VM decisions for school laptop..
Hi All, My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route. He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian. A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices? As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for? -- Michael Galea
On 04/11/2018 08:05 PM, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
For VM engines there is VirtualBox which works fairly well. There is also the possibility of dual boot because if you don't run both windows and linux at the same time you can have more memory for each OS. Having an SSD makes a huge performance improvement in a laptop over a spinning disk. -- Alvin Starr || land: (905)513-7688 Netvel Inc. || Cell: (416)806-0133 alvin@netvel.net ||
On 2018-04-11 08:05 PM, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
A third choice is VirtualBox. I just checked the website for it and it is available for Windows. I also noticed it is from Oracle and some people don't like dealing with Oracle products. I've been using VirtualBox under Linux to run an older version of Windows so I can run a 3D modelling program that is Windows only. One of the things that pushed me towards VirtualBox was ease of setup. I first looked at VM Ware but found it confusing to determine which version I would have needed to use. -- Cheers! Kevin. http://www.ve3syb.ca/ | "Nerds make the shiny things that https://www.patreon.html/KevinCozens | distract the mouth-breathers, and | that's why we're powerful" Owner of Elecraft K2 #2172 | #include <disclaimer/favourite> | --Chris Hardwick
On 11/04/18 08:31 PM, Kevin Cozens via talk wrote:
On 2018-04-11 08:05 PM, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
A third choice is VirtualBox. I just checked the website for it and it is available for Windows. I also noticed it is from Oracle and some people don't like dealing with Oracle products. I've been using VirtualBox under Linux to run an older version of Windows so I can run a 3D modelling program that is Windows only.
One of the things that pushed me towards VirtualBox was ease of setup. I first looked at VM Ware but found it confusing to determine which version I would have needed to use.
I too recommend Virtual Box, and the large memory you mentioned (32GB) You may have fun finding large memories: all too many devices have soldered-in small memory chips, to "encourage" you to buy a whole new machine when you need more. --dave [currenty running an old-looking brands new t44p, fro the pluggable memory] -- David Collier-Brown, | Always do right. This will gratify System Programmer and Author | some people and astonish the rest davecb@spamcop.net | -- Mark Twain
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 08:35:20AM -0400, David Collier-Brown via talk wrote:
I too recommend Virtual Box, and the large memory you mentioned (32GB)
You may have fun finding large memories: all too many devices have soldered-in small memory chips, to "encourage" you to buy a whole new machine when you need more.
--dave
[currenty running an old-looking brands new t44p, fro the pluggable memory]
Is that a t440p with a missing 0 or a model I don't know about? And if it is a t440p, how do you live without trackpoint buttons? -- Len Sorensen
| From: Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org> The following is an idiosycratic reaction to your question. Not exactly an answer and not exactly reliable. | He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses | mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of | booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian. I'm pretty lazy. If I were your son, I'd use just one OS until there was a very good reason to run the other. And it would almost never come up. Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux? You missed your chance to brainwash him: you had to start earlier. I succeeded with my kids :-) My (adult) kids do boot to Windows for two things: games and playing back protected streaming content (on a dedicated HDTV). We also boot to Windows to run tax preparation software. Having two OSes as "home" is kind of schizophrenic. It requires developing twice the skills and experiencing twice the annoying puzzles. It may not be a good use of a student's time. It's also best to have the same OS as your associates: sharing documents and expertise. Libreoffice is almost good enough as an MS Office clone. | As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model | Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this | spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for? I now think that an ultrabook is better for students: easy to carry, long battery life. 256G of SSD and 8G of RAM is fine now, I think. I love having a great screen. An external drive left at home/residence may be a great way to keep archives safe. But kids these days actually may be shedding notebooks for phones. So maybe a stays-at-home beefy "gaming" notebook might be better. And archives are for the cloud (scares me on a couple of levels). Then again, in some crowds, cool kids have some kind of MacBook. It has UNIX underneath but most folks never look.
On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 10:27:17PM -0400, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
It's also best to have the same OS as your associates: sharing documents and expertise. Libreoffice is almost good enough as an MS Office clone.
No! If sharing is a goal, then MS-Office. -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 10:27:17PM -0400, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
The following is an idiosycratic reaction to your question. Not exactly an answer and not exactly reliable.
I'm pretty lazy. If I were your son, I'd use just one OS until there was a very good reason to run the other. And it would almost never come up.
Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux?
I almost never boot Linux on my laptop... Everything else in the house runs Linux, I can ssh to it as needed, I have the linux on windows for tools I need occationally. But if I am just webbrowsing or playing games, it really doesn't matter. Strangely my previous laptop never booted Windows. Weird. -- Len Sorensen
On 04/11/18 22:27, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
| From: Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org>
The following is an idiosycratic reaction to your question. Not exactly an answer and not exactly reliable.
| He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses | mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of | booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
I'm pretty lazy. If I were your son, I'd use just one OS until there was a very good reason to run the other. And it would almost never come up.
Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux?
I imagine he will want to run the Linux instance in the background so he can get access to a personal git server. The course he is taken is in game design and it is mixed Windows/Linux, so what he actually uses the Linux for will be mandated by the school. I myself would push him completely to Linux but for: 1) Some game design systems have sole support or better support under Windows (according to him), 2) Windows seems to be his preferred development target, 3) He plays a lot (too many really) games on Windows.
You missed your chance to brainwash him: you had to start earlier. I succeeded with my kids :-)
Well, he did come to my work to pick up some professional development working in C on Linux, so he's not inexperienced. He can still be turned from the dark side.
My (adult) kids do boot to Windows for two things: games and playing back protected streaming content (on a dedicated HDTV). We also boot to Windows to run tax preparation software.
We have 5 dedicated Linux machines in the home, 3 are always on. (I am not counting the multitude of tablets and embedded Linux devices, only things I upgrade on a regular basis). We have one Windows machine is entirely dedicated to games, but runs Chrome, Thunderbird, Libreoffice and the Gimp instead of whatever Microsoft runs). I would ditch Windows 10 if Wine was good enough. And there is my Son's Windows machine, whatever is on that (shudders).
Having two OSes as "home" is kind of schizophrenic. It requires developing twice the skills and experiencing twice the annoying puzzles. It may not be a good use of a student's time.
It's also best to have the same OS as your associates: sharing documents and expertise. Libreoffice is almost good enough as an MS Office clone.
| As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model | Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this | spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
I now think that an ultrabook is better for students: easy to carry, long battery life. 256G of SSD and 8G of RAM is fine now, I think. I love having a great screen.
Good point, but I suspect that the laptop should be meaty enough to play the things he develops on it. He uses unity and recommendations for building a dev machine range from 8-32 GB.
An external drive left at home/residence may be a great way to keep archives safe.
He can always rsync from the residence to the (family) home for backup.
But kids these days actually may be shedding notebooks for phones. So maybe a stays-at-home beefy "gaming" notebook might be better. And archives are for the cloud (scares me on a couple of levels).
Then again, in some crowds, cool kids have some kind of MacBook. It has UNIX underneath but most folks never look. ---
Thanks to all the subsequent commenters! Summarizing: 1) Don't forget VirtualBox, it works well. Some say try Hyper-V since it is native. But then he would need Windows Professional, hmmm. 2) Make sure the processor support Intel's VT-x for 64 bit development. 3) Consider an SSD. 4) Some say 8GB memory is enough, some favour 32GB. The university recommends 8GB at minimum. 5) It was pointed out has Microsoft has "Linux subsystem for Windows", but its command line only. Thanks! -- Michael Galea
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 01:46:01PM -0400, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
I imagine he will want to run the Linux instance in the background so he can get access to a personal git server.
The course he is taken is in game design and it is mixed Windows/Linux, so what he actually uses the Linux for will be mandated by the school. I myself would push him completely to Linux but for: 1) Some game design systems have sole support or better support under Windows (according to him), 2) Windows seems to be his preferred development target, 3) He plays a lot (too many really) games on Windows.
Well, he did come to my work to pick up some professional development working in C on Linux, so he's not inexperienced. He can still be turned from the dark side.
We have 5 dedicated Linux machines in the home, 3 are always on. (I am not counting the multitude of tablets and embedded Linux devices, only things I upgrade on a regular basis). We have one Windows machine is entirely dedicated to games, but runs Chrome, Thunderbird, Libreoffice and the Gimp instead of whatever Microsoft runs). I would ditch Windows 10 if Wine was good enough.
And there is my Son's Windows machine, whatever is on that (shudders).
Good point, but I suspect that the laptop should be meaty enough to play the things he develops on it. He uses unity and recommendations for building a dev machine range from 8-32 GB.
He can always rsync from the residence to the (family) home for backup.
Thanks to all the subsequent commenters! Summarizing: 1) Don't forget VirtualBox, it works well. Some say try Hyper-V since it is native. But then he would need Windows Professional, hmmm. 2) Make sure the processor support Intel's VT-x for 64 bit development. 3) Consider an SSD. 4) Some say 8GB memory is enough, some favour 32GB. The university recommends 8GB at minimum. 5) It was pointed out has Microsoft has "Linux subsystem for Windows", but its command line only.
Well if you are doing unity development and 3D games, that something like a Thinkpad P51 might be what to look at. I have have a W530 myself at home (the 5 year old predecessor to it) and a W541 at work. (They went W530, W540 (and W541 with a fixed trackpoint), P50 and P51). I helped a friend get a P50 for development work last year and she likes it a lot. They max out at 64GB ram, so 32GB is trivial for those, and they can fit two 1TB disks if you really need it, or a mix of disk and SSD (which is how I run mine which has 1TB disk and 1TB SSD). -- Len Sorensen
| From: Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org> | On 04/11/18 22:27, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote: | > Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux? | | I imagine he will want to run the Linux instance in the background so he can | get access to a personal git server. I would *guess* that git could run natively under Windows. Googling gets hits but I haven't read any of them. If not, I'd expect that it could run on the Windows Subsystem for Linux. That should incur less overhead (hardware resources and sysadmin resources) than a VM. Are there other examples? | The course he is taken is in game design and it is mixed Windows/Linux, so | what he actually uses the Linux for will be mandated by the school. That changes things a lot. The schools guidance should provide baseline requirements. I'm impressed that the school even considers Linux relevant. I wonder why. For serious gaming, I imagine you need a notebook with a dedicated GPU. Generally that's annoying to support under Linux. Not an area I know much about. Gaming notebooks have developed into a different breed. | I myself would push him completely to Linux but for: | 1) Some game design systems have sole support or better support under Windows | (according to him), Sure looks that way to me, from a distance. | 2) Windows seems to be his preferred development target, | 3) He plays a lot (too many really) games on Windows. Those two go hand-in-hand. | > I now think that an ultrabook is better for students: easy to carry, | > long battery life. 256G of SSD and 8G of RAM is fine now, I think. I | > love having a great screen. | > | Good point, but I suspect that the laptop should be meaty enough to play the | things he develops on it. He uses unity and recommendations for building a | dev machine range from 8-32 GB. The ultrabook is probably not appropriate for what he needs to do. Using the minimum amount of memory might turn out to be a problem. On no basis, I'd recommend 16G (RAM is very expensive these days). I'd aim for a notebook with some open memory slots that you can populate after purchase. That gets tricky: you'd prefer that the slots each be occupied with high density cards so as to leave room for expansion without having to evict the original cards. | 2) Make sure the processor support Intel's VT-x for 64 bit development. I think that all modern chips that would be offered to you would have VT-X. Perhaps VT-D would be useful too, but I don't know. | 3) Consider an SSD. I imagine that gaming notebooks would allow both to be installed. These days, M.2 connector with NVMe is great for SSD. Much faster than SATA. And then you want a separate 2.5" bay for a SATA HDD. Don't get me wrong. Linux offers wide horizons. Lots of amazing systems. More than are available on Windows.
On 12/04/18 03:58 PM, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
| From: Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org>
| The course he is taken is in game design and it is mixed Windows/Linux, so | what he actually uses the Linux for will be mandated by the school. | On 04/11/18 22:27, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote: That changes things a lot. The schools guidance should provide baseline requirements.
I'm impressed that the school even considers Linux relevant. I wonder why.
At World Gaming, I was doing C++ Steam mods on Linux and Windows Studio: both were core for steam in those days. Somewhat less so now, as their own Linux machine and distribution was a worst-seller (;-)) --dave -- David Collier-Brown, | Always do right. This will gratify System Programmer and Author | some people and astonish the rest davecb@spamcop.net | -- Mark Twain
On 04/12/18 15:58, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
| From: Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org>
| On 04/11/18 22:27, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
| > Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux? | | I imagine he will want to run the Linux instance in the background so he can | get access to a personal git server.
I would *guess* that git could run natively under Windows. Googling gets hits but I haven't read any of them.
If not, I'd expect that it could run on the Windows Subsystem for Linux. That should incur less overhead (hardware resources and sysadmin resources) than a VM.
Are there other examples?
| The course he is taken is in game design and it is mixed Windows/Linux, so | what he actually uses the Linux for will be mandated by the school.
That changes things a lot. The schools guidance should provide baseline requirements.
I'm impressed that the school even considers Linux relevant. I wonder why.
Yeah, it wasn't the school. When we visited the university fair to look into the program, we spoke to an enthusiastic second year student. I asked her, somewhat hopefully, if they used Linux at all. "Absolutely" she said, "It's what I mainly use on my laptop". She had debian installed. My wife, deity bless her, turned to me and said "Isn't that what we use?"
For serious gaming, I imagine you need a notebook with a dedicated GPU. Generally that's annoying to support under Linux. Not an area I know much about.
Gaming notebooks have developed into a different breed.
| I myself would push him completely to Linux but for: | 1) Some game design systems have sole support or better support under Windows | (according to him),
Sure looks that way to me, from a distance.
| 2) Windows seems to be his preferred development target, | 3) He plays a lot (too many really) games on Windows.
Those two go hand-in-hand.
| > I now think that an ultrabook is better for students: easy to carry, | > long battery life. 256G of SSD and 8G of RAM is fine now, I think. I | > love having a great screen. | >
| Good point, but I suspect that the laptop should be meaty enough to play the | things he develops on it. He uses unity and recommendations for building a | dev machine range from 8-32 GB.
The ultrabook is probably not appropriate for what he needs to do. Using the minimum amount of memory might turn out to be a problem. On no basis, I'd recommend 16G (RAM is very expensive these days).
I'd aim for a notebook with some open memory slots that you can populate after purchase. That gets tricky: you'd prefer that the slots each be occupied with high density cards so as to leave room for expansion without having to evict the original cards.
| 2) Make sure the processor support Intel's VT-x for 64 bit development.
I think that all modern chips that would be offered to you would have VT-X. Perhaps VT-D would be useful too, but I don't know.
| 3) Consider an SSD.
I imagine that gaming notebooks would allow both to be installed.
These days, M.2 connector with NVMe is great for SSD. Much faster than SATA.
And then you want a separate 2.5" bay for a SATA HDD.
Don't get me wrong. Linux offers wide horizons. Lots of amazing systems. More than are available on Windows. --- Talk Mailing List talk@gtalug.org https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
-- Michael Galea
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 1:46 PM, Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 04/11/18 22:27, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux?
I imagine he will want to run the Linux instance in the background so he can get access to a personal git server.
There are perfectly good Git clients for Windows whether it's command line only or GUI.
The course he is taken is in game design and it is mixed Windows/Linux, so what he actually uses the Linux for will be mandated by the school. I myself would push him completely to Linux but for: 1) Some game design systems have sole support or better support under Windows (according to him), 2) Windows seems to be his preferred development target, 3) He plays a lot (too many really) games on Windows.
You missed your chance to brainwash him: you had to start earlier. I succeeded with my kids :-)
Well, he did come to my work to pick up some professional development working in C on Linux, so he's not inexperienced. He can still be turned from the dark side.
back protected streaming content (on a dedicated HDTV). We also boot to Windows to run tax preparation software.
We have 5 dedicated Linux machines in the home, 3 are always on. (I am not counting the multitude of tablets and embedded Linux devices, only
My (adult) kids do boot to Windows for two things: games and playing things I upgrade on a regular basis). We have one Windows machine is entirely dedicated to games, but runs Chrome, Thunderbird, Libreoffice and the Gimp instead of whatever Microsoft runs). I would ditch Windows 10 if Wine was good enough.
And there is my Son's Windows machine, whatever is on that (shudders).
developing twice the skills and experiencing twice the annoying puzzles. It may not be a good use of a student's time.
It's also best to have the same OS as your associates: sharing documents and expertise. Libreoffice is almost good enough as an MS Office clone.
| As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model | Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this | spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
I now think that an ultrabook is better for students: easy to carry, long battery life. 256G of SSD and 8G of RAM is fine now, I think. I love having a great screen.
Good point, but I suspect that the laptop should be meaty enough to play
Having two OSes as "home" is kind of schizophrenic. It requires the things he develops on it. He uses unity and recommendations for building a dev machine range from 8-32 GB.
8GB is completely inadequate for a dev machine unless you don't run a (piggy) web browser and ideally, no GUI. I would consider 16GB a minimum these days, especially if you intend to run a virtual machine within the host machine. It does not matter if the host OS is Windows, macOS, or Linux. None of them are especially lightweight these days and they're all piggy in different ways. I have a ThinkPad A21p from circa 1998 that still works. That is maxed out at 512M of RAM. I ran Linux on that for years and eventually that machine was retired when it became untenable to do so.
An external drive left at home/residence may be a great way to keep
archives safe.
He can always rsync from the residence to the (family) home for backup.
But kids these days actually may be shedding notebooks for phones. So
maybe a stays-at-home beefy "gaming" notebook might be better. And archives are for the cloud (scares me on a couple of levels).
Then again, in some crowds, cool kids have some kind of MacBook. It has UNIX underneath but most folks never look. ---
Thanks to all the subsequent commenters! Summarizing: 1) Don't forget VirtualBox, it works well. Some say try Hyper-V since it is native. But then he would need Windows Professional, hmmm.
There are other reasons besides Hyper-V to spring for Windows 10 Professional over Windows 10 Home. See: < https://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/windows/compare>. The ability to join an Active Directory managed network is a big one. If you were buying just a Windows license from Canada Computers today, the difference is $50. On an OEM license, it will be even less than that. If you're willing to spring for 32GB of RAM, the $25 or $30 you'll spend for the delta between Home and Pro seems negligible as a percentage of the total cost of the system.
2) Make sure the processor support Intel's VT-x for 64 bit development.
It's not just the CPU and it's not just for 64 bit development. The BIOS must support VT-x, too. The "workstation" type of notebooks should support it. Cheaper notebooks might have a CPU that supports VT-x but the BIOS might not. Hyper-V will not work without VT-x enabled.
3) Consider an SSD. 4) Some say 8GB memory is enough, some favour 32GB. The university recommends 8GB at minimum.
See my comments above. I'm typing this on a Dell Precision M4700 mobile workstation with 32GB of RAM. It's fast. It has a decent keyboard, though not as nice as the classic ThinkPad keyboards, a great TFT panel, but it is bulky, heavy, and noisy when the fans come on. On the plus side, I have replaced both the CPU and the GPU fan to alleviate fan bearing noise that it used to have.
5) It was pointed out has Microsoft has "Linux subsystem for Windows", but its command line only.
That is how I use it. I have read accounts of people installing X on it. I didn't pay attention to the details so I have no idea how viable it is. I would be less inclined to use the LSW if I did not already have a full-fledged Linux developer workstation. Regards, Clifford Ilkay +1 647-778-8696
| From: Clifford Ilkay via talk <talk@gtalug.org> | The BIOS | must support VT-x, too. The "workstation" type of notebooks should support | it. Cheaper notebooks might have a CPU that supports VT-x but the BIOS | might not. Hyper-V will not work without VT-x enabled. I haven't seen a BIOS that stupid. I've seen them stupidly default VT-X off. Perhaps there were in a few the early days when only some Intel chips supported VT-x. I don't remember that being the case for any Core i processors. I think that only some Core 2 Duo processors had VT-x. And only some Pentium 4 processors had VT-x. Neither family matters these days.
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 11:07 PM, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk < talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
| From: Clifford Ilkay via talk <talk@gtalug.org>
| The BIOS | must support VT-x, too. The "workstation" type of notebooks should support | it. Cheaper notebooks might have a CPU that supports VT-x but the BIOS | might not. Hyper-V will not work without VT-x enabled.
I haven't seen a BIOS that stupid. I've seen them stupidly default VT-X off. Perhaps there were in a few the early days when only some Intel chips supported VT-x. I don't remember that being the case for any Core i processors.
From < https://www.howtogeek.com/213795/how-to-enable-intel-vt-x-in-your-computers-... :
"Unfortunately, some laptop manufacturers and motherboard manufacturers don’t include an option in their BIOS or UEFI settings for enabling Intel VT-x. If you don’t see the option, try performing a web search for the model number of your laptop—or your motherboard, if it’s a desktop PC—and “enable Intel VT-x”. In some cases, manufacturers may later release a BIOS or UEFI firmware update that includes this option. Updating your BIOS or UEFI firmware might help—if you’re lucky." I think I recall someone mentioning it on this list some years ago. Regards, Clifford Ilkay +1 647-778-8696
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 07:31:08PM -0400, Clifford Ilkay via talk wrote:
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 1:46 PM, Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 04/11/18 22:27, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk wrote:
Do you have a good example of why he would bother firing up Linux?
I imagine he will want to run the Linux instance in the background so he can get access to a personal git server.
There are perfectly good Git clients for Windows whether it's command line only or GUI.
Yes, gitforwindows.org for one. I use their "Git Bash" when BusyBox is not good enough. -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
On Wed, 2018-04-11 at 20:05 -0400, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
My kids run Linux at home and Windows at school. My first will be headed off to University this fall as well. I asked and the school does support using Linux so she will likely choose that as her main OS.
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
If the courses require Windows it is likely best to run Windows. Though the technically adept can run Linux with a VM machine with Windows. (Assuming they do not need direct hardware access for gaming). Linux as a host OS takes up less memory than Windows as a host OS so that is the route I chose.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
VirtualBox is another solid choice.
As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
That sounds like a heavy brick of a machine. To be honest 32GB of ram is overkill in most cases. I might consider getting a USB attached HD for long term storage and a 512GB SSD for the laptop. That would be a good mix of performance with the ability to save files for long term use.
Windows 10 has something called the Linux subsystem for Windows. It was originally Ubuntu only. Now it supports Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, and maybe others, too. I've used the Ubuntu version when it first came out. It makes Windows 10 tolerable as a developer workstation. If you insist that he must use virtualization, Hyper-V is the natural choice since it comes with Windows Professional and up. That, like VMware ESXi, Xen, and Linux KVM are all Type 1 hypervisors, i.e., they run on bare metal and as such, tend to have better I/O performance. VirtualBox and VMware Workstation are Type 2 hypervisors. They run on a host operating system. VirtualBox is fine as long as you're not expecting great disk I/O performance. All these options work well enough. Picking one does not preclude you from using the others. You should be aware that the CPU and the BIOS must support Intel's VT-x to run Hyper-V. You can run VirtualBox without it but you'll be limited to 32 bit operating systems. The only notebooks that I have encountered with 32GB of RAM are expensive, large, and heavy. I have an older Dell Precision M4700 mobile workstation. It has 32GB of RAM and it's a plenty fast but the even the brick weighs more than my 13" MacBook Pro. Regards, Clifford Ilkay +1 647-778-8696 On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 8:05 PM, Michael Galea via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
-- Michael Galea --- Talk Mailing List talk@gtalug.org https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018, 09:22 James Knott via talk, <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
Windows 10 has something called the Linux subsystem for Windows.
However, unless I'm missing something, it's command line only.
You can do graphical things, but they require an X server running under Windows. So the hassle factor is about the same as spinning up VirtualBox. The Linux subsystem integration is pretty neat if you live in the command line. It starts up instantly, and can be closed with a mouse click. The downsides I've found: - many familiar packages are missing, such as the entire man system. It's been a long time since I had to remember how to install that. - It uses a Windows cmd window for the terminal, so the copy/paste integration is there but terrible. - the filesystem integration is there and decent, but Windows is still a CRLF world (mostly) so text files are more difficult. Stewart
On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 08:05:19PM -0400, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
I'm not too keen on recommending VM route. If you have the budget, get 2 identical laptops. If Linux doesn't work out, it can serve as "backup" Windows machine.
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
By now, you know 3rd contenders, VirtualBox. :-) But, since Hyper-V is part of Windows10, just use that.
As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
-- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 12:57 AM, William Park via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 08:05:19PM -0400, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
I'm not too keen on recommending VM route.
Why not? Unless you have really underpowered machines, it's a perfectly viable way to run multiple operating systems simultaneously.
If you have the budget, get 2 identical laptops. If Linux doesn't work out, it can serve as "backup" Windows machine.
That seems rather impractical. Would you carry two laptops "just in case"?
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
By now, you know 3rd contenders, VirtualBox. :-) But, since Hyper-V is part of Windows10, just use that.
The version of Windows 10 matters. Windows 10 Home does not have Hyper-V. You must be using Windows Professional or better for it to support Hyper-V. Regards, Clifford Ilkay +1 647-778-8696
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 01:25:54AM -0400, Clifford Ilkay wrote:
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 12:57 AM, William Park via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
I'm not too keen on recommending VM route.
Why not? Unless you have really underpowered machines, it's a perfectly viable way to run multiple operating systems simultaneously.
I use VirtualBox and VMware at work. They are OK for network testing or application. But, they seem to have or encouraging or amplifying silent filesystem corruption, especially USB subsystem. -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 1:42 AM, William Park via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 01:25:54AM -0400, Clifford Ilkay wrote:
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 12:57 AM, William Park via talk <talk@gtalug.org
wrote:
I'm not too keen on recommending VM route.
Why not? Unless you have really underpowered machines, it's a perfectly viable way to run multiple operating systems simultaneously.
I use VirtualBox and VMware at work. They are OK for network testing or application. But, they seem to have or encouraging or amplifying silent filesystem corruption, especially USB subsystem.
If such a thing existed as a systemic issue, it would be calamitous for the billions of virtual machines that are deployed and we'd either stop doing virtualization or find a solution to this problem. Granted, cloud providers probably aren't using the USB subsystem. We deploy our web application on Debian virtual machine images to our customers that they can run on VMware ESXi 5, 5.5, 6, Hyper-V, or VirtualBox. With thousands of VMs deployed on a wide variety of hardware, we would have heard something by now if there were some systemic issues with filesystem corruption. We don't have any need to interact with USB devices though. If such a thing is happening, this isn't a feature of virtualization. It's a bug. Have you filed a bug report? Regards, Clifford Ilkay +1 647-778-8696
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 12:57:07AM -0400, William Park via talk wrote:
By now, you know 3rd contenders, VirtualBox. :-) But, since Hyper-V is part of Windows10, just use that.
Have you ever actually used hyper-v? What an awful interface and the requirement it puts on the guest is rather annoying and makes life weird for linux. That's like suggesting to just use MS Edge because it comes with it. -- Len Sorensen
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 10:36 AM, Lennart Sorensen via talk <talk@gtalug.org
wrote:
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 12:57:07AM -0400, William Park via talk wrote:
By now, you know 3rd contenders, VirtualBox. :-) But, since Hyper-V is part of Windows10, just use that.
Have you ever actually used hyper-v? What an awful interface and the requirement it puts on the guest is rather annoying and makes life weird for linux.
I use it on a regular basis on my Windows 10 mobile workstation. I didn't have to do anything special to have Debian run within the VM so I'm not sure what these requirements you mentioned are. Note: I only do server stuff with these virtual machines so I don't have any need for X. If there is something special you have to do in order to get X running, I wouldn't be aware of it since it does not impact me. VirtualBox is not as complex to configure because it can't do as much as Hyper-V or VMware ESXi but those things may or may not be important for you. I don't find its interface to be any more difficult to use than ESXi or VirtualBox, just different. For instance, both Hyper-V and ESXi have extensive support for virtual networks, virtual switches, VM migration, scaling, etc. VirtualBox is more like Parallels or VMware Fusion/Workstation. Hyper-V can do everything VirtualBox can do provided the host OS is Windows. The converse is not true. Regards, Clifford Ilkay +1 647-778-8696
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 10:36:09AM -0400, Lennart Sorensen via talk wrote:
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 12:57:07AM -0400, William Park via talk wrote:
By now, you know 3rd contenders, VirtualBox. :-) But, since Hyper-V is part of Windows10, just use that.
Have you ever actually used hyper-v?
Yes, on Windows 10 Enterprise. Once I go into VM, I sort of stay there, until I'm finished with my tests. In other words, I don't do VM sysadmin, like setup, deployment, migration, backup, security, etc.
What an awful interface and the requirement it puts on the guest is rather annoying and makes life weird for linux.
That's like suggesting to just use MS Edge because it comes with it.
Some of us have to use it, you know. :-) -- William Park <opengeometry@yahoo.ca>
On Wed, Apr 11, 2018 at 08:05:19PM -0400, Michael Galea via talk wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
At work I run Debian in virtualbox on windows. I much prefer it over vmware and hyperv. For a lot of stuff the linux on windows feature in Windows 10 covers a lot of use cases too. Not X applications though.
As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
Well personally I think the only good option says Thinkpad on it. Getting more than 1TB in a laptop is not cheap. 32GB ram can be done, although I have found 16 to be plenty so far. I did 24 for a while and didn't notice any change (other than adding 50% to windows's suspend/resume to disk time). -- Len Sorensen
On 04/12/2018 10:30 AM, Lennart Sorensen via talk wrote:
For a lot of stuff the linux on windows feature in Windows 10 covers a lot of use cases too. Not X applications though.
If the linux on windows does not directly support a graphical interface then there may be other solutions. Once upon a time there was an xserver that would run on windows but I don't know if such a thing still exists. But if it does then it should be possible to run up xdm and connect in from the windows xserver. Another possible solution would be vncserver which I do use on a number of headless systems. It is not super fast but works for what I need it for. It would be interesting to know if these would actually work on linux on windows and it would make for a good test of how complete the linux implementation is. Is linux on windows as good(bad) as Wine on linux? -- Alvin Starr || land: (905)513-7688 Netvel Inc. || Cell: (416)806-0133 alvin@netvel.net ||
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018, 10:45 Alvin Starr via talk, <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
Once upon a time there was an xserver that would run on windows but I don't know if such a thing still exists.
The vowel-free VcXsrv is still in (occasional) development. Works decently with the Windows Linux subsystem. Another possible solution would be vncserver which I do use on a number
of headless systems.
As a Raspberry Pi user, I'm blown away by how good the (commercial) RealVNC server is. It's extremely fast, and has a level of hardware integration that the free implementations can only gawp at. Is linux on windows as good(bad) as Wine on linux?
Way better. It's indistinguishable for Linux, for me. It's got all the /proc and /dev I'd expect. It's got a kernel and an os-release. You can install and run x86_64 packages, and run a full dev environment Wine is more like "you might be able to run this old Win32 app if you fiddle with it enough, sorta". Since my Wine needs are limited to running a terrible old laser cutter control software that only runs under XP, it does the job, but pretty it isn't. Stewart
On Thu, Apr 12, 2018 at 10:45:47AM -0400, Alvin Starr via talk wrote:
If the linux on windows does not directly support a graphical interface then there may be other solutions.
Once upon a time there was an xserver that would run on windows but I don't know if such a thing still exists. But if it does then it should be possible to run up xdm and connect in from the windows xserver.
There are people that have used Xming and cygwin X and such, and it does work fine with it.
Another possible solution would be vncserver which I do use on a number of headless systems. It is not super fast but works for what I need it for.
It would be interesting to know if these would actually work on linux on windows and it would make for a good test of how complete the linux implementation is.
Is linux on windows as good(bad) as Wine on linux?
I would say it works a lot better than wine, but of course it isn't trying to handle graphics. Some network stuff doesn't work, but in general it is quite useful. -- Len Sorensen
On Wed, Apr 11, 2018, 20:05 Michael Galea via talk, <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
Hi All,
My son is off to university for CS this fall, and will need a laptop. I'm looking at purchasing one for him, so he can run Windows and Linux. I'm figuring on going the VM route.
He can use both OS's but is probably more familiar with Win, and his courses mandate a number of windows only tools. I'm heading in the direction of booting Win10 and using a VM running Debian.
A bit of research indicates that the two most popular free VM contenders are VMware and Microsoft's Hyper-V. Can anyone recommend one over the other? Are there better choices?
As per laptop specs, I am figuring on getting something with a late model Intel i7, 32 GB RAM, and 1-2TB storage. I figure many laptops must meet this spec. Is there anything else I should be looking for?
Some Lenovos have a 2nd graphics card in addition to the one on the chip. Some time ago, some body posted to the internet a video of a game being played on a Windows guest on Linux. The machine in question had VT-d and a second graphics card and a second monitor. VT-d allowed the guest OS to have direct access to the 2nd graphics card. Today I don't know what the performance would be with Meltdown/Spectre mitigations in both the host OS and the guest OS.
participants (12)
-
Alvin Starr -
Charles Profitt -
Clifford Ilkay -
D. Hugh Redelmeier -
David Collier-Brown -
Ivan Avery Frey -
James Knott -
Kevin Cozens -
lsorense＠csclub.uwaterloo.ca -
Michael Galea -
Stewart Russell -
William Park