[GUIDE] Virtualizing unRAID in KVM on openSUSE 13.1 (64Bit) <--- Completed 12/19


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Virtualizing unRAID in KVM on openSUSE 13.1 (64Bit)

 

Why KVM?

 

Kernel-based virtual machine (KVM) technology is the most recent step in the evolution of open source, x86 virtualization technology. KVM turns the Linux kernel into a bare-metal hypervisor using the hardware virtualization support built into Intel and AMD processors. This means that KVM can use Linux to do many of the things that a hypervisor needs to do, like scheduling tasks, managing memory and interacting with hardware devices.

 

KVM creates virtual machines as Linux processes which can then run either Linux or Windows as a guest operating system, and using a modified version of another open source module – QEMU – to provide I/O device emulation inside the virtual machine. KVM is thus able to efficiently and effectively run both Windows and Linux workloads in virtual machines – and also Linux applications natively alongside if required.

 

By leveraging Linux for core functions, KVM is able to avoid reinventing the wheel – taking advantage of the performance, scalability and security already built into Linux, which has been enterprise hardened for over 10 years and is trusted by millions of organizations in the heart of their data center to run their mission critical workloads. This gives KVM a significant "feature velocity" that other virtualization solutions cannot match. KVM has also brought new features to the Linux kernel including kernel page sharing (KSM), transparent large page support, and a new user-mode device driver infrastructure. Based on Linux, KVM is designed to be cost-effective and efficient and avoids vendor "lock in" giving you the virtualization capabilities you need.

 

Do you prefer the Desktop below or flashing cursor on a console screen in ESXi or XenServer?

(Note: Your VMs will run as fast as they do in ESXi / XenServer)

 

gbOGVEr.png

 

[glow=red,2,300]BEFORE YOU EVEN BOTHER DOWNLOADING PLEASE TAKE NOTE:[/glow]

 

I suspect most of you will have a motherboard that you either passthrough ALL or none of your onboard sata ports. openSUSE can be installed to a USB Stick. The default install with Linux Desktop is roughly 3.6GB. So if you want to install to a USB Flash Drive, use an 8GB one. If your motherboard is like mine where you aren't forced to passthrough all your onboard sata ports you can install openSUSE to a Hard Drive that sits outside of unRAID. Another solution if you are forced to pass through all your onboard sata ports is to get a cheap ($10 - $15) PCI sata card for your OS / datastore drive (where your VMs and their virtual hard drives reside).

 

My advice... Go with a PCI sata card and get an SSD or use your old cache drive (Sickbeard, Couchpotato, SQL, PFSense, TFTP server are running on other VMs now so why even bother with a cache drive). XenServer (or your Distro with Xen on it) only takes a very small portion of space and the rest can be used as your datestore. Again, this is an option... you could do all of this if you have a large enough flash drive.

 

"Freedom" with KVM...

 

You could install and Linux Distro and enable the KVM Hypervisor on top that. Within your Linux Distro with KVM Hypervisor install CouchPotato, SickBeard, sabNZDb, etc. and only have a VM for Windows or OSX if you want. Me personally, I separated things out into several VMs but just showing you the "freedom" that you now have with KVM.

 

With KVM, you are no longer in a "box" when it comes to hardware or the customizations you can do. You can start with openSUSE get comfortable with KVM and later plug in a usb stick with CentOS (or whatever Linux Distro with KVM Hypervisor on it), boot it, add your unRAID usb drive to the unRAID VM and as far as unRAID (or your data) is concerned... nothing has changed.

 

Below are a few links where you will find MANY answers to the questions you might have. If you ask questions that answered / explained / etc. that are in any of the following links, I will refer you to them. They are very well written and do a much better job than I could do. Sorry, I am can only explain so much "info" into a forum guys.

 

openSUSE: Virtualization with KVM

 

If you want to know if your hardware is compatible or before you purchase any hardware expecting it work, I would look at the 3 links I have provided below:

 

VT-d Enabled Systems

List of IOMMU-supporting hardware

Supported Intel CPUs

 

For you to be able to use unRAID in KVM you will need to download the following file:

 

unRAID 5.0.4:

 

KVM-unRAID-5.0.4.vhd <--- Download Link [glow=red,2,300]Updated 12/19/2013[/glow]

 

Download the above file and follow the step by step guide in the next post.

 

[glow=red,2,300]BEFORE YOU BEGIN TAKE A SCREENSHOT OF YOUR unRAID SO YOU KNOW WHERE EACH DRIVE IS ASSIGNED JUST IN CASE[/glow]

 

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openSUSE 13.1 (64Bit) Installation Guide

 

[glow=red,2,300]YOU WILL NEED TO UNPLUG THE POWER FROM EVERY DISK DRIVE IN YOUR SYSTEM (unless you are installing openSUSE to a drive which is outside of your unRAID configuration) AND REMOVE YOUR unRAID USB FLASH DRIVE BEFORE INSTALLING.openSUSE by DEFAULT will format one or more of your unRAID drives if they are plugged in! I REPEAT AGAIN, DO NOT HAVE POWER PLUGGED INTO ANY OF YOUR unRAID DRIVES or CACHE DRIVE (if you are going to use one).[/glow]

 

[glow=red,2,300]NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO BE BRAVE, ADVENTUROUS, A REBEL, CUT CORNERS OR BE UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF DRUGS OR ALCOHOL. I WILL TELL YOU WHEN IT'S SAFE TO PLUG IN YOUR DRIVES AND USE YOUR UNRAID USB FLASH DRIVE.[/glow]

 

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you are installing openSUSE to USB Drive or a Disk Drive outside of unRAID that is the only drive that should be plugged in and powered up. If you unplug the power from every disk drive in your system and remove your unRAID USB Flashdrive (Except the USB Flash Drive / SEPARATE disk drive you are installing openSUSE too)... You can test out openSUSE, KVM, PCI Passthrough and unRAID in a VM on your current unRAID system without harming it or your data. When you are finished testing, you plug the power back into all of your disk drives, insert your original unRAID USB Flash Drive and boot up just like you always have. Everything will work just like it did before.

 

1. Boot into the openSUSE 13.1 USB Flash Drive.

 

NOTE: For a more detail explanation of the various steps below, refer to this guide: openSUSE: Start-Up

 

SQeqUhG.jpg

 

2. Select Installation on the boot screen and press Enter. This loads the openSUSE installation program and starts the installation in normal mode.

 

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3. Select the language and the keyboard layout to be used during the installation and for the installed system.

 

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4. Select New Installation and proceed with Next.

 

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5. Either use the map or the drop down lists for Region and Time Zone to select the clock and time zone to use in your system. Proceed with Next.

 

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6. Select the desktop system you would like to use. KDE and GNOME, are powerful graphical desktop environments, with KDE being a bit similar to Windows, alternative selections are available when checking Other. Proceed with Next.

 

If you want to see screenshots of what the various Desktops look like, Click Me.

 

NOTE: This Guide is based on KDE. However, if you select another Desktop it should still be easy for you to follow along.

 

zxvfejk.png

 

7. Define a partition setup for openSUSE in this step. In most cases a reasonable scheme that can be accepted without change is proposed. Accept the proposal with Next and proceed with the installation. Experienced users can also customize the proposal (Edit Partition Setup) or apply their own partitioning scheme (Create Partition Setup).

 

NOTE: For additional information / help / guidance, please refer to this guide: Advanced Disk Setup

 

Before Partitioning your Drives, please consider the following:

 

1. You can partition your drive just for the openSUSE install. Afterwards, you can use YAST's Partition Tool to set up your partition scheme for the rest of your drive(s).

 

2. If you have some Linux skills and experience, I HIGHLY recommend you install openSUSE on a BTRFS partition. Snapshots / Rollbacks makes updating / trying new things on your Server a whole lot easier / safer. Please see the following link to learn more what I am talking about: Snapshots/Rollback with Snapper.

 

3. I installed openSUSE on a 10GB btrfs Partition (stable unless using btrfs RAID) and a separate 500MB Ext4 Boot Partition (btfs requires a separate boot partition). I dual boot between various Linux Distros that have Xen or KVM (Yes, my unRAID VMs in all of them work and all of my data on those drives. unRAID doesn't know / notice / care when I switch what Hypervisor, Linux Distro or even boot "bare metal").

 

4. I use the rest of my disk drive as a LVM for VMs. For all you Linux / Filesystem people, if you do not know about LVM Thin Provisioning (Thin metadata, pools, and LVs) you are MISSING OUT. This topic could be a whole thread by itself. However, I wanted to put the idea in your head as you consider your partitioning scheme / layout.

 

mimDXna.png

 

8. Type your first and last name in the User’s Full Name field, your login name in the Username field, and your password in the Password field.

 

For security reasons, your password should be at least eight characters long and should contain uppercase and lowercase letters and numbers. Passwords are case-sensitive.

 

By default, the password you enter here is also used for the system administrator, root. Uncheck Use this password for system administrator if you prefer to specify a different password for root in the next step.

 

With automatic login enabled, the system boots straight to your desktop with no authentication at all. If you store sensitive data on your system, you should not enable this option as long as the computer can also be accessed by others.

 

Proceed with Next.

 

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9. Use the Installation Settings screen to review your choices as well as some automatically proposed settings.

 

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10. Select Software, Detail (located in the bottom left), enable KVM Host Server and add libvirt package.

 

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11. Select Console Tools and install the nano package.

 

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12. Go through the various Software options and add / remove things that you want.

 

Example: I removed Games, MultiMedia (even without this XBMC will still work), Office Software, Graphics and AppArmor.

 

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13. When finished selecting what Software Packages you do / do not want click Accept and then Continue.

 

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Next is Configuring openSUSE, KVM, libvirt, etc.

 

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Configuring openSUSE, KVM, libvirt, etc.

 

[glow=red,2,300]IT IS STILL NOT SAFE FOR YOU TO PLUG IN YOUR UNRAID DRIVES, CACHE DRIVE OR YOUR UNRAID USB FLASH STICK! I WILL TELL WHEN IT IS SAFE TO PLUG THEM IN.[/glow]

 

NOTE: Go through all these steps below. You will reboot the Server at the end.

 

1. Install openSUSE Updates.

 

04mXpBX.png

 

2. Tim to Configure several things in the Server. This is all done using a GUI, called Yast.

 

(When prompted, enter in your password if you did not set up a separate password for root when you installed openSUSE)

 

NOTE: You will use this program again so drag and drop this into the Plasma Window with the other icons.

 

C21Ldy3.png?1

 

3. Within Yast, click on System.

 

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4. Click on Services Manager, enable libvirtd and click Ok.

 

NOTE: If you want SSH access, enable sshd too.

 

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5. Click on Network Network Settings and customize to your liking. When finished, click Ok.

 

NOTE: You will want to at least change the name of your Server (see below).

 

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6. Click Hostnames and edit to your liking and click Ok.

 

NOTE: Add your Server Name as an alias for 127.0.0.1.

 

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7. Click Firewall and customize to your liking. When finished, click Finish.

(My server sits behind a firewall so I disabled it on mine.)

 

NOTES:

 

1. For more information on how to secure your Server, please see the following link: openSUSE: Security Guide

 

2. You need to enable libvirtd. If you want SSH access, enable that too.

 

NLacl26.png

 

8. Click Sudo, click add, give your user Sudo Rights without a password.

 

NOTE: When it prompts you for command, enter: ALL (in capital letters)

 

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9. Select User and Group Administration

 

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10. Add your user to the following groups: libvirt, audio, video and wheel.

 

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11. Click Install Hypervisor and Tools, select KVM and click Ok.

 

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12. We are done with Yast. Now click on the openSUSE icon in the bottom left and open up a Terminal Window.

 

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Login as root with the following command:

 

su

 

13. If you didn't install nano during the openSUSE install, do so now.

 

yast --install nano

 

14. We need to enable libvirt to talk with KVM.

 

NOTE: libvirt can communicate with KVM via SSH or TCP. You can select one, the other or both. If you have the Firewall enabled, you will need to allow SSH or TCP Port 16509 (which you can customize) through.

 

nano /etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf

 

For libvirt to communicate via SSH, uncomment the following:

 

unix_sock_group = "libvirt"
unix_sock_ro_perms = "0777"
unix_sock_rw_perms = "0770"
unix_sock_dir = "/var/run/libvirt"
auth_unix_ro = "none"
auth_unix_rw = "none"

 

For libvirt to communicate via TCP, uncomment the following:

 

listen_tcp = 1
auth_tcp = "none" <---- Change the default from auth_tcp = "sasl"

 

When finished, CTL+X will ask you to save and quit.

 

15. Assign QEMU with user and group privileges of "root".

 

nano /etc/libvirt/qemu.conf

 

To assign QEMU with "root" user and group privileges uncomment the following:

 

user = "root"
group = "root"

 

When finished, CTL+X will ask you to save and quit.

 

16. Exit out of Terminal. Either close the windows or type the following TWICE in the console.

 

exit

 

17. You are finished with all the various "tweaks" needed to get a basic Server with KVM up and running. Time to reboot so all these changes take effect. Select the openSUSE start button and then leave. It will give you an option to restart the computer.

 

Many of you will want to do more. Set up Samba & NFS Shares, Add Printers, Online Backup, SQL Server, etc. There are PLENTY of guides out there on the web for how to do all that.

 

Next Step is to install unRAID in a VM...

 

 

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Installing unRAID in a VM

 

[glow=red,2,300]IT IS STILL NOT SAFE FOR YOU TO PLUG IN YOUR UNRAID DRIVES OR YOUR UNRAID USB FLASH STICK! I WILL TELL WHEN IT IS SAFE TO PLUG THEM IN.[/glow]

 

1. Open Virt-Manager, Create a New Virtual Machine, Name it unRAID, Select import existing disk.

 

iMH1nKS.png

 

2. There are two steps that need to be completed.

 

Select Browse and locate the KVM-unRAID-5.0.4.vhd:

 

NOTE: The location of the default storage folder (/var/lib/libvirt/images). When you download the KVM-unRAID.vhd above you need to place it in the /var/lib/libvirt/images folder or change the location of your default folder to point it to where you put the KVM-unRAID.vhd.

 

NOTE: This doesn't apply to our unRAID VM but when installing other VMs be sure to select virtio under bus device type. This is the Paravirtualized Driver for your virtual disk drive and when enabled it will increase the speed of your VM.

 

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Select Linux for the OS, select Version, select Other OS and Select Generic 2.6.25 or later kernel with virtio.

 

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Before moving forward, make sure it looks like this:

 

ISyjZC3.png

 

3. Select the amount of Memory and the number of CPUs.

 

NOTE: Since all of your scripts are going to be running on other VMs, your unRAID will use less than 300MB of memory. Giving it a lot of memory of numerous CPUs isn't going to make it copy files faster, do parity checks or transfer Movies / TV Shows to your XBMCs any faster.

 

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4. Installation of the unRAID VM, select Customize configuration before install, select advanced, select i686 and finally Finish.

 

NOTE: The MAC default MAC Address should work. If you want to change it, it MUST always start with 54:52:00. You can customize the rest after that. Also, make sure that your Network Bridge is selected. It should be br0.

 

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5. Select Processor, then Copy host CPU configuration and then Apply.

 

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6. Select NIC, verify it is set to bridge, select virtio (this is KVMs Paravirtualized Network Driver) and then apply.

 

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7. Select the Begin Installation Button.

 

NOTE: Do not Add your PCI Passthrough Devices (video, network, SCSI / SATA controllers, etc.) or passthrough a USB Device. We first need to start unRAID without those. Otherwise, you will get the incorrect PCI IDs assigned to your unRAID VM.

 

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8. If everything is correct, unRAID should have started in console like below.

 

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9. Shutdown the unRAID VM. If it doesn't shutdown, you can force it to shutdown.

 

10. Edit the unRAID VM and add the PCI Passthrough Devices.

 

Sata Controller

 

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USB Device

 

NOTE: If you want, you can try to Passthrough a USB Device instead of the PCI Device (USB Controller). This worked on some motherboards I tested it on but not all.

 

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10. Poweroff your PC via the openSUSE icon.

 

11. Do you have a screenshot of your working unRAID WebGUI so you have a copy of which drives went where?

 

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you do not have the above, boot back into unRAID and take a screenshot. If you added or plan on adding new drives to your system outside of unRAID, it will reorder your Hard Drives. unRAID should grab the correct drives based on the UUID (which is unique for each drive) but lets be on the safe side.

 

[glow=green,2,300]IT IS FINALLY TIME FOR YOU TO PLUGIN YOUR unRAID USB Flash Drive and unRAID Hard Drives[/glow]

 

NOTE: If you have the vmware-tools plugin enabled, you will need to disable it and reboot the unRAID VM.

 

11. Power on your PC and if you did everything correct and have hardware that supports PCI Passthrough... You should have unRAID working in a VM.

 

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Managing your Server via Webmin and WebYast

 

Webmin

 

Status Screen:

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MySQL:

 

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Samba Windows File Sharing:

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To install Webmin

 

1. Goto Terminal

 

2. Login as Root

 

su

 

3. Download Webmin RPM

 

wget http://www.webmin.com/download/rpm/webmin-current.rpm

 

4. Install Webmin

 

rpm -ivh webmin-current.rpm

 

5. Now you can use any browser and connect with 'http://<name of your computer or IP Address>:10000' to your computer. The default rights of WebYaST are set to root only. So you can login with the root password of that machine.

 

WebYaST

 

Login:

 

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Main Page:

 

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System Services:

 

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Memory:

 

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CPUs:

 

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To install WebYaST

 

1. Goto Terminal

 

2. Login as Root

 

su

 

3. Add the WebYast Repository

 

zypper addrepo http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/YaST:Web/openSUSE_13.1/YaST:Web.repo

 

4. Refresh openSUSE Package Manager with the newly added WebYaST Repository and enter t (to trust it)

 

zypper refresh

 

5. Install WebYaST

 

yast --install patterns-openSUSE-webyast

 

6. It should be Enable WebYast on Next Boot

 

7. Now you can use any browser and connect with 'http://<name of your computer or IP Address>:4984' to your computer. The default rights of WebYaST are set to root only. So you can login with the root password of that machine.

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Installing XBMC

 

NOTE: If you are passing through a AMD video card and want DTS-HD, TrueHD and LPCM sound use the following guide instead of the one below:

 

XBMC Radeon OSS vdpau from git on openSUSE

 

1. Open Yast, Select Software, Select Software Repositories and Select Add.

 

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2. Select Specify URL and add the 1st software repository:

 

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3. Select Add, Select Specify URL and add the 2nd software repository.

 

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4. Select Trust and then Ok.

 

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5. In Yast, Select Software Management, search for XBMC and Select the Package.

 

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6. Select Accept and then Continue.

 

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7. openSUSE will download all the packages it needs along with XBMC.

 

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8. Select the openSUSE Start Menu, Goto Applications, Goto Media and Start XBMC.

 

NOTE: Copy and Paste a Link into the Desktop along with the other Icons.

 

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NOTE: If you are passing through a AMD video card and want DTS-HD, TrueHD and LPCM sound use the following guide instead of the one below:

 

XBMC Radeon OSS vdpau from git on openSUSE

 

 

grumpy...have you tried (or had success) performing the XBMC installation described in the thread above in a VM?  I got through the entire procedure but XBMC (or Ubuntu) always wanted to default to the VMware graphics adapter rather than the Radeon card.  Is there a way to force Ubuntu (XBMC) to use the Radeon card as the default adapter?

 

Edit:  I'm actually following the how-to on the first page:  http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=174854

 

John

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grumpy...have you tried (or had success) performing the XBMC installation described in the thread above in a VM?  I got through the entire procedure but XBMC (or Ubuntu) always wanted to default to the VMware graphics adapter rather than the Radeon card.  Is there a way to force Ubuntu (XBMC) to use the Radeon card as the default adapter?

 

Edit:  I'm actually following the how-to on the first page:  http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?tid=174854

 

Yes. I have had success this in several Linux Distros (I maintain the thread on Arch Linux on how to do this). Let's take this discussion offline since it doesn't apply here. Sending you a PM.

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what is the diff between arch xen and this opensuse kvm?

im currently gathering component$$ for it, that can hav XBMC, unraid and Windows(gaming with gtx780ti) in a box.

had been following around virtualization posts, but stil cant make up my mind which. or i shud just wait for unraid64 bit, mentioned somewher in this forum.

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what is the diff between arch xen and this opensuse kvm?

im currently gathering component$$ for it, that can hav XBMC, unraid and Windows(gaming with gtx780ti) in a box.

had been following around virtualization posts, but stil cant make up my mind which. or i shud just wait for unraid64 bit, mentioned somewher in this forum.

 

I'm putting together this guide on openSUSE because its EASY and they aren't behind like Ubuntu (and others) are with their version of KVM, Xen, libvirt and QEMU. ! Even a novice could do it. When finished, I will have a Xen on openSUSE too (it's only a couple of changes). You could even use this guide as a template on how to do it in Ubuntu, CentOS, etc. The main thing is configuring libvirt to talk to KVM or Xen. The other Linux Distros can do it just as well and use the same software.

 

Xen and KVM there really isn't much of difference. They both use QEMU as a machine emulator and virtualizer and they both use libvirt.

 

The only difference really is Xen has their version of Paravirutalized Drivers and KVM has theirs. Both of which are in the Linux Kernel and most Distros have them enabled. Performance wise, I can't tell a difference.

 

If you put a gun to my head and asked me to choose... I would probably go with KVM.

 

1. Mainly because you can passthrough nVidia cards that aren't quattro series (GEFORCE 7, 8, 4xx, 5xx, 6xx). Xen is slightly behind but should have it in 4.4 (a RC is due out anyday now) . ESXi... LOL! Probably a year or two from now.

 

2. 9P with virtio drivers. Sharing folders / Data between guest and host is BLAZING FAST and kills NFS and Samba as far as speed goes.

 

Note: I am adding this to the unRAID Kernel and will have a section on how to do this above.

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Good to have you back again Grumpy.  I will be giving your guide here a thorough workout once you have it complete.  Timing should be good as I am still awaiting delivery of some memory I ordered two weeks ago (that's another story...) to complete my backup server hardware (same as in my sig below).

 

Meanwhile last weekend I did manage to get  KVM on openSUSE up and running on another system I have (not pass-though capable) just to get my feet wet.  I made use of the docs on the openSUSE site.  Set up a vmdk to use for the vm storage.    Not ideal, but at least I could set up a vm and play around with it.  Looks to me like there are a lot of similarities with ESXi.

 

Samba was a pain to figure out, but I did get it working.  I never did find any decent up to date docs on it.  Looks like it has had some changes made to it's setup recently.  Got any good links on the subject?  Should be easy to do once one knows what the hell they are doing... Not having a Linux background didn't help either.  This will be a whole lot more fun when I can use my backup hardware (hopefully) this weekend.   

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Samba was a pain to figure out, but I did get it working.  I never did find any decent up to date docs on it.  Looks like it has had some changes made to it's setup recently.  Got any good links on the subject?  Should be easy to do once one knows what the hell they are doing... Not having a Linux background didn't help either.  This will be a whole lot more fun when I can use my backup hardware (hopefully) this weekend. 

 

You can use WebYaST or Webmin (or both) and setup Samba, NFS, Printers, Cron jobs, Users, etc. all via a WebGUI instead of doing it command line. I will walk you through installing both up above.

 

Really all you have to do is outside of that, is go to system services and enable Samba (or whatever else you want NFS, mysql, etc.) to start on boot.

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as usual nice and usable info in one simple post :-)

 

thanks grumpy.

 

want to try this ASAP so next week will be a busy one.

couple of questions on setup.

 

1. I have been playing with OpenSuse for several month now

    do I need the desktop? with WebMin and WebYast it seams to me that loading the desktop is kind of overkill on the server, especially with version 13.1 OS.

what do you think?

 

2. I have been plaing with BTRFS setup and SAMBA

is there a good guide to setup a shares and local domain that you can recomend.

a side from unRaid array I also want to have some external shares setup for torrents,ISO strorage and VM storage that would be based on BTRFS RAID 1 or RAID 6 volume based. I am having issues with securty on this.

 

 

 

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Some of you asked me to provide a Guide / Explanation / Screenshot of what I meant when I said you could run Linux Desktop / GUI Applications on a HEADLESS Server from your Windows PC without having to install a full Linux Desktop.

 

On an Arch Linux HEADLESS Server every single window you see open below on my Windows PC... Is a Linux GUI / Desktop Application

 

BnxvE97.png

 

On my Windows PC

 

XMing

 

Download and install xming

 

Configure XMing

 

1. In Windows, select Xming ? XLaunch

 

2. At the Display settings dialog box, select Multiple windows and set the Display number as 0. Click on Next.

 

3. Keep clicking on Next button till you reach the Finish configuration page, then click on the Finish button.

 

Putty

 

Download and Install Putty

 

Configure Putty

 

1. Start PuTTY.

 

2. In the PuTTY Configuration section, on the left panel, select Connection ? SSH ? X11

 

3. On the right panel, click on the Enable X11 forwarding checkbox

 

4. Set the X display location as :0.0

 

5. Click on Session option on the left panel.

 

6. Enter the hostname or IP address in the Host Name textbox

 

7. Save the session.

 

Arch Linux Server

 

1. Install the packages I need

 

pacman -S openssh terminus-font xorg-xauth xterm

 

2. Configure openssh for X11 Forwarding

 

nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

AllowTcpForwarding yes
X11Forwarding yes
X11DisplayOffset 10
X11UseLocalhost yes
Compression yes

 

nano /etc/ssh/ssh_config

 

ForwardX11 yes
ForwardX11Trusted yes <-- Had to add that one

 

3. Enable SSH to start on boot

 

systemctl enable sshd.service

 

4. Start SSH

 

systemctl start sshd.service

 

I "sexed" my xterm up by doing the following

 

NOTE: Each Linux Distro is a little different on where / how you "tweak" xterm. This might not work for you. However, the popular Linux Distros have wikis on customizing xterm.

 

xterm*dynamicColors:     true
xterm*background:        black
xterm*foreground:        white
#xterm*utf8:            2
xterm*eightBitInput:    true
xterm*saveLines:        32767
xterm*scrollTtyKeypress: true
xterm*scrollTtyOutput: false
xterm*scrollBar: false
xterm*loginShell: true
xterm*jumpScroll: true
xterm*multiScroll: true
xterm*toolBar: false
xterm*geometry: 100x30
xterm*faceName: Terminus:style=Regular:size=10
xterm*selectToClipboard: true

 

Then run the next command to test

 

xterm <--- Will start xterm on the server and open the GUI on your Windows PC. You can either type exit in your xterm that shows up on your Windows PC or you can CTL-C to quit.

 

To run Linux GUI Programs in the Background and still have access to your SSH session

 

xterm &

NOTE: Putting a space and then a & at the end will start it and it will run in the background and allow you start more programs like virt-manager. If you close the window in Windows, it will close the program running on the server.

 

A few examples of programs you might want to run

 

virt-manager, gparted, makemkv, etc.

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I think my questions were not  very clear , sorry about that.

 

I meant if I load the CLI OpenSuse setup

install webmin and webyast, do I need the desktop?

between this 2 webGUI I should have all the control I need to limit the CLI use, right?

OR webyast will not allow the Virtualization setup control in the same way the desktop yast does.

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I think my questions were not  very clear , sorry about that.

 

I meant if I load the CLI OpenSuse setup

install webmin and webyast, do I need the desktop?

between this 2 webGUI I should have all the control I need to limit the CLI use, right?

OR webyast will not allow the Virtualization setup control in the same way the desktop yast does.

 

I'm in what I suspect is the same boat as you, my server is headless, (but I do have IPMI), so a full on gui desktop might be overkill.

 

That said, I'm a 1.5 out of 10 on the linux noob scale, so perhaps I should stick with the GUI for the sake of simplicity.

 

Ogi

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NOTE: Do not Add your PCI Passthrough Devices (video, network, SCSI / SATA controllers, etc.) or passthrough a USB Device. We first need to start unRAID without those. Otherwise, you will get the incorrect PCI IDs assigned to your unRAID VM.

 

8. If everything is correct, unRAID should have started in console like below.

 

9. Shutdown the unRAID VM. If it doesn't shutdown, you can force it to shutdown.

 

10. Poweroff your PC via the openSUSE icon.

 

[glow=green,2,300]IT IS FINALLY TIME FOR YOU TO PLUGIN YOUR unRAID USB Flash Drive and unRAID Hard Drives[/glow]

 

NOTE: If you have the vmware-tools plugin enabled, you will need to disable it.

 

11. Power on your PC and if you did everything correct and have hardware that supports PCI Passthrough... You should have unRAID working in a VM.

 

Emphasis mine ... so my question / confusion is you say to not enable pci passthrough, then we reboot, and [insert magic] we have pci passthrough working?!?! 

 

When you say "We first need to start unRAID without those" that makes me feel like there is a "second" step where we then enable it.  The fact that you don't actually detail how to do it tells me we don't, but it is the [insert magic] part I'm just curious about.  How does it get enabled on reboot if we have not specifically enabled it ourselves per your direction?

Link to comment

I think my questions were not  very clear , sorry about that.

 

I meant if I load the CLI OpenSuse setup

install webmin and webyast, do I need the desktop?

between this 2 webGUI I should have all the control I need to limit the CLI use, right?

OR webyast will not allow the Virtualization setup control in the same way the desktop yast does.

 

I'm in what I suspect is the same boat as you, my server is headless, (but I do have IPMI), so a full on gui desktop might be overkill.

 

That said, I'm a 1.5 out of 10 on the linux noob scale, so perhaps I should stick with the GUI for the sake of simplicity.

 

Ogi

 

I am about in the same boat  :-)

 

I play with a distro or two now and than but need a lot of help.

 

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Ok so step 3 right there ... that might need some more explanation?  Or is it pretty easy to do? 

 

I'm not jonesing for it myself right now because I'm a bit away from using your guide.  I've just dipped my toe in the water last night by installing virtual box on my win-7 machine and creating my first VM with Fedora.  Beyond my learning curve I also need to buy a new m/b that supports iommu.

 

And in case it isn't clear, thanks for putting this together.  Reading through it this morning all seemed to make sense until I got to the part where I thought magic just happened :)

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