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nzmaa ,

VMware, Virtualbox for OSes that hate VMware, and Qemu for emulating OSes that only run on obscure platforms.

data1701d ,
@data1701d@startrek.website avatar

Qemu/KVM and Virt Manager. I have three VMs that I pass my GPU to: a Hackintosh, a Windows 10, and and Windows 7.

teawrecks ,

Do you have two GPUs or do you fully switch to the VM while passed through?

data1701d ,
@data1701d@startrek.website avatar

I have two GPUs - an RX 550 hooked to the monitors and 580 for VMs. Until recently, once the VM shut down, the 580 was able to return to Linux and be used again via PRIME - no reset bug. It randomly stopped working and I’ve tried to debug it to fix the problem to little avail.

teawrecks ,

I actually may have seen the same issue recently. Have you tried adding initcall_blacklist=simpledrm_platform_driver_init to your kernel launch params?

data1701d ,
@data1701d@startrek.website avatar

I’ll have to try that. What I have tried so far is running a different kernel version and making sure my driver blacklists are correct (I found that the GPU shouldn’t ever connect to snd_hda_intel. It briefly eas again, but after fixing it, I still had the problem.).

teawrecks ,

For me, I have intel integrated + amd discrete. When I tried to set DRI_PRIME to 0 it complained that 0 was invalid, when I set it to 2 it said it had to be less than the number of GPUs detected (2). After digging in I noticed my cards in /dev/dri/by-path were card1 card2 rather than 0 and 1 like everyone online said they should be. Searching for that I found a few threads like this one that mentioned simpledrm was enabled by default in 6.4.8, which apparently broke some kind of enumeration with amd GPUs. I don’t really understand why, but setting that param made my cards number correctly, and prime selection works again.

data1701d ,
@data1701d@startrek.website avatar

Huh. My issue seems different, but I’ll still test that flag to see if it changes anything. My problem looks like the device doesn’t return to host after VM shutdown, possibly because of the reset bug (based on my observation of dmesg), which I hadn’t encountered after about a year of GPU passthrough VM usage.

teawrecks ,

Ahh, yeah if it’s specifically when coming back from a VM, that sounds different. Maybe the vfio_pci driver isn’t getting swapped back to the real one? I barely know how it works, I’m sure you’ve checked everything.

possiblylinux127 ,

I hope you air gap that Windows 7 VM

eugenia ,
@eugenia@lemmy.ml avatar

I never found a way to share a Public folder with VirtManager though, I need to move files between host and guest. How would you go about it?

wildbus8979 ,

Install the quemu guest agent in the VM. For Linux and Windows you’ll even be able to drag and drop.

data1701d ,
@data1701d@startrek.website avatar

I go to the host folder I want to transfer files from and run ‘’’python3 -m http.server’’’. Then (I can’t remove if I use ‘’’ip a’’’ to find the IP address of the host or if I used mDNS), I use the guest web browser to download files.

D_Air1 ,
@D_Air1@lemmy.ml avatar

And here I have just been using samba.

nickb333 ,
@nickb333@fedia.io avatar

If I'm running another Linux distro that will be happy under the host kernel then I use LXD (or Incus) containers. Otherwise it's QEMU+KVM or occasionally Virtual Box.

QuazarOmega ,

I use LXD (or Incus) containers

I’ve been curious about those for a while, what are they about, are they somehow better than the usual Docker/Podman conatiners?

nickb333 ,
@nickb333@fedia.io avatar

They run a full distro rather than the minimalist that Docker containers use. You can also use them to run gui apps but that needs a bit more work to configure. I run Google Chrome sandboxed this way.

cizra ,
@cizra@lemm.ee avatar

I’m using systemd-nspawn or Bubblewrap, depending on the scenario.

possiblylinux127 ,

Those are container platforms not virtualization

cizra ,
@cizra@lemm.ee avatar

Yep. I found I don’t have much use for a full-blown VM, whereas there’s plenty of argument for isolating my browser from ~/.ssh/id_*.

nyan ,

Raw qemu at the command line for the one I use on a daily basis (not recommended for the average user). VirtualBox if I need to spin something up quickly but don’t expect to need to keep it past the current testing cycle.

possiblylinux127 ,

Virtualbox is slow and the licensing for guest addons is nasty. It is proprietary of course and if a person in a company uses it unlicensed they will send the company a massive invoice.

nyan ,

I only need it for the very occasional testing of open-source software on Windows, using the precanned VM images provided by Microsoft (last I checked, they had none for qemu, or I would be using that instead). And if you’re using software commercially, you’d better be damned sure you understand the licensing before setting up. A company of any size will have lawyers vetting that anyway.

In other words, I don’t disagree with you, but those issues don’t matter for my use case.

wildbus8979 ,

Virt-Manager, even works remotely via SSH.

IsoSpandy ,

Virtmanger-kvm-qemu

velox_vulnus ,

You can run a system as a VM on Guix, so yes, that. It’s a type-2 hypervisor, as it uses QEMU. Pretty sure this also works for NixOS.

possiblylinux127 ,

Qemu can be a type I as well if you use hardware acceleration such as KVM or Hyper-V.

Rick_C137 ,
@Rick_C137@programming.dev avatar

Proxmox seem powerfull

It’s a Type1, not Type2
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypervisor#Classification

hperrin ,

I use Proxmox for the machine that I use to download all of the Linux ISOs I want. You know, with a VPN, through BitTorrent. Linux ISOs.

sfera ,

Thanks for the pointer. But since Proxmox supports both KVM and LXC virtualization, wouldn’t that make it both type 1 and type 2?

possiblylinux127 ,

Proxmox isn’t really its own hypervisor. It combines a few common projects to make a OS. It is pretty much KVM with corosync for clustering.

With that being said it is a solid platform. Just keep in mind it is just standard Linux virtualization and for single nodes you can get the exact same setup easily on any Linux system.

princessnorah ,
@princessnorah@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Well, the exact same except for the frontend. It’s arguably better than virt-manager imo. I wonder how hard it would be to get pve-manager running outside the OS.

possiblylinux127 ,

You absolutely can. People have done Proxmox installs on Debian and unsupported architectures by building from source.

fmstrat ,

I used KVM with virt-manager for a long time. Even ran a gaming VM with GPU pass-through.

Then I created a Docker image with Linux, Gnome, and novnc so I can spin one up instantly with little resource overhead and control it from any web browser.

frankenswine ,

control it from any whuAT!?

TheGrandNagus , (edited )

Gnome boxes.

Based on QEMU+KVM so it’s quite robust. It works pretty well, plus it has various little features working out of the box that in some other software is a pain in the arse to configure.

Sticks out a bit on my system due to still being GTK3, but there is a GTK4 prototype out that usually works well.

E: downvoting anybody who says Gnome Boxes because you use a different virtual machine frontend is laughably pathetic lmao. Some people in the Linux community are such losers lol

nickb333 ,
@nickb333@fedia.io avatar

Does it matter what front end it uses if the underlying environment is QEMU+KVM.
Upvote for tha above.

possiblylinux127 ,

It doesn’t work for all cases and it is annoying that you have to wait until creation to change CPU count.

MrCamel999 ,
@MrCamel999@programming.dev avatar

I use virt-manager, aka Virtual Machine Manager. Using this specifically because of the winapps for Linux repo has instructions on how to get Windows apps to run through the VM to be integrated in a Linux environment.

Mwa OP ,
@Mwa@thelemmy.club avatar

might try that tbh am gonna run razer software or apps that dont work on linux at all and for games am gonna use my windows ssd

CosmicTurtle0 ,

How “scriptable” is virt-manager?

My biggest issue with VirtualBox is that I have to install OSes as if I’m actually installing them. There aren’t any images (at least that I’m aware of) that can run with a command, like deploying an EC2.

skullgiver ,
@skullgiver@popplesburger.hilciferous.nl avatar

virt-manager is a frontend for a bunch of virtualisation systems, but usually it’s configured for qemu+kvm+libvirt.

Libvirt is a dedicated API to managing virtual machines. It’s probably most versatile when launching new VMs on it by using the libvirt XML definitions, but there’s an API you can use if you want more low level access, and optional command line tooling as well.

Something like virt-install --name=lemmyvm --vcpus=1 --memory=2048 --cdrom=/tmp/debian-netinst.iso --disk size=50 --os-variant=debian12 should automatically install a Debian 12 VM (from a downloaded ISO) through the automated setup process. It’s been a while since I used that, though, so you may need an extra step or two to get the setup to autocomplete today. I think cloudinit is how you auto setup Linux distros these days?

stsquad ,

Virt-manager isn’t super scriptable but the underlying libvirt can be controlled by virsh which is a shell interface to libvirt. You can use both at the same time, e.g. start and stop via virsh and access to gui container via virt-manager/virt-viewer.

possiblylinux127 ,

Virtual manager isn’t scriptable at all as it is just a GUI for libvirt. You are probably looking for qemu or virsh (libvirt)

lnxtx ,
@lnxtx@feddit.nl avatar

VirtualBox (desktop for testing and development), KVM: libvirt, Proxmox (production stuff).

possiblylinux127 ,

Just be mindful of guest addons. (The are not foss)

freedomsailor ,
@freedomsailor@programming.dev avatar

Gnome Boxes 🥲 Because im avoiding to install anything to the kernel.

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

You should never install anything to the kernel if possible tbh.

atzanteol ,

You’re using qemu+kvm.

help.gnome.org/…/supported-protocols.html.en

possiblylinux127 ,

You also could try virtual manager

It is all KVM so it is natively supported

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

GNOME Boxes because it doesn’t require 5 academic degrees to set up and I’m a GNOME user.

I_Miss_Daniel ,

Same.

The lack of graphics acceleration is a bit painful though.

VirtualBox won’t work on Fedora 40 AFAICT, and once installed it can’t be uninstalled.

TheGrandNagus ,

It has graphics acceleration.

I_Miss_Daniel ,

I’ll have another look. Didn’t seem to be an option to have it on a Windows guest when I installed it.

GolfNovemberUniform ,
@GolfNovemberUniform@lemmy.ml avatar

Yes afaik it should have it.

possiblylinux127 ,

It also isn’t entirely foss

nzmaa ,

I’m a GNOME user. Gross

Mwa OP ,
@Mwa@thelemmy.club avatar

Real for me it was problematic it was barely customizable and tracker3 randomly broke most of my apps

TheGrandNagus ,

Grow up. People use different software to you. It’s not the end of the world.

Besides, Gnome is great.

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