Dell™ Solutions Overview Guide for Microsoft® Hyper-V™ w w w. d e l l . c o m | s u p p o r t . d e l l .
Notes and Cautions NOTE: A NOTE indicates important information that helps you make better use of your computer. CAUTION: A CAUTION indicates potential damage to hardware or loss of data if instructions are not followed. ____________________ Information in this document is subject to change without notice. © 2008 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction of these materials in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of Dell Inc. is strictly forbidden.
Contents Microsoft® Windows Server™ 2008 Hyper-V™ Operating System Editions That Support Hyper-V . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Hyper-V Architecture Overview . . . . . 5 . . . . . . 6 . . . . . . . . . . . Hyper-V Virtual Machine Components . 6 . . . . . . 10 . . . . . . . 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Dell Storage Arrays and Enclosures . . . . . . . . 12 Dell Network and Storage Adapters . . . . . . . . 13 . . . . . . . .
Storage Best Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Clustering Best Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 . . . . 24 . . . . . 25 Dell Virtualization Advisor Tool for Hyper-V Appendix A: Integration Services in Hyper-V . Appendix B: Installing Windows Server 2008 on Virtual Machines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 . . . . . . 27 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 Appendix C: Known Issues and Resolutions Appendix D: References .
Microsoft® Windows Server™ 2008 Hyper-V™ Hyper-V is the hypervisor-based virtualization technology from Microsoft that is integrated into all Dell supported Windows Server 2008 x64 Editions operating system. As a virtualization solution, Hyper-V allows a user to take maximum advantage of server hardware by providing the capability to run multiple operating systems (on virtual machines) on a single physical server. Windows Server 2008 introduces the concept of roles within the operating system.
For additional information after completing this document, see the following documents available at www.dell.
partition or parent partition. This root partition hosts the Windows Server 2008 instance that was running on the hardware prior to enabling the Hyper-V role. The root/parent partition is important for two main reasons: • It controls all hardware devices, such as network, storage, and graphics adapters, and is also responsible for physical memory allocation to the partitions. • It requests the hypervisor to create and delete partitions (referred to as child partitions).
Figure 1. Hyper-V High-Level Architecture The indirect I/O model utilized by Hyper-V allows VMs to be independent of the specific type of hardware devices on the physical server (the device drivers for the specific hardware devices are running in the Windows Server 2008 parent partition). This architecture allows Hyper-V to leverage the broad support in Windows Server 2008 for Dell servers, storage, and I/O devices.
high-performance channel called the VMBUS as the communication mechanism between the different partitions. There is less processor overhead when using synthetic devices than when using emulated devices. In general, implementations that reduce overhead and improve guest operating systems in virtual environments are referred to as paravirtualization, and Microsoft refers to such implementations as enlightenments. The synthetic device model is an example of device enlightenment.
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• A VSV file for storing the VM running state during suspend/save operations • A VHD file (virtual hard disk) NOTE: For more information on VHDs and other options for VM disks, see the Dell Storage Solutions Guide for Microsoft Hyper-V at www.dell.com/hyper-v. Supported Guest Operating Systems For a list of supported guest operating systems in Hyper-V, see the Supported Guest OS list at www.microsoft.com/hyper-v.
System Model Processor Socket PowerEdge 1950 I/II/III Intel 2 PowerEdge 2900 I/II/III Intel 2 PowerEdge 2950 I/II/III Intel 2 PowerEdge T605 AMD 2 PowerEdge 1900 Intel 2 PowerEdge 1955 Intel 2 PowerEdge SC1435 AMD 2 PowerEdge R300 Intel 1 Only with Xeon® PowerEdge T300 Intel 1 Only with Xeon PowerEdge R200 Intel 1 Only with Xeon PowerEdge T105 AMD 1 PowerEdge T100 Intel 1 Only with Xeon PowerEdge 1430 Intel 1 Only with Xeon PowerEdge 840 Intel 1 Only with Xe
Models Type Dell | EMC CX300/500/700 Fiber Channel Arrays Dell | EMC AX4-5i/AX4-5F Fiber Channel and iSCSI Arrays Dell | EMC AX150/AX150i Fiber Channel and iSCSI Arrays Dell PowerVault MD3000i iSCSI Storage Array Dell PowerVault™ MD3000 SAS Storage Array Dell PowerVault MD1000 SAS Storage Enclosure Dell PowerVault MD1120 SAS Storage Enclosure For more information on Dell Storage support for Hyper-V, see the Dell Storage Solutions Guide for Microsoft Hyper-V at www.dell.com/hyper-v.
Enabling Hardware-Assisted Virtualization NOTE: By default, hardware-assisted virtualization is enabled on the Dell PowerEdge T105. 1 Press in the POST screen to go to the BIOS setup. 2 Navigate to the CPU Information section. 3 Press and navigate to Virtualization Technology. 4 Select Enabled by toggling the left and right arrow keys. 5 Save the selection and exit the BIOS setup. Upgrading to Hyper-V RTM The RTM version of Windows Server 2008 x64 Editions only has a Beta version of Hyper-V.
6 Do not select a network adapter. The Hyper-V Role Wizard recommends that a network adapter be chosen at this step. However, the name of the virtual network created at this time cannot be changed later and hence will not allow you to configure your system as per Dell's best practices for Hyper-V. For more information, refer to the Dell Networking Solutions Guide for Microsoft Hyper-V at www.dell.com/hyper-v. 7 Follow the instructions on the screen to complete the role installation.
The Hyper-V Manager MMC console is available locally (under Administrative Tools) when the Hyper-V Role is enabled. The Hyper-V Manager MMC console is also available for install as a standalone management console on Windows Server 2008 x86 Editions and Windows Vista to enable remote management of a Hyper-V host. Setting up the standalone Hyper-V Manager console on Windows Server 2008: 1 Install the KB950050 Hyper-V update for Windows Server 2008.
Enabling the Hyper-V Role 1 Ensure that the required hardware features are enabled in the system BIOS. 2 Log on to the Windows Server 2008 x64 Server Core operating system using an account with administrator privileges. 3 Make sure that Hyper-V RTM bits (KB950050 from support.microsoft.com) are downloaded to the Server Core system. Run the command wusa.exe Windows6.0-KB950050-x64.msu /quiet at the command prompt to install the Hyper-V RTM update. When prompted, reboot the system.
2 To rename network adapter names netsh interface set interface name="" newname="" Joining the Server to a Domain 1 At the command prompt, type netdom join %computername% /domain: /userd: /password:* 2 At the command prompt, type shutdown /r /t 0 Before the Server Core system can be managed remotely, certain default security settings have to be changed. Refer to Server Core Installation Option of Windows Server 2008 Step-By-Step Guide at http://technet.microsoft.
peak, average, and low utilization metrics. The information from this virtualization assessment effort will assist in sizing the virtual machines. Dell offers consulting services to assist with these efforts. For a list of Dell PowerEdge servers that are recommended by Dell for hosting virtualization workloads, go to www.dell.com/servers. Processor Considerations Hyper-V is currently supported on systems with up to 24 logical processors.
NOTE: All the current (as of September 2008) shipping Dual-socket and Quadsocket Dell PowerEdge servers meet all of the above processor requirements. If the Hyper-V hosts will be part of a Hyper-V Host Cluster configuration, Dell strongly recommends that all the processors on all the Hyper-V hosts that are part of that configuration be identical. If not, there is a possibility that migrations of virtual machines between Hyper-V hosts will be unsuccessful.
The general guidance on the amount of physical memory is the total of the following: • For the parent partition: 2GB of physical memory is recommended • For each child partition: Amount of physical memory allocated to each VM + 32MB memory overhead for the first 1GB of memory allocated to the VM + 8MB memory overhead for each additional 1GB of memory allocated to a VM If additional virtual machines may possibly migrate (either planned or unplanned) to the server, then memory (per the sizing guidance abo
Figure 2. Sample Dell Hyper-V Deployment Figure 2 shows a typical Dell solution that encompasses the following components: • 22 Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V: Dell PowerEdge servers running Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V. The latest generation Dell PowerEdge servers such as the PowerEdge R905 referenced above were specifically designed to support virtualized workloads such as Hyper-V. For a full list of Dell PowerEdge servers recommended for virtualization, go to www.dell.com/servers.
• Virtual machine storage: To employ such features as Virtual Machine Quick Migration and Virtual Machine High Availability, VMs have to be storage be stored on external storage arrays such as the Dell EqualLogic PS5500 series shown above.
Storage Best Practices Many virtualization features such as Quick Migration, High Availability, and Failover Clustering are dependent on the existence of shared storage among the servers in the virtualized environment. Decisions about how to design and configure storage software and storage hardware affect the performance of virtual machines. For an overview of the storage options available in Hyper-V and Dellsupported solutions, see the Dell Storage Solutions Guide for Microsoft HyperV at www.dell.
Appendix A: Integration Services in Hyper-V As mentioned in the introductory section of this solutions guide, Integration Services are meant to provide better integration between child and parent partitions.
Appendix B: Installing Windows Server 2008 on Virtual Machines A Dell PowerEdge server that was purchased with a factory installation of Windows Server 2008 will include a Dell customized Windows Server 2008 re-installation DVD media. During a re-installation of the operating system using this Dell DVD media on that specific Dell PowerEdge server, the installation wizard does not prompt for a license key.
Appendix C: Known Issues and Resolutions For information about current known issues, see http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/software/ws2k8/en/Hyper-V/IIG.pdf.
Appendix D: References • 28 Dell Solutions for Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V at www.dell.com/hyper-v – Dell Virtualization Solutions Advisor Tool – Dell Solutions Overview Guide for Hyper-V – Dell Networking Solutions Guide for Hyper-V – Dell Storage Solutions Guide for Hyper-V – Dell Virtualization Reference Architecture for Hyper-V • Hyper-V Getting Started Guide at technet.microsoft.com • Hyper-V Planning and Deployment Guide at download.microsoft.
