Sun X4200 Question...

[Tiernan OToole]

I know this might be the wrong place to ask, but hopefully someone can
point me in the right direction...

I got my hands on a Sun x4200. Its the original one, not the M2, and has 2
single core Opterons, 4Gb RAM and 4 73Gb SAS Disks... But, I dont know what
to install on it... I was thinking of SmartOS, but the site mentions Intel
support for VT, but nothing for AMD... The Opterons dont have VT, so i wont
be using XEN, but the Zones may be useful...

Any advice?

Thanks!

[Bob Friesenhahn]

I know this might be the wrong place to ask, but hopefully someone can point me in the right direction...
I got my hands on a Sun x4200. Its the original one, not the M2, and has 2 single core Opterons, 4Gb RAM and 4 73Gb SAS Disks...
But, I dont know what to install on it... I was thinking of SmartOS, but the site mentions Intel support for VT, but nothing for
AMD... The Opterons dont have VT, so i wont be using XEN, but the Zones may be useful... 

OpenIndiana or OmniOS seem like the most likely candidates.

You can run VirtualBox on OpenIndiana and it should be able to work
without VT extensions.

Bob

[Tiernan OToole]

to tell you the truth, i dont really need the virtualization stuff... Zones
sounds interesting, since it seems to be ligher weight than Xen or anything
like that...


On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 8:50 PM, Bob Friesenhahn <

Post by Tiernan OToole
I know this might be the wrong place to ask, but hopefully someone can

Post by Tiernan OToole
point me in the right direction...
I got my hands on a Sun x4200. Its the original one, not the M2, and has
2 single core Opterons, 4Gb RAM and 4 73Gb SAS Disks...
But, I dont know what to install on it... I was thinking of SmartOS, but
the site mentions Intel support for VT, but nothing for
AMD... The Opterons dont have VT, so i wont be using XEN, but the Zones
may be useful...

OpenIndiana or OmniOS seem like the most likely candidates.
You can run VirtualBox on OpenIndiana and it should be able to work
without VT extensions.
Bob
--
Bob Friesenhahn
users/bfriesen/ <http://www.simplesystems.org/users/bfriesen/>
GraphicsMagick Maintainer, http://www.GraphicsMagick.org/

[Jim Klimov]

Post by Bob Friesenhahn

Post by Tiernan OToole
I know this might be the wrong place to ask, but hopefully someone can
point me in the right direction...
I got my hands on a Sun x4200. Its the original one, not the M2, and
has 2 single core Opterons, 4Gb RAM and 4 73Gb SAS Disks...
But, I dont know what to install on it... I was thinking of SmartOS,
but the site mentions Intel support for VT, but nothing for
AMD... The Opterons dont have VT, so i wont be using XEN, but the
Zones may be useful...

OpenIndiana or OmniOS seem like the most likely candidates.
You can run VirtualBox on OpenIndiana and it should be able to work
without VT extensions.

Also note that without the extensions VirtualBox has some quirks.
Most notably, lack of "acceleration" and support for virtual SMP.
But unlike some other virtualizers, it should work (does work for
us on a Thumper also with pre-VTx Opteron CPUs). However, recently
the VM "virtual hardware" clocks became way slow. I am at loss so
far, the forum was moderately helpful - probably the load on the
host and induced latencies have their role. But the problem does
happen on more modern hardware too, so VTx (lack of) shouldn't be
our reason...

//Jim

[Gary Driggs]

However, recently the VM "virtual hardware" clocks became way slow.

Does NTP help correct the guest's clock?

[Jim Klimov]

Post by Gary Driggs

However, recently the VM "virtual hardware" clocks became way slow.

Does NTP help correct the guest's clock?

Unfortunately no, neither guest NTP, ntpdate or rdate in crontabs,
nor VirtualBox timesync settings, alone or even combined for test
(though known to conflict) - nothing has definitely helped so far.

We also have some setups on rather not-loaded hardware where after
a few days of uptime the clock stalls to the point that it has a
groundhog day - rotating over the same 2-3 second range for hours,
until the VM is powered off and booted.

Conversely, we also have dozens of VMs (and a few hosts) where no
such problems occur. Weird stuff...

//Jim

[Heiko L.]

Post by Tiernan OToole
support for VT, but nothing for AMD... The Opterons dont have VT, so i wont
be using XEN, but the Zones may be useful...

We use XEN/PV on X4200 for many years without problems.
dom0: X4200+openindiana+xvm
guests(PV): openindiana,linux/fedora,linux/debian (vmlinuz-2.6.32.28-xenU-32,vmlinuz-2.6.18-xenU64)


regards Heiko

[Tiernan OToole]

Thanks for the info. I am planning g the install this weekend, between
formula one and other hardware upgrades... fingers crossed it works!

Post by Heiko L.

Post by Tiernan OToole
support for VT, but nothing for AMD... The Opterons dont have VT, so i

wont

Post by Tiernan OToole
be using XEN, but the Zones may be useful...

We use XEN/PV on X4200 for many years without problems.
dom0: X4200+openindiana+xvm
guests(PV): openindiana,linux/fedora,linux/debian
(vmlinuz-2.6.32.28-xenU-32,vmlinuz-2.6.18-xenU64)
regards Heiko
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