[virt-tools-list] how to virtualize an ancient 2.2 kernel

[Stefan G. Weichinger]

Greetings,

I subscribed to this list today because I currently face issues with a
VM and I am not yet able to solve these issues by myself.

At first I posted to the list "libvirt-users at redhat.com", you can read
that thread at

http://www.spinics.net/linux/fedora/libvirt-users/msg03556.html

-

I continued testing today and think it has to do with the IO-stuff:
copying files within the guest sometimes takes very long time ... it
seems as if the communication guest to host somehow breaks.

Right now I use the VM listed in the end of this mail.

I switched from using LVM-volumes to raw-files now, just to check
things. It didn't change things.

The guest is an ancient Suse Linux 6.1 on a 2.2.5 kernel.
I have to stay with this to provide an environment for a specific
software (just let's say this is a given fact ...).

This very guest runs without these performance hickups on a VMware
Server 2.0 ... I want to migrate from there to improve performance and
get rid of that unsupported VMware-Server.


My questions:

What is the recommended config for a VM hosting such a kernel?

What to chose at setup time, what CPU, what IO-caching strategy, etc ...

Is my choice of "arch" and "cpu" ok or might the current setup lead to
that erratic behavior?

Right now I run on the host:

gentoo linux 64 bit, Kernel 3.6.1
qemu-kvm-1.1.1-r1
libvirt-0.9.13-r1

For sure, KVM is compiled into the kernel ... and I took care of stuff
like RTC, high res timers etc.

I would appreciate any feedback on this issue!

Thanks in advance, Stefan

-- VM config now -->

<domain type='kvm'>
  <name>linux4</name>
  <uuid>f1ac2054-10a1-d16a-da76-c1c5bf2fba2e</uuid>
  <memory unit='KiB'>1048576</memory>
  <currentMemory unit='KiB'>1048576</currentMemory>
  <vcpu placement='static'>2</vcpu>
  <os>
    <type arch='x86_64' machine='pc-1.1'>hvm</type>
    <boot dev='hd'/>
  </os>
  <features>
    <acpi/>
    <apic/>
    <pae/>
  </features>
  <cpu mode='custom' match='exact'>
    <model fallback='allow'>kvm32</model>
  </cpu>
  <clock offset='localtime'/>
  <on_poweroff>destroy</on_poweroff>
  <on_reboot>restart</on_reboot>
  <on_crash>restart</on_crash>
  <devices>
    <emulator>/usr/bin/qemu-kvm</emulator>
    <disk type='file' device='disk'>
      <driver name='qemu' type='raw' cache='none'/>
      <source file='/mnt/kvm_storage/hda.raw'/>
      <target dev='hda' bus='ide'/>
      <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='0' target='0' unit='0'/>
    </disk>
    <disk type='file' device='disk'>
      <driver name='qemu' type='raw' cache='none'/>
      <source file='/mnt/kvm_storage/hdb.raw'/>
      <target dev='hdb' bus='ide'/>
      <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='0' target='0' unit='1'/>
    </disk>
    <controller type='usb' index='0'>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x01'
function='0x2'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='ide' index='0'>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x01'
function='0x1'/>
    </controller>
    <interface type='bridge'>
      <mac address='52:54:00:3e:0d:ef'/>
      <source bridge='br0'/>
      <model type='pcnet'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x03'
function='0x0'/>
    </interface>
    <serial type='pty'>
      <target port='0'/>
    </serial>
    <console type='pty'>
      <target type='serial' port='0'/>
    </console>
    <input type='mouse' bus='ps2'/>
    <graphics type='vnc' port='-1' autoport='yes'/>
    <video>
      <model type='cirrus' vram='9216' heads='1'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x02'
function='0x0'/>
    </video>
    <memballoon model='virtio'>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x04'
function='0x0'/>
    </memballoon>
  </devices>
</domain>