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Forum Discussion
chirpa
Mar 07, 2009Luminary
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
- jmalmlundAspirant
laksmkk wrote: With the mini-guide written by jmalmlund was successfully able to install Windows. Now here is my question? How do I install the sound card?
First you need to assign what soundcard your virtual machine should have, for a Windows XP machine this would do.VBoxManage modifyvm <name> --audiocontroller ac97
If you use Vista 64bit or Windows 7 32/64bit the only supported controller (soundcard) is named "hda"..
Once this is done (with machine powered off) and you start it again you just need to install the appropriate windows drivers to support the card you selected to use.
ps. When setting up your virtual machines from a console everything is done using the application 'VBoxManage' and to get usage help just type 'VBoxManage' without any commands and it'll print a list of all supported commands. If you just need a reminder of how 'VBoxManage modifyvm' works, then press enter after that and you'll get help on just 'modifyvm' section. - mdgm-ntgrNETGEAR Employee Retired
MikeMcr wrote:
OK, thanks, that is very poor of Netgear; how can they expect people to keep up to date with RAIDiator releases when they make these mistakes :x
You do not have to run the latest RAIDiator. However, it is expected that you will run a recent version of RAIDiator. After all, firmware updates are free. If you run very old firmware limited support can be provided. If you rely on running software like Virtualbox then I would suggest waiting after a firmware upgrade for reports of successful installation of Virtualbox on that firmware. Keep an eye on this thread.
It is true that often a firmware update will be recommended for many problems as an early troubleshooting step, to see if it will fix it, but the choice is still up to you as to whether you update to the newer firmware.
It should also be pointed out that installing and using software like Virtualbox is not "supported". Whilst NetGear makes it possible to do so, the only support you'll get for that will be from this forum. The focus of NetGear's QA testing would be on features handled by the GUI, not extra things you can do via SSH (the possibilities of what you can do are rather endless). Having said that in most cases firmware updates shouldn't cause problems with this. In the rare case there is an issue due to a problem at their end that slips by then they will then deal with it proceeding based on what the determine as the best way forward. Sometimes unfortunately it may not be able to be resolved until a firmware update is provided.
There are of course likely complications due to the continued use of Debian etch. NetGear has looked into moving to Debian Lenny or Debian Squeeze, but there are issues that prevent that from being possible at this time: http://www.readynas.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=58629&p=332047 - jmalmlundAspirant
mdgm wrote:
You do not have to run the latest RAIDiator. However, it is expected that you will run a recent version of RAIDiator. After all, firmware updates are free. If you run very old firmware limited support can be provided. If you rely on running software like Virtualbox then I would suggest waiting after a firmware upgrade for reports of successful installation of Virtualbox on that firmware. Keep an eye on this thread.
It is true that often a firmware update will be recommended for many problems as an early troubleshooting step, to see if it will fix it, but the choice is still up to you as to whether you update to the newer firmware.
It should also be pointed out that installing and using software like Virtualbox is not "supported". Whilst NetGear makes it possible to do so, the only support you'll get for that will be from this forum. The focus of NetGear's QA testing would be on features handled by the GUI, not extra things you can do via SSH (the possibilities of what you can do are rather endless). Having said that in most cases firmware updates shouldn't cause problems with this. In the rare case there is an issue due to a problem at their end that slips by then they will then deal with it proceeding based on what the determine as the best way forward. Sometimes unfortunately it may not be able to be resolved until a firmware update is provided.
There are of course likely complications due to the continued use of Debian etch. NetGear has looked into moving to Debian Lenny or Debian Squeeze, but there are issues that prevent that from being possible at this time: http://www.readynas.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=58629&p=332047
While I agree that there's nothing that say that I have to run the latest RAIDiator but it's still expected.
But what's more, from a developers perspective I really think that this is an area which does deserve to be checked in the QA since some of tools that are now unavailable for "normal" apt-get installs in 4.2.19, well they are required for development of some of the add-ons!
I don't expect Netgear to ever support things like VirtualBox but I do expect them to support their developer community with tools to make great add-ons!
Sure I'll admit that I can manually install (download/compile/install) pretty much all software that's missing from the apt-sources to get these tools and then keep developing with/running the desired tools/programs but that I still hope that this was a one-off mistake from Netgear and that they'll get it right when they release 4.2.20. If not then I really really hope that the major version update that'll give us a newer Debian base (Lenny or preferably Squeeze) will leap forward soon 8) - laksmkkAspirantThank You for the reply
- maciekishAspirant
jmalmlund wrote: InTheShires wrote: MikeMcr wrote: jmalmlund wrote: Only problem is that the software-repository holding these components for 4.2.19 is broken with version mismatches and creating an add-on that first downgrades the installed RAIDiator software to 4.2.17, a version that to my knowledge doesn't work well with Mac OS X Lion afp isn't a good idea.
Has this been fixed yet? Am I safe to install VirtualBox with 4.2.19?
I don't know the answer at all, but I'm running into errors that "could" relate the above quote. (At least the way I'm interpreting things)
I'm simply trying to install bzip2/bunzip2.
4.2.19 is still a no-go and I don't expect it to ever get fixed eigther seeing how work on 4.2.20 seems to be progressing with numerous beta releases already. I just hope that Netgear doesn't make the same mistake again and that we'll have a working software repository once again when 4.2.20 is released in finalized form.
Its not a no-go. I got it running and i just installed bzip2 from sources on http://bzip.org/.
Just make && make install. No ./configure - maciekishAspirantAny1 got the bridged network working? I got some error but forgot to copy it. Will restart the vm soon and get the exact error.
- maciekishAspirantHeres the error. Any clues please? As i said before, trying to run bridged networking on an Ultra 2 with 2GB RAM.
Error: failed to start machine. Error message: Failed to open/create the internal network 'HostInterfaceNetworking-' (VERR_INVALID_PARAMETER).
Failed to attach the network LUN (VERR_INVALID_PARAMETER) - maciekishAspirant
maciekish wrote: Heres the error. Any clues please? As i said before, trying to run bridged networking on an Ultra 2 with 2GB RAM.
Error: failed to start machine. Error message: Failed to open/create the internal network 'HostInterfaceNetworking-' (VERR_INVALID_PARAMETER).
Failed to attach the network LUN (VERR_INVALID_PARAMETER)
SOLVED: VBoxManage modifyvm "Ubuntu" --nic1 bridged --bridgeadapter1 eth0 - cmasseyGuideI just wanted to say thanks to everyone in this thread :)
Especially to both jmalmlund & Xaver
After a bit of tweaking I now have a WinXP VM working on my Pro 6 with 4.2.19
The main issues I had was with apt-get not working with 4.2.19, so went back to 4.2.17, still no joy.
So I decided to upgrade to 4.2.20 [T32] installed what I needed and moved back to 4.2.19 (not sure if this was a good or bad thing to do but no issues so far for the NAS or Virtualbox) - cduceAspirantOk, so during my numerous attempts to install VirtualBox on my Ultra+, here's where I stand and I need some assistance from the community.
- Before going on this Journey, my FW was at 4.2.19, and I ran into quite a few issues attempting to get VB installed; so I saw a few posts where ppl were having success with FW 4.2.17, so I figured a downgrade wouldn't hurt.
- I proceed with the downgrade and now I cannot access my NAS via GUI, but can still access via SSH., Not exactly sure what I may have done to the GUI, but I need to get it back.
- Also, everytime I try to do an apt-get -f install, I get the following error msg:
Linking and byte-compiling packages for runtime python2.4...
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/py_compile.py", line 164, in ?
main()
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/py_compile.py", line 159, in main
compile(filename, doraise=True)
File "/usr/lib/python2.4/py_compile.py", line 115, in compile
f = open(file, 'U')
IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '-'
dpkg: error processing python2.4-minimal (--configure):
subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 1
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of python2.4:
python2.4 depends on python2.4-minimal (= 2.4.4-3+etch3); however:
Package python2.4-minimal is not configured yet.
dpkg: error processing python2.4 (--configure):
dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of virtualbox-2.1:
virtualbox-2.1 depends on python2.4 (>= 2.3.90); however:
Package python2.4 is not configured yet.
dpkg: error processing virtualbox-2.1 (--configure):
dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
Setting up bzip2 (1.0.3-6) ...
Errors were encountered while processing:
python2.4-minimal
python2.4
virtualbox-2.1
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
Any guidance on this will be appreciated :)
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