Are virtual machines best way to sovle problem?

Lateralus88 · 26 Feb 2015

Hi people, so i have one question or more! i work in the call ageny and we have about 50 computer connected in workgroup. Our computers are starting to colapse applications dude to low ram (2gb) and im afraid the space on our ssd is to small, about 60 GB, i think updates will eat remaining memory, because they took like 33% of space till now and the system is only 11 mount old. So i ask some good administrator. What should we do? To start with virtualization, and is that hardver good enoughe for virtual machines, because only thing i know it aint for standart windows!

strollin · 26 Feb 2015

If the machines are running low on disk space and have RAM starvation issues, then creating a virtual machine will just make the situation worse. Virtual machines need RAM and disk space as well.

Virtual machines can be used in lieu of physical machines but the machine you run the VM on needs to be beefy enough to handle the original OS as well as the VM. If you replaced those 50 machines with some beefy servers with lots of RAM and disk space, then you could possible eliminate some of the physical machines with VMs running on the servers.

RoasterMen · 26 Feb 2015

Recommended RAM for running a VM is 4GB. Try running Windows 7 on VM with 1GB and you'll see what I mean.

Lateralus88 · 26 Feb 2015

i understand for ram but why larger disk space, long time ago i was at school witch had virtual machines, and every time we turned of PCs the changes we made and programs we instaled were delieted. And what is the diference between standard PCs and Citrix systems and ther recivers wuth also run on windows server?

strollin · 26 Feb 2015

The VM still needs disk space allotted to it for it's operating files and such, just like any other machine would. You can set the VMs disk so that it can't grow any larger than a certain size or that it discards changes but it still needs disk space. On the machine running the VM, the "Host", you need enough disk space for it's operating files as well as disk space for the VM(s), the "Guests", you create on that machine.

I only have a passing familiarity with Citrix so will let some one else answer that question.

doctore · 26 Feb 2015

In your case, the best route may be to run cloud applications with a cloud server (as opposed to your own server).

Lateralus88 · 01 Mar 2015

doctore said:

In your case, the best route may be to run cloud applications with a cloud server (as opposed to your own server).

You mean something like getting terminal service server and connecthing them to thin client?

Berton · 01 Mar 2015

I agree about not running a VM on your present hardware. Any second OS running either as a VM or as a Dual-boot requires the same basic System Requirements for CPU speed, RAM and HDD/SSD space in addition to the current installation. If considering Win10TP Pro as the second OS keep in mind that a test/BETA version of an OS should not be used on only computers or on production machines, not yet stable enough to be released for general use even though lots of folks are not having problem, including me.

whs · 01 Mar 2015

A 60GB SSD should be ample for your purposes. If it is only 33% full at this time, it will not grow a lot for the OS. Only a lot of data could add things. I run 3 Windows 7 desktops since years on 60GB SSDs and I never ran out of space. But my data is on another disk.

jimbo45 · 02 Mar 2015

RoasterMen said:

Recommended RAM for running a VM is 4GB. Try running Windows 7 on VM with 1GB and you'll see what I mean.

Hi there

W7 works quite well in a VM with 1GB RAM -- remember also these days with latest Virtualisation Software such as VMWARE WORKSTATION 11.1 and PLAYER 7.1 Dynamic RAM is used too so the amount of RAM is only the minimum allocated -- in fact if the VM is "Idling" almost NO RAM will be used now.

Amount of RAM in a VM isn't a 1:1 equivalent to a "Real" machine -- running VM's is a complex issue but obviously they can't run with too small an amount available. Often POOR HDD's are the major problem with VM performance --running the VM from an SSD (even an externally connected one) will usually improve performance no end.

For about 99% of typical applications a VM is certainly an excellent way of testing Software (and some hardware) too. Specialized hardware like extreme GPU's for Gaming or some other type of hardware which directly acts with the computer itself won't be suitable for using on a VM but pretty well anything else will be.

Video playing and streaming is quite possible now on a VM -- I use the Mezzmo Video streamer on a Windows VM -- no problem playing on my Remote devices. I'm running W10 Enterprise X64 very successfully in a 2GB RAM VM. Runs OIffice and all the "other usual suspects" very well too -- but I'm using an external SSD for the VM as I've previously said. Performance even on a USB2 connection is fine and it FLIES on a SATA==>USB3 connection (set the VM config USB to 3.0 of course though).

So unless you are a serious gamer using a VM is a perfectly good (and sensible) way of testing or even running software. Dual booting should where possible be relegated to the past.

Cheers
jimbo

Are virtual machines best way to sovle problem?

Are virtual machines best way to solve problem?