KVM in Linux 2.6.20

[Michael]

For those living under a rock that haven't heard about the kernel virtual machine in Linux 2.6.20, in early January Phoronix will be offering a first look at KVM in the Linux 2.6.20 release candidate. Some of the possibilities being thrown around at this time include a comparison against Xen and/or a comparison on different Intel and AMD processors with their virtualization technologies.

Feel free to voice your thoughts on what you would like to see.

KVM Reading: http://kvm.sourceforge.net/

[Michael]

For only being a release candidate the Linux 2.6.20 kernel has already generated quite a bit of attention. On top of adding asynchronous SCSI scanning, multi-threaded USB probing, and many driver updates, the Linux 2.6.20 kernel will include a full virtualization solution. Kernel-based Virtual Machine is a GPL software project that has been developed and sponsored by Qumranet. In this article we are offering a brief overview of the Kernel-based Virtual Machine for Linux as well as offering up in-house performance numbers as we compare KVM to other virtualization solutions such as QEMU Accelerator and Xen.

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=8410

Digg Link: http://www.digg.com/linux_unix/Linux_KVM_Virtualization_Performance

[linportal]

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=8410

Digg Link: http://www.digg.com/linux_unix/Linux_KVM_Virtualization_Performance

Nice article, Michael, thank you!

For those who would like to see how Windows XP performs under KVM, check recently published article at http://www.linuxinsight.com/finally-user-friendly-virtualization-for-linux.html

And, BTW, 2.6.20-rc3 has a serious bug in the CFQ I/O elevator, it doesn't merge read requests at all, so disk is very slow! It has been fixed slightly after rc3 came out, so rc4 should be okay...

[svebru]

Hi, I'm a Swedish IT journalist. I read Michael's article about KVM and is interested in more opinions about KVM, especially from Swedish users. What do you think about KVM in comparison to Xen and VMware's and Microsofts efforts in the field? What's the potential for KVM?

[Thund]

Any chance of getting a VMware run included? I'd do it myself but I lack a AM2 or 775 socket to check it.

[Michael]

Any chance of getting a VMware run included? I'd do it myself but I lack a AM2 or 775 socket to check it.

It's on the long TODO list.