[Fedora-xen] Paravirtualization - Fedora-XEN - run windows

[Pasi Kärkkäinen]

On Tue, Sep 22, 2009 at 11:25:32PM +0800, Lolo Andrew wrote:
> Dear Expert
> 
> Got any release of Fedora-Xen that can support windows on
> paravirtualization.
>

Windows doesn't really support Xen paravirtualization. You can run
Windows only as Xen HVM (fully virtualized) guest.

> if I wanna to customized the existing feature, what direction should i go,
> to install to or make windows 32bit be able to run stable on bare Fedora-xen
> based bare metal machine?
> 

First of all you need to get the Xen dom0 (host) running. Fedora 11 (and
Fedora 12 rawhide) contains Xen rpms what will work, but you need xen
enabled dom0 kernel in addition to that - dom0 kernel is not included in
fedora atm.

Take a look at for more information about missing dom0 kernel, and where
to find beta rpms to try: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/XenPvopsDom0

> Like kernel, driver over the windows side, any many more, rather than having
> a enterprise solution
> 

You might want to run GPLPV drivers in Windows to boost disk/net
performance.

> I still newbie, I would like to have expert advice and opinion to make it be
> possible.
> 

First I recommend you to setup your dom0/host, and make sure you're able
to run Linux PV (paravirtual) guests. 

1) Install Fedora 11 (or even better, Fedora 12 rawhide) on the host
2) Install xen rpms
3) Install or compile Xen dom0 kernel
4) Boot into Xen
5) Make sure you're able to run and install Linux PV (Fedora/RHEL/CentOS)
guests using virt-install and/or virt-manager

Then after that go for running HVM windows guests.

-- Pasi