XP Virtual machines

[miikkeeb]

I just deployed 2 virtual XP workstations so I could do some testing. I am looking at my VIC and these machines are almost always marked as red saying they are using a lot of memory. I have them configured with 2gb of ram and dual proc. My ESX server is a quad proc with 16gb of ram and only 1 other server that is not using that much. Is Xp just that much of a hog? Just cause I know someone will ask the only thing currently installed on these XP boxes is McAfee.

[jonathanp]

I am running my xp as a vm on ESX 3 and no reboot for a couple of months....

have you installed the last version of VMtools.... ?

Also you might try to give the vm just one cpu... beacause 2 Vcpu for xp with 2gb ram might cause some overhead....

Remember to change the hal in xp to uni proc in device manager if you do this.

Mine is perfectly running with 1 cpu and a 512 mb ram...

By the way mcafee 8 is also installed on this vm.

Jon

[miikkeeb]

Thank you Jon. I will give that a shot. I gave it 2 procs because the app I need to run is already taxing out physical machines that are single proc.

[Henry_T_]

miikkkeeb,

check the values for red alert.

i found out that they were very low:

when they come above 20% vic starts screaming....

i've raised them to a higher level and the alarms stops

regards,

henry T.

[esiebert7625 · Accepted solution]

Is this Guest Mem % where you are seeing high percentages? Windows will do this initially when the server boots and over time settle down. Windows zeroes the contents of all pages in physical memory while booting. This causes the system to become overcommitted almost immediately, as each VM accesses all of its memory. Since the Windows balloon drivers are not started until late in the boot sequence, ESX Server is forced to start paging to disk. Soon after booting the amount of shared memory drops rapidly, and ESX Server compensates by using ballooning to reclaim memory. Page sharing continues to exploit sharing opportunities over time saving additional memory.

Also are you using Memory Reservations at all?

[miikkeeb]

Thanks. I think that is probably what is going on. I did notice it settled down after about 15 minutes. No I don't have any memory reservations

[esiebert7625]

If you're interested here are some good memory links...

The Role of Memory in ESX Server 3 - http://www.vmware.com/pdf/esx3_memory.pdf

Memory resource management in Vmware ESX Server - http://www.vmware.com/pdf/usenix_resource_mgmt.pdf

[miikkeeb]

Thanks. I am completely new to VM so any help I get I appreciate.