I was previously running Pop!_OS (22.04) on my desktop machine, and used Oracle Virtualbox with a bunch of VMs (mostly other Linux distros - but also a Windows server and FreeBSD)…
Now have a fresh install of Ubuntu 24.04 (Gnome 46)…
I don’t want to go the VirtualBox route this time around. I’d like something closer to my kernel - i.e. more “native”…
I see there’s “virt-manager” and also Gnome-Boxes.. What other ones? Looking for recommendations… I don’t want to start off cold with CLI deployment of guests…
I would like to get my head around CLI management of KVM - but - would prefer a GUI frontend to kick-off a few VMs to get started… Probably mostly Red Hat (VMs) as that’s about 90% of my job (Red Hat Linux 8 and 9)…
– edit –
CRAP! Just checked my CPU and it’s not currently supporting KVM…
I know why that is too - had to reset my UEFI / BIOS couple weeks back to change boot order / detection - and this CRAP BIOS for this pretty crap MOBO - calls AMD Virtualization “svm” (I think?). I’ll never get another MSI mobo ever again - garbage BIOS - feels like child’s toy - and you pretty much can’t drive the BIOS without a f–king mouse - that’s a joke! That’s not “pro”!
Anyway - the CPU flags set when I cat /proc/cpuinfo - shows “smv_lock” and :
╭─x@titanii ~/Videos/Movies/1982-Koyaanisqatsi
╰─➤ sudo kvm-ok 127 ↵
INFO: Your CPU does not support KVM extensions
KVM acceleration can NOT be used
Pezzo di merda!
Next time I get a mobo - I reckon I’ll go back to Asus… What was wrong with a text based BIOS interface?
– edit 2 –
Shutdown…
Bios :
OC Explore Mode (Expert) > CPU Features > Enable SVM Mode
The useless sods have buried it three layers deep - and just WTF does amdv / svm have to do with fecking OverClocking? BUGGER ALL!
Anyway - my machine now passes “muster” :
╭─x@titanii ~/MPZ/ENO-Brian
╰─➤ sudo kvm-ok
INFO: /dev/kvm exists
KVM acceleration can be used
Yes, Boxes is fine for trying a distro.
If you want to use a VM permanently, and maybe login to it remotely and share files, or connect to hardware, I think you need virt-manager.
There is another option called distrobox, which is more like a container than a VM.
You can run VMs and containers. I’ve used Boxes a bit and had pretty good luck too.
Another Ubuntu thing is MicroCloud. Maybe that’s the one that will do both VMs and containers. It uses LXD as a backend.
One thing I like about both of these is they install via Snap. That should mean an easy install and a clean uninstall that doesn’t affect anything else after evaluation.
There’s a port of virt-manager to MacOs too… So I can install / configure VMs from my Linux desktop - and manage / tweak from MacOs too…
I can remember using virt-manager some 10 or so years ago when I got fed up of VirtualBox… bit more of a learning curve… But I don’t need to know VirtualBox for my job… I do need to know a bit more about KVM, virt-manager, and especially “virsh” for my job… I can do all this on my home system…
Red Hat have a management UI for their enterprise KVM solution… I looked at it once - looks/feels more like VMware than virt-manager…
I do also need to know about VMware / ESX for my job - don’t really have the infrastructure for that - and - Broadcom (talk about the shittiest of the enshittifiers) have pretty much destroyed that ecosystem for home lab users…
Not really interested in LXD - I’ve looked at that before - before “docker” became all the rage… But thanks for the suggestion…
So - I’ll probably go for virt-manager to get started - and then get my head around virsh and qemu…
I’m already kinda/sorta using QEMU via the UTM app on MacOS - but that also takes all the heavy lifting from you…
Broadcom has reinstated the free version of ESXi. We still run the licensed version that never expires. Can’t get any updates without $$$. For a lab, I purchased a Dell precision workstation (with supported CPU) on eBay for about $300. Running ESXi 8u03, Dell specific. Have 8 virtual machines on it but only run 3 or 4 at a time. Use Veeam to backup images to TrueNAS running on another re-purposed workstation. Turn on, backup, and turn off.
OK - just done my first VM (Ubuntu 24.04.3 desktop) in KVM using virt-manager (I’ve done it before - but quite a few years ago now)…
But - I’m wanting to do bridged adaptor - which is reasonably straightforward with VirtualBox (but even so - something so simple still stumps casual new users - like the ephemeral floods of Kali users trying to get their Kali VM on their LAN) - seems not so simple with KVM…
Hmmm - I might persevere with NAT in KVM / virt-manager for the time being…
Trying out an install of RHEL 9 now…
Just tried emulating aarch64 and an emulated Pi3 - and it complained about ACPI - so I switched back to x86_64… still got a fair bit to learn about QEMU I guess… I’ve emulated x86, Sparc and PPC in QEMU in UTM on my M1 MacBooks (i.e. on aarch64 MacOS).
In “virt-manager”… So - is that virsh sitting behind it? So not directly… But in UTM on MacOS - it’s seems better integrated with QEMU than virt-manager…
Here’s what I LOVE about virt-manager - e.g. I’m running RHEL9 with Gnome 40, and, in a terminal - the X select buffer works inside, and outside… So - I can paste from my desktop machine, into a terminal window in a Linux guest… virtualbox can’t do that (not in all my testing anyway). Or I can select a string of text in my guest’s terminal window - and - paste into a browser on my desktop machine…
The other thing I like about virt-manager - you can opt to see the xml it will generate… that’s a pretty neat learning tool!
But - here’s the deal with RHEL9… by default it doesn’t have an NFS client installed (for that matter neither does Ubuntu)… but getting one installed in RHEL proved “thorny”… I kept scp’ing RPM files from the DVD - and finding yet more dependancies… Gave up… setup subscription manager and licensed it with my developer license and was able to install nfs-utils and dependancies from RHN CDN repos (only works if legitimately subscribed)… i.e. RHEL9 doesn’t connect to any repos (I know a way to make it use the DVD ISO image as a software repo - but - getting 9 GB of ISO image onto a small VM not always feasible - and not via NFS as I don’t have a client installed! Vicious circle…)
The thing that bridge networked will get me - is ability to SSH to a KVM VM from outside of my hypervisor machine… I guess I could setup ProxyJump SSH config but that’s too much messing around…
One thing I did notice - on this Ubuntu desktop machine running KVM with virt-manager installed - I didn’t even have bridge-manager insalled… but I’m still no nearer to getting bridged network adapter working in kvm / virsh… it’s not a biggie… But I’d kinda like the luxury of being able to directly SSH to a VM hosted on another machine - and - managing stuff like ResilioSync client remotely - probably not possible or viable with NAT (e.g. I don’t think setting up a static route is the answer either!). I’ve setup my main LAN with a /14 CIDR… I’d rather just use something in that vast space…
Also - one of the dumbest pages I’ve come across in a while :
i.e. you can install a gnome extension if you know the UUID - but - HOW DO YOU FIND THAT OUT??? Dumb!
– edit –
dumb as in it doesn’t even have a link to page where you can get the UUID from - what’s the point of the page?
That seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to do. If you can’t get a bridged network running, you could use Tailscale. It seems like the long way around to setup a VPN to SSH to a VM running on your network, but it would work.
I know I’m not as schooled as you guys are but ssh is how I am building LFS. Most times I just use the host machine that has my VirtualBox LFS on, but I have also used ssh from my Gentoo and my other Windows machine. With the help of a script from copilot, I finally got mesa compiled, via ssh!!!
