I've run some tests to test the disks, and CPU & Memory.
(Intel XEON 5400 Series, 4 cores, 1 processor, 2.66 GHZ, 4 Gigs RAM, local 10,000 rpm 146 gig SCSIs, RAID-1, FreeBSD 7.1 64-bit)
- The disk looks OK. (diskinfo -t ) It shows virtual faster than native, but then the size of the disk is less than physical, and there may be some read-ahead going on there. Either way, worst case is livable, and best case it's a lot faster. I'm not disk-bound anyway.
Transfer rates:
outside: 102400 kbytes in 0.740411 sec = 138302 kbytes/sec
middle: 102400 kbytes in 0.590457 sec = 173425 kbytes/sec
inside: 102400 kbytes in 0.816407 sec = 125428 kbytes/sec
Virtual:
Transfer rates:
outside: 102400 kbytes in 0.740411 sec = 102478 kbytes/sec
middle: 102400 kbytes in 0.590457 sec = 225934 kytes/sec
inside: 102400 kbytes in 0.816407 sec = 232638 kbytes/sec
- Memory & CPU, the CPU lost about 16%, which seems about right. Memory is down 50% which is not what I would have expected:
Ubench CPU: 1346168
Ubench MEM: 228570
Ubench AVG: 787369
VM with VMware Tools installed:
Ubench CPU: 1129519 (-16%)
Ubench MEM: 115477 (-50%)
Ubench AVG: 622498 (-21%)
I played some games with the amount of memory, CPUs, etc. None of it
worked. In fact, if I gave the VM all of the memory and CPU, and just
let VMware do the scheduling and resource management instead of me, it
worked WAY, WAY, WAY better than me trying to help by reserving CPU or
RAM for the hypervisor. It's not even close. I learned the hypervisor does a far better job of scheduling resources if I don't "help". I tried para on, but it wouldn't even boot that way.
I've seen several extensive tests done around the web and they consistently put the cost of virtualization at 25% pretty for this type of virtualization where VMs don't share the same kernel, and 10% when they do. It's possible this combo in real world this would align with their findings of 25% penalty depending on the CPU to memory mix. I'd just like to catch someone getting ready to set up and try the ubench test and see if yours is coming out about like mine. It would be best if you tested with a 4 core. I've noticed as you drop cores, the cost of virtualization as a percent of the total goes UP disproportionately. That's quite the opposite of physical where adding cores normally has a diminishing rate of return. That might make someone with a 2 core feel like there is something wrong when it's perfectly normal.
Thanks!
