It fails with a Status: 0xc000035a and below that it states
"Info: Attempting to load a 64-bit application, however this CPU is not compatible with 64-bit mode."
I installed this version:
VirtualBox-3.1.2-56127-Linux_amd64.run ptaylor874 wrote: I'm trying to install Windows 2008 R2 (which appears to only be available as 64 bit)...
Just after it boots to the DVD image, it starts loading files, then gets to the point where it's starting Windows. It fails with a Status: 0xc000035a and below that it states
"Info: Attempting to load a 64-bit application, however this CPU is not compatible with 64-bit mode."
I installed this version:
VirtualBox-3.1.2-56127-Linux_amd64.run
Hi ptaylor874,
We had got the same error when we've tried to install Win7 Pro x64 on the Pro.
Here is the screenshot of the error (in French), but the last line of the error is the exact translation of your error msg.
I was too busy this WE to try my own installation ... I'd try later
@++
Dwarf- I upgraded my home box to 4.2.9 last night and updated to VirtualBox 3.1.2. Working well. I've noticed they have changed a lot of the command line stuff, so my page 1 post on setting up a VM doesn't work completely anymore, I will try and update those lines for the new version soon.
64-bit guests are supported under the following conditions: You need a 64-bit processor with hardware virtualization support
The ReadyNAS Pro comes with Dual Core E2160 CPU. This does not support Hardware Virtualization. So if you want to run 64-bit Guest OSes, you would need to upgrade the CPU. For example, I replaced mine with an E6300, which does support VT-x. Some details here: viewtopic.php?f=50&t=29284. Side-note, the 3200 has a Core2Duo, which should support this out of the box. chirpa wrote: It may work. We are not going to endorse any CPU mods, and of course, your warranty is at risk by doing that modification.
I am the one running an E6300 in my personal system at home. It has worked for me, but as always, YMMV (your mileage may vary). Don't need a kernel re-compile. I have VirtualBox running on mine.
Considering that the Pro comes standard with 1GB RAM and people are upgrading it up to 4GB RAM, there isn't much of a case RAM wise to use 64-bit VMs on the Pro. So unless you're prepared to void your warranty, I'd stick with 32-bit VMs.- Only having 4GB or less RAM is not a 64-bit/32-bit decision. As posted above, the user is trying to run Windows 2008 R2, which is 64-bit only. There is other advantages to 64-bit besides using >3GB RAM.
- That's a good point.
Well I guess a CPU mod on the Pro; or purchasing a server (new or second hand that supports 64-bit, depending how often you upgrade your servers and how big your organisation is you may have a spare one lying around or one soon to be decommisioned from production use) and using VMWare ESXi would be the way to go if you need to run 64-bit VMs. If you already have a Pro (and even probably if you don't), using the ReadyNas as a VMWare Datastore would certainly be cheaper than buying a 3200. - Well, I have a spare E7200 processor, but from reading the other post, it sounds like nothing about the E6X00 series is supported...
In my case there's no requirement to run R2, except that I thought it would be supported by Microsoft longer than the x86 version... That'll probably do just fine for my purposes. chirpa wrote: The ReadyNAS Pro comes with Dual Core E2160 CPU. This does not support Hardware Virtualization. So if you want to run 64-bit Guest OSes, you would need to upgrade the CPU. For example, I replaced mine with an E6300, which does support VT-x. Some details here: viewtopic.php?f=50&t=29284. Side-note, the 3200 has a Core2Duo, which should support this out of the box.
Does this mean VT-x support is enabled by default in the ReadyNAS BIOS (which we don't have access to)? I know with some motherboards you actually have to enable it when swapping in a compatible CPU.
I should be able to verify this tomorrow, going to be testing some other CPUs in the Pro.MikeMcr wrote: Does this mean VT-x support is enabled by default in the ReadyNAS BIOS (which we don't have access to)? I know with some motherboards you actually have to enable it when swapping in a compatible CPU.
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