On a i7+16Gb+SSD notebook of a my friend I have install Fedora 29 workstation (all work fine! ... thank to all!) and into qemu/kvm/libvirtd via virt-manager I have install a win10pro with all virtio driver (disk, network, ecc..).
After few days my friend say me that the win10 is slow and less efficient than same installation on another PC with VirtualBox. He told me "virtualbox is better and faster"
I have heard this statement in other cases in the past and the only solution (sig!) was to replace qemu with virtualbox.
There is some other solution to optimize qemu/kvm on Fedora to increase the performance for win10 VM?
Someone has some performance comparison between the two virtualization system?
Many thanks
On Tue, 09 Apr 2019 13:51:27 +0200 Dario Lesca wrote:
There is some other solution to optimize qemu/kvm on Fedora to increase the performance for win10 VM?
You should certainly install all the redhat virtual drivers for disks and network if you haven't already:
Il giorno mar, 09/04/2019 alle 09.06 -0400, Tom Horsley ha scritto:
You should certainly install all the redhat virtualdrivers for disks and network if you haven't already: https://www.linux-kvm.org/page/WindowsGuestDrivers
Thank for reply, but when I have install w10 I have mount the virtio- drivers.iso CD
https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/creating-windows-virtual-mac...
and install this virtio driver.
[X] NetKVM/ - Virtio network driver[X] viostor/ - Virtio block driver[ ] vioscsi/ - Virtio Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) driver[ ] viorng/ - Virtio RNG driver[X] vioser/ - Virtio serial driver[X] Balloon/ - Virtio memory balloon driver[ ] qxl/ - QXL graphics driver for Windows 7 and earlier. (build virtio-win-0.1.103-1 and later)[ ] qxldod/ - QXL graphics driver for Windows 8 and later. (build virtio- win-0.1.103-2 and later)[ ] pvpanic/ - QEMU pvpanic device driver (build virtio-win-0.1.103-2 and later)[ ] guest-agent/ - QEMU Guest Agent 32bit and 64bit MSI installers[ ] qemupciserial/ - QEMU PCI serial device driver
is this correct ? or I must install also other drivers?
Thanks
On Tue, 09 Apr 2019 16:51:29 +0200 Dario Lesca wrote:
is this correct ? or I must install also other drivers?
That looks like all the ones I have, so you probably do have about as good performance as you are likely to get (as far as I know anyway, lots of people probably know more about qemu that I do :-).
On 4/9/19 7:51 AM, Dario Lesca wrote:
[ ] qxl/ - QXL graphics driver for Windows 7 and earlier. (build virtio-win-0.1.103-1 and later)
[ ] qxldod/ - QXL graphics driver for Windows 8 and later. (build virtio-win-0.1.103-2 and later)
Why don't you install the graphics drivers? That could definitely cause a slow down.
Il giorno mar, 09/04/2019 alle 13.16 -0700, Samuel Sieb ha scritto:
[ ] qxl/ - QXL graphics driver for Windows 7 and earlier. (build virtio-win-0.1.103-1 and later) [ ] qxldod/ - QXL graphics driver for Windows 8 and later. (build virtio-win-0.1.103-2 and later)
Why don't you install the graphics drivers? That could definitely cause a slow down.
Thank for the suggest, I'll try it.
On Tue, Apr 9, 2019 at 5:52 AM Dario Lesca d.lesca@solinos.it wrote:
There is some other solution to optimize qemu/kvm on Fedora to increase the performance for win10 VM?
I'd like to know as well. I have tried KVM periodically, but the performance is always horrible with Windows VMs, and since having a place to run all that "windows-only" software is my primary reason for using VMs, I have always been forced back to VirtualBox.
--Greg
On 4/9/19 4:51 AM, Dario Lesca wrote:
After few days my friend say me that the win10 is slow and less efficient than same installation on another PC with VirtualBox. He told me "virtualbox is better and faster"
I have heard this statement in other cases in the past and the only solution (sig!) was to replace qemu with virtualbox.
If you can compare them on similar hardware, what specifically is the slowdown? Make sure that the VM configuration is set to create virtio devices and that the Windows virtio drivers are being used.
On Tue, 9 Apr 2019 13:20:05 -0700 Samuel Sieb wrote:
what specifically is the slowdown?
From my highly non-scientific and inexact testing, the virtual disks have better I/O performance in virtualbox and in vmware. Since qemu has 47 gazillion different format virtual disks, I have no idea which one is the best performance (raw, qcow2, something else?)
Also, there is no 3D graphics support in the video driver (though I see a mysterious checkbox in the latest virt-manager that says something about 3D and has a warning triangle next to it). So if the windows program you are running is willing to fall back to pure software 3D, the performance will be dreadful (though windows programs I've tried have simply refused to run without hardware 3D).
On Tue, 2019-04-09 at 16:41 -0400, Tom Horsley wrote:
On Tue, 9 Apr 2019 13:20:05 -0700 Samuel Sieb wrote:
what specifically is the slowdown?
From my highly non-scientific and inexact testing, the virtual disks have better I/O performance in virtualbox and in vmware. Since qemu has 47 gazillion different format virtual disks, I have no idea which one is the best performance (raw, qcow2, something else?)
Also, there is no 3D graphics support in the video driver (though I see a mysterious checkbox in the latest virt-manager that says something about 3D and has a warning triangle next to it). So if the windows program you are running is willing to fall back to pure software 3D, the performance will be dreadful (though windows programs I've tried have simply refused to run without hardware 3D).
The problem with 3D support is essentially that you need to use the proprietary Windows drivers with direct access to the GPU (because GPUs themselves aren't virtualizable). There is a way round it using VFIO and video passthrough (I use it for gaming) but it requires a lot of setup and depends on your specific hardware, BIOS and chipset.
poc
On 4/9/19 1:41 PM, Tom Horsley wrote:
On Tue, 9 Apr 2019 13:20:05 -0700 Samuel Sieb wrote:
what specifically is the slowdown?
From my highly non-scientific and inexact testing, the virtual disks have better I/O performance in virtualbox and in vmware. Since qemu has 47 gazillion different format virtual disks, I have no idea which one is the best performance (raw, qcow2, something else?)
That should only matter if you're doing something disk intensive. I used Windows 7 in a VM a while back and didn't have any issues with it. I wasn't doing anything that required a lot of performance though.
Also, there is no 3D graphics support in the video driver (though I see a mysterious checkbox in the latest virt-manager that says something about 3D and has a warning triangle next to it). So if the windows program you are running is willing to fall back to pure software 3D, the performance will be dreadful (though windows programs I've tried have simply refused to run without hardware 3D).
I think the only 3D support is if the guest is Linux with the 3D virtio driver.
On 4/10/19 8:18 AM, Dario Lesca wrote:
Il giorno mar, 09/04/2019 alle 19.53 -0700, Gordon Messmer ha scritto:
Can you post the content of /etc/libvirt/qemu/<your windows vm>.xml?
see attach.
It looks like this host is using virtio drivers for disk and network, and that's usually the important bits. It's possible that qcow2 on a journaled drive is slower than expected. I typically use LVM block devices to minimize overhead. I'm not sure how much difference that'll make.
Is the user interfacing with the VM through virt-manager, or over RDP? My experience has been that, although Spice is better than VNC, interfacing with the virtual console is noticeably less responsive than RDP.
Il giorno mar, 23/04/2019 alle 21.39 -0700, Gordon Messmer ha scritto:
Is the user interfacing with the VM through virt-manager, or over RDP? My experience has been that, although Spice is better than VNC, interfacing with the virtual console is noticeably less responsive than RDP.
My friend use virt-manager spice console, and the drive is a 7.2 rpm disk ext4 parted (no LVM) ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: MQ04ABF100 size: 931.51 GiB [alb@vivobook-pro ~]$ df -T /virt/win10.qcow2File system Tipo 1K- blocchi Usati Disponib. Uso% Montato su/dev/sda2 ext4 337375272 120006960 200160916 38% /virt Then, I will recommend my friend to use RDP Thanks
On Wed, 2019-04-24 at 11:07 +0200, Dario Lesca wrote:
Il giorno mar, 23/04/2019 alle 21.39 -0700, Gordon Messmer ha scritto:
Is the user interfacing with the VM through virt-manager, or over RDP? My experience has been that, although Spice is better than VNC, interfacing with the virtual console is noticeably less responsive than RDP.
My friend use virt-manager spice console, and the drive is a 7.2 rpm disk ext4 parted (no LVM) ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: MQ04ABF100 size: 931.51 GiB [alb@vivobook-pro ~]$ df -T /virt/win10.qcow2File system Tipo 1K- blocchi Usati Disponib. Uso% Montato su/dev/sda2 ext4 337375272 120006960 200160916 38% /virt Then, I will recommend my friend to use RDP Thanks
You haven't said which version of Win10 your friend has, but note that RDP requires at least Win10 Pro.
poc
On 4/9/19 4:51 AM, Dario Lesca wrote:
On a i7+16Gb+SSD notebook of a my friend I have install Fedora 29 workstation (all work fine! ... thank to all!) and into qemu/kvm/libvirtd via virt-manager I have install a win10pro with all virtio driver (disk, network, ecc..).
After few days my friend say me that the win10 is slow and less efficient than same installation on another PC with VirtualBox. He told me "virtualbox is better and faster"
I have heard this statement in other cases in the past and the only solution (sig!) was to replace qemu with virtualbox.
There is some other solution to optimize qemu/kvm on Fedora to increase the performance for win10 VM?
Someone has some performance comparison between the two virtualization system?
Many thanks
--
Dario Lesca (inviato dal mio Linux Fedora 29 Workstation)
Hi Dario,
Keep in mind that Windows 10 runs at about 1/2 the speed that Fedora runs at. No fooling. Windows 10 is a dog. If you were to install Windows 10 natively on your machine it would only run about 10% faster than it does in qemu-kvm. KVM (Kernel Virtual Machine) is know for its performance as it works at the kernel level.
So, unless you really goofed up your VM's configuration, the problem is going to be Windows 10 itself. I will attach my Windows 10 XML file at the end of this letter:
Here are some sites for speeding up Windows 10:
https://fossbytes.com/speed-up-windows-performance-tips/
https://www.cnet.com/news/black-hole-picture-revealed-first-look-from-across...
HTH, -T
Oh wow. I managed to get through this entire letter without calling it Windows Nein. Opps, I just did. Rats!
<!-- WARNING: THIS IS AN AUTO-GENERATED FILE. CHANGES TO IT ARE LIKELY TO BE OVERWRITTEN AND LOST. Changes to this xml configuration should be made using: virsh edit KVM-W10 or other application using the libvirt API. -->
<domain type='kvm'> <name>KVM-W10</name> <uuid>08acc96b-e96d-4ab7-afd0-6d6f25c6a731</uuid> <memory unit='KiB'>4194304</memory> <currentMemory unit='KiB'>4194304</currentMemory> <vcpu placement='static'>2</vcpu> <os> <type arch='x86_64' machine='pc-i440fx-2.10'>hvm</type> </os> <features> <acpi/> <apic/> <hyperv> <relaxed state='on'/> <vapic state='on'/> <spinlocks state='on' retries='8191'/> </hyperv> <vmport state='off'/> </features> <cpu mode='custom' match='exact' check='partial'> <model fallback='allow'>Nehalem</model> </cpu> <clock offset='localtime'> <timer name='rtc' tickpolicy='catchup'/> <timer name='pit' tickpolicy='delay'/> <timer name='hpet' present='no'/> <timer name='hypervclock' present='yes'/> </clock> <on_poweroff>destroy</on_poweroff> <on_reboot>restart</on_reboot> <on_crash>destroy</on_crash> <pm> <suspend-to-mem enabled='no'/> <suspend-to-disk enabled='no'/> </pm> <devices> <emulator>/usr/bin/qemu-kvm</emulator> <disk type='file' device='disk'> <driver name='qemu' type='raw'/> <source file='/home/kvm/KVM-W10.img'/> <target dev='hda' bus='ide'/> <boot order='2'/> <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='0' target='0' unit='0'/> </disk> <disk type='file' device='cdrom'> <driver name='qemu' type='raw'/> <source file='/home/kvm/Win10_1809_English_x64.iso'/> <target dev='sda' bus='sata'/> <readonly/> <boot order='1'/> <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='0' target='0' unit='0'/> </disk> <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-ehci1'> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x05' function='0x7'/> </controller> <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-uhci1'> <master startport='0'/> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x05' function='0x0' multifunction='on'/> </controller> <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-uhci2'> <master startport='2'/> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x05' function='0x1'/> </controller> <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-uhci3'> <master startport='4'/> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x05' function='0x2'/> </controller> <controller type='pci' index='0' model='pci-root'/> <controller type='ide' index='0'> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x01' function='0x1'/> </controller> <controller type='virtio-serial' index='0'> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x06' function='0x0'/> </controller> <controller type='sata' index='0'> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x04' function='0x0'/> </controller> <interface type='bridge'> <mac address='52:54:00:37:3e:30'/> <source bridge='br0'/> <model type='rtl8139'/> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x03' function='0x0'/> </interface> <serial type='pty'> <target type='isa-serial' port='0'> <model name='isa-serial'/> </target> </serial> <console type='pty'> <target type='serial' port='0'/> </console> <channel type='spicevmc'> <target type='virtio' name='com.redhat.spice.0'/> <address type='virtio-serial' controller='0' bus='0' port='1'/> </channel> <input type='tablet' bus='usb'> <address type='usb' bus='0' port='1'/> </input> <input type='mouse' bus='ps2'/> <input type='keyboard' bus='ps2'/> <graphics type='spice' port='5906' autoport='no'> <listen type='address'/> <image compression='off'/> </graphics> <video> <model type='qxl' ram='65536' vram='65536' vgamem='16384' heads='1' primary='yes'/> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x02' function='0x0'/> </video> <redirdev bus='usb' type='spicevmc'> <address type='usb' bus='0' port='2'/> </redirdev> <redirdev bus='usb' type='spicevmc'> <address type='usb' bus='0' port='3'/> </redirdev> <redirdev bus='usb' type='spicevmc'> <address type='usb' bus='0' port='4'/> </redirdev> <memballoon model='virtio'> <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x07' function='0x0'/> </memballoon> </devices> </domain>
Dario Lesca wrote:
On a i7+16Gb+SSD notebook of a my friend I have install Fedora 29 workstation (all work fine! ... thank to all!) and into qemu/kvm/libvirtd via virt-manager I have install a win10pro with all virtio driver (disk, network, ecc..).
After few days my friend say me that the win10 is slow and less efficient than same installation on another PC with VirtualBox. He told me "virtualbox is better and faster"
I have heard this statement in other cases in the past and the only solution (sig!) was to replace qemu with virtualbox.
There is some other solution to optimize qemu/kvm on Fedora to increase the performance for win10 VM?
Use virtio drivers?
https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/creating-windows-virtual-mac...
-- Rex
On Thu, 2019-04-11 at 08:26 -0500, Rex Dieter wrote:
Dario Lesca wrote:
On a i7+16Gb+SSD notebook of a my friend I have install Fedora 29 workstation (all work fine! ... thank to all!) and into qemu/kvm/libvirtd via virt-manager I have install a win10pro with all virtio driver (disk, network, ecc..).
After few days my friend say me that the win10 is slow and less efficient than same installation on another PC with VirtualBox. He told me "virtualbox is better and faster"
I have heard this statement in other cases in the past and the only solution (sig!) was to replace qemu with virtualbox.
There is some other solution to optimize qemu/kvm on Fedora to increase the performance for win10 VM?
Use virtio drivers?
https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/quick-docs/creating-windows-virtual-mac...
The OP says he's using virtio drivers.
opoc
On Tue, Apr 9, 2019 at 5:52 AM Dario Lesca d.lesca@solinos.it wrote:
On a i7+16Gb+SSD notebook of a my friend I have install Fedora 29 workstation (all work fine! ... thank to all!) and into qemu/kvm/libvirtd via virt-manager I have install a win10pro with all virtio driver (disk, network, ecc..).
After few days my friend say me that the win10 is slow and less efficient than same installation on another PC with VirtualBox. He told me "virtualbox is better and faster"
What backing storage is the VM using? qcow2, raw, LVM? If it's a file, what filesystem is it on?
It's worth experimenting with the virtio disk "cache mode" setting, in virt-manager under advanced > performance options. I use unsafe, which is bad advice to give because it really is not safe if there's a crash, good chance the guest filesystem is toast. But it's a lot faster. And I consider my VM's throwaway. There may be another cache setting that's not so dangerous but also doesn't penalize like the default. I think what you want is cache=writeback if it's a file, and cache=none if it's LVM. I would say test both and pick the one with better performance.
https://doc.opensuse.org/documentation/leap/virtualization/html/book.virt/ch...
Note that some of the cache modes must be paired with a specific IO mode, e.g. unsafe only works with threads.
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Chris Murphy -
Dario Lesca -
Gordon Messmer -
Greg Woods -
Patrick O'Callaghan -
Rex Dieter -
Samuel Sieb -
ToddAndMargo -
Tom Horsley