VMware Workstation vs KVM

[ProPAAS DBA]

Hi All;


I'm running Fedora 25 on a laptop with 16GB of ram. I'm frustrated with 
the VMware workstation reliably breaking every 2 to 3 kernel updates and 
sometimes with no reasonable fix in sight for some time. Not the end of 
the world and I get the reasons behind it, however I wonder if KVM might 
be a better plan. I used KVM many years ago and it was not quite as 
reliable & easy to work with as I needed.  I assume it's gotten better?

Questions:

- does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? Any gotcha's or 
common issues I should be aware of?

- Anyone have experience with both KVM and VMware? opinions on which is 
better, more stable, etc?

- Is is easy / possible to convert a VMware workstation VM to a KVM?

- With VMware I get the vmnet network and I don't have to do anything 
other than select nat, bridged, etc to get networking in place for a VM, 
even if I want to access te VM directly from another machine (i.e. not 
the local only network). Is this true with KVM as well?

- If I decide later to remove it does it remove cleanly? I dislike the 
vmnet & other bits VMware leaves around even after an uninstall


Thanks in advance..

[Kam Leo]

Why are you expecting stability when the host OS you are using is betaware?
Use CentOS as your host OS and you might get better results.

On Tue, Jan 17, 2017 at 8:01 AM, ProPAAS DBA <dba(a)propaas.com&gt; wrote:

>  Hi All;
>
>
>  I'm running Fedora 25 on a laptop with 16GB of ram. I'm frustrated with
>  the VMware workstation reliably breaking every 2 to 3 kernel updates and
>  sometimes with no reasonable fix in sight for some time. Not the end of the
>  world and I get the reasons behind it, however I wonder if KVM might be a
>  better plan. I used KVM many years ago and it was not quite as reliable &
>  easy to work with as I needed.  I assume it's gotten better?
>
>  Questions:
>
>  - does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? Any gotcha's or
>  common issues I should be aware of?
>
>  - Anyone have experience with both KVM and VMware? opinions on which is
>  better, more stable, etc?
>
>  - Is is easy / possible to convert a VMware workstation VM to a KVM?
>
>  - With VMware I get the vmnet network and I don't have to do anything
>  other than select nat, bridged, etc to get networking in place for a VM,
>  even if I want to access te VM directly from another machine (i.e. not the
>  local only network). Is this true with KVM as well?
>
>  - If I decide later to remove it does it remove cleanly? I dislike the
>  vmnet & other bits VMware leaves around even after an uninstall
>
>
>  Thanks in advance..
>
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  users mailing list -- users(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
>  To unsubscribe send an email to users-leave(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
>

[Joe Wulf]

I use a mixture of VMware Workstation on Linux and KVM both at home and at work.
One PRO for VMware Workstation is the existing library of VMs which serve various
purposes.  Regenerating or rebuilding them all over again, as well as protecting the
infrastructure of unique/local configurations would be too painful and simply not an
efficient use of time.-  I've not experienced the cruft left behind from uninstalling
VMware Workstation, as you'd mentioned; maybe that was a significantly older version?-
 The issue of it breaking every 2-3 kernel updates is a little vague; though this might
simply be the outdatedness of an older instance of VMware Tools in the VM.  Simply keeping
VMware Workstation up to date, and periodically ensuring your VM's get updated
(consistent with the version of VMware Workstation) and that their internal VMware Tools
also get updated will likely reduce the frequency of this problem, again, assuming it is
kernel version to VMware Tools version related.
One PRO for KVM is its command-line ability to instantiate a VM from scratch, even to the
point of giving it the right configuration, 'booting' it up, and it goes to the
kickstart server to automatically build itself (of course the kickstart server has to have
the wherewithal already established).  I'm disappointed that VMware has failed to
include this staple in their PIX tools.

      From: ProPAAS DBA <dba(a)propaas.com&gt;
 To: Community support for Fedora users <users(a)lists.fedoraproject.org&gt; 
 Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2017 11:01 AM
 Subject: VMware Workstation vs KVM
   
Hi All;


I'm running Fedora 25 on a laptop with 16GB of ram. I'm frustrated with 
the VMware workstation reliably breaking every 2 to 3 kernel updates and 
sometimes with no reasonable fix in sight for some time. Not the end of 
the world and I get the reasons behind it, however I wonder if KVM might 
be a better plan. I used KVM many years ago and it was not quite as 
reliable & easy to work with as I needed.  I assume it's gotten better?

Questions:

- does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? Any gotcha's or 
common issues I should be aware of?

- Anyone have experience with both KVM and VMware? opinions on which is 
better, more stable, etc?

- Is is easy / possible to convert a VMware workstation VM to a KVM?

- With VMware I get the vmnet network and I don't have to do anything 
other than select nat, bridged, etc to get networking in place for a VM, 
even if I want to access te VM directly from another machine (i.e. not 
the local only network). Is this true with KVM as well?

- If I decide later to remove it does it remove cleanly? I dislike the 
vmnet & other bits VMware leaves around even after an uninstall


Thanks in advance..


_______________________________________________
users mailing list -- users(a)lists.fedoraproject.org
To unsubscribe send an email to users-leave(a)lists.fedoraproject.org

[Gordon Messmer]

On 01/17/2017 08:01 AM, ProPAAS DBA wrote:
>  - does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? Any gotcha's or 
>  common issues I should be aware of? 
I've been using KVM exclusively since Red Hat stopped shipping Xen dom0 
kernels.  It works the way I expect it to and hasn't given me any grief.

>  - Is is easy / possible to convert a VMware workstation VM to a KVM?
That probably depends on the client OS, making sure the bootloader and 
drivers are available.  Converting the disk image is pretty 
straightforward, using "qemu-img".

>  - With VMware I get the vmnet network and I don't have to do
> anything 
>  other than select nat, bridged, etc to get networking in place for a 
>  VM, even if I want to access te VM directly from another machine (i.e. 
>  not the local only network). Is this true with KVM as well? 
NAT support will be present automatically.  If you want to use bridged 
networking, you'll need a bridge interface.  You can create one by 
running "virsh iface-bridge eth0 br0", which would create a new 
interface named "br0" with the IP configuration previously assigned to 
"eth0".  eth0 would then be enslaved to br0, as will the interfaces of 
any VMs you create with bridged networking.

>  - If I decide later to remove it does it remove cleanly? I dislike
> the 
>  vmnet & other bits VMware leaves around even after an uninstall  
Yes, it does.

[George N. White III]

On 17 January 2017 at 12:01, ProPAAS DBA <dba(a)propaas.com&gt; wrote:

>  Hi All;
>
>
>  I'm running Fedora 25 on a laptop with 16GB of ram. I'm frustrated with
>  the VMware workstation reliably breaking every 2 to 3 kernel updates and
>  sometimes with no reasonable fix in sight for some time. Not the end of the
>  world and I get the reasons behind it, however I wonder if KVM might be a
>  better plan. I used KVM many years ago and it was not quite as reliable &
>  easy to work with as I needed.  I assume it's gotten better?
>  
What VM's do you need, e.g., do you need to run Windows or just linux
VM's?  Is there are reason to rule out VirtualBox and lightweight tools
(LXC -- Docker, LXD, etc)?


>  Questions:
>
>  - does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? Any gotcha's or
>  common issues I should be aware of?
>  
I've had good experiences, but roghly 5 years ago)  using VMware VM's to
provide linux in a Wiindows-based teaching lab. The same VM's can be run on
a Linux or MacOS host to prepare teaching material. KVM at the time was
considerably slower than VMware.


>  - Anyone have experience with both KVM and VMware? opinions on which is
>  better, more stable, etc?
>  
I switched to VirtualBox after trying VMware and KVM, and then from VB to
LXC, but I'm no longer running workshops, just software testing across
multiple linux platforms.   Disk space requirements of VM's gives LXC a
huge advantage.


>  - Is is easy / possible to convert a VMware workstation VM to a KVM?
>  
Looked at this once, but had some issues with the device drivers (VM was
using a disk controller that KVM didn't support).


>  - With VMware I get the vmnet network and I don't have to do anything
>  other than select nat, bridged, etc to get networking in place for a VM,
>  even if I want to access te VM directly from another machine (i.e. not the
>  local only network). Is this true with KVM as well?
>
>  - If I decide later to remove it does it remove cleanly? I dislike the
>  vmnet & other bits VMware leaves around even after an uninstall
>  
You might find it better to host VM's on a minimal install of a stable
distro (CentOS 7) and run
unstable OS's (e.g., Fedora) in VM's or containers.



-- 
George N. White III <aa056(a)chebucto.ns.ca&gt;
Head of St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia

[Greg Woods]

On Tue, Jan 17, 2017 at 9:01 AM, ProPAAS DBA <dba(a)propaas.com&gt; wrote:

>  - does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? 

We use it a lot here at work and it works quite well for us (under CentOS
7), but all our VMs are also Linux. In my experience at home, when running
non-Linux VMs (such as Windows 7) under KVM on Fedora, the VMs perform like
crap, so I always end up installing VirtualBox.

--Greg

[Tom Horsley]

On Tue, 17 Jan 2017 12:54:46 -0700
Greg Woods wrote:

>  when running
>  non-Linux VMs (such as Windows 7) under KVM on Fedora, the VMs perform like
>  crap, so I always end up installing VirtualBox. 
If you go to the trouble of digging up the different virtio disk
and network drivers and QXL video drivers for Windows the performance
definitely get better.

It just always seems to require 3 hours of goolging to find
the Windows drivers every time I look for them to update my KVM
because they keep moving to make them easier to find :-).

[ProPAAS DBA]

Hi All;

I'll try and answer all the questions:

Why are you expecting stability when the host OS you are using is 
betaware? Use CentOS as your host OS and you might get better results.
I use Fedora for the eye-candy, and the fact that the stuff I most often 
use just works. I understand that it's a beta but I don't want to go to 
a centos desktop. Basically I want it all and I want it now, and most of 
the time Fedora delivers for me

What VM's do you need, e.g., do you need to run Windows or just linux 
VM's?  Is there are reason to rule out VirtualBox and lightweight tools 
(LXC -- Docker, LXD, etc)?
I run mostly Linux VM's although I do have a couple of mac VM's and one 
windows VM for clients that force me to use VPN's that I can only get 
running on mac or windows. I'm actually testing virtualbox as we speak. 
However I may be stuck with VMware to keep the mac VM's running

-  The issue of it breaking every 2-3 kernel updates is a little vague; 
though this might simply be the outdatedness of an older instance of 
VMware Tools in the VM.  Simply keeping VMware Workstation up to date, 
and periodically ensuring your VM's get updated (consistent with the 
version of VMware Workstation) and that their internal VMware Tools also 
get updated will likely reduce the frequency of this problem, again, 
assuming it is kernel version to VMware Tools version related.
The current issue is that VMware workstation 12.5 Pro does not start 
with kernel 4.9 (the latest update). Luckily I caught it before I 
updated my laptop but I see this somewhat often and sometimes there is a 
patch and sometimes I just have to wait but I use these VM's for testing 
day to day so I need to do what I can to ensure they are running




I know I'm wanting the moon, looking for a possible replacement cause I 
want a fully patched laptop and my VM's to work. Just poking around t 
see if there is a better plan.

Thanks for all the feedback

[Rick Stevens]

On 01/17/2017 02:08 PM, ProPAAS DBA wrote:
>  Hi All;
>  
>  I'll try and answer all the questions:
>  
>  Why are you expecting stability when the host OS you are using is
>  betaware? Use CentOS as your host OS and you might get better results.
>  I use Fedora for the eye-candy, and the fact that the stuff I most often
>  use just works. I understand that it's a beta but I don't want to go to
>  a centos desktop. Basically I want it all and I want it now, and most of
>  the time Fedora delivers for me
>  
>  What VM's do you need, e.g., do you need to run Windows or just linux
>  VM's?  Is there are reason to rule out VirtualBox and lightweight tools
>  (LXC -- Docker, LXD, etc)?
>  I run mostly Linux VM's although I do have a couple of mac VM's and one
>  windows VM for clients that force me to use VPN's that I can only get
>  running on mac or windows. I'm actually testing virtualbox as we speak.
>  However I may be stuck with VMware to keep the mac VM's running 
>  
>  -  The issue of it breaking every 2-3 kernel updates is a little vague;
>  though this might simply be the outdatedness of an older instance of
>  VMware Tools in the VM.  Simply keeping VMware Workstation up to date,
>  and periodically ensuring your VM's get updated (consistent with the
>  version of VMware Workstation) and that their internal VMware Tools also
>  get updated will likely reduce the frequency of this problem, again,
>  assuming it is kernel version to VMware Tools version related.
>  The current issue is that VMware workstation 12.5 Pro does not start
>  with kernel 4.9 (the latest update). Luckily I caught it before I
>  updated my laptop but I see this somewhat often and sometimes there is a
>  patch and sometimes I just have to wait but I use these VM's for testing
>  day to day so I need to do what I can to ensure they are running
>  
>  
>  
>  
>  I know I'm wanting the moon, looking for a possible replacement cause I
>  want a fully patched laptop and my VM's to work. Just poking around t
>  see if there is a better plan. 
I use kvm/libvirt/VirtualMachineManager for a number of Linux VMs and
(grudgingly) Win7, Win8.1 and Win10. I use the virtio drivers for
pretty much all of it and it does help.

I really don't care about the performance of Windows. I need it for a
couple of things (such as clients who use VPNs that only have Windows
agents), but I absolutely will NOT put Windows of any variant on my
hard drive or boot my machines into it. I'm rather upset that I even
have to have it anywhere near me. I'm an honest chap and I've paid for
the Windows versions I have (I really don't want to support M$'s
questionable business practices, but rules are rules), but I keep them
in VMs where damage can be limited.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Rick Stevens, Systems Engineer, AllDigital    ricks(a)alldigital.com -
- AIM/Skype: therps2        ICQ: 226437340           Yahoo: origrps2 -
-                                                                    -
-     The trouble with troubleshooting is that trouble sometimes     -
-                             shoots back.                           -
----------------------------------------------------------------------

[Greg Woods]

On Tue, Jan 17, 2017 at 3:23 PM, Rick Stevens <ricks(a)alldigital.com&gt; wrote:

>  I really don't care about the performance of Windows. I 

Up to a point, I don't either. But the performance is so bad under KVM that
I cannot even successfully run Windows Update, it takes too long to search
for updates and eventually times out (other network-related things work so
I know it's not my network connection). This does not happen under
VirtualBox.

I might at some point look into alternate drivers, but it's easier to just
install VirtualBox. But VB is not free software, so I might be motivated
enough to try making Windows-under-KVM work better at some point (and I
haven't missed the obvious point that Windows isn't free software either, I
just have reasons why I have to use it).

--Greg


--Greg

[Tom Horsley]

On Tue, 17 Jan 2017 15:42:16 -0700
Greg Woods wrote:

>  Up to a point, I don't either. But the performance is so bad
> under KVM that
>  I cannot even successfully run Windows Update, it takes too long to search
>  for updates and eventually times out 
If you look on windows forums, I think you'll find that isn't
unique to KVM machines. My actual hardware Windows 10 box can often
take hours to download updates. For some reason I picture
Microsoft running their update server on an old 486 box with a
Tbase10 ethernet card :-). If you've seen it work better outside of
a KVM it was probably just random.

[Samuel Sieb]

On 01/17/2017 08:01 AM, ProPAAS DBA wrote:
>  I'm running Fedora 25 on a laptop with 16GB of ram. I'm
> frustrated with
>  the VMware workstation reliably breaking every 2 to 3 kernel updates and
>  sometimes with no reasonable fix in sight for some time. Not the end of
>  the world and I get the reasons behind it, however I wonder if KVM might
>  be a better plan. I used KVM many years ago and it was not quite as
>  reliable & easy to work with as I needed.  I assume it's gotten better?
>  
I've never had any trouble with the reliability of KVM and I've been 
using it for years.

>  - does anyone have experiences good and bad with KVM? Any
> gotcha's or
>  common issues I should be aware of?
>  
I find it works great, although I've primarily used it for Linux VMs.  I 
personally use a VM for XP occasionally and I've had no problems with 
it.  I setup a VM for a friend with Windows 2012 a couple of years ago 
and he hasn't had any issues with it.

>  - Anyone have experience with both KVM and VMware? opinions on which
> is
>  better, more stable, etc?
>  
I've never had any reason to use VMware so I can't compare it.

>  - Is is easy / possible to convert a VMware workstation VM to a KVM?
>  
I've done this once I think.  Converting the image isn't the problem, 
but you might have driver issues depending on how VMware provides 
devices to the VM.  If possible you will want to convert the installed 
OS to use the virtio drivers for best performance.

>  - With VMware I get the vmnet network and I don't have to do
> anything
>  other than select nat, bridged, etc to get networking in place for a VM,
>  even if I want to access te VM directly from another machine (i.e. not
>  the local only network). Is this true with KVM as well?
>  
By default, kvm (libvirt) provides a NAT device for the VMs, but in the 
VM config, you can change it to be bridged with one of the existing 
interfaces.

>  - If I decide later to remove it does it remove cleanly? I dislike
> the
>  vmnet & other bits VMware leaves around even after an uninstall
>  
yes