When I’m feeling blue

I picked the first line from “Groovy kind of love” by Phil Collins as a title for this article because it all has to do with feeling blue. Today I attended a Microsoft TechNet Virtualization workshop. I was curious about the Hyper-V thing and thought let’s give it a try. I discovered that Microsoft still has a long way to go before they even can tip to the same features and stability as VMware has to offer. When I got home I installed Hyper-V on my client's lab and stored the Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V files in a CIFS/SMB file share just like Jose Barreto's describes in his TechNet article.

As explained in my previous blog post you can store your Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V files in a CIFS/SMB file share. This additional storage option can be used for the VM configuration, VHDs, snapshots and ISOs. That post explains the required permissions, describes in detail how to do it and also offers some performance tips.

Here is the video:

When I’m feeling blue from Eric Sloof NTPRO.NL on Vimeo.

I think it shows that Hyper-V isn't stable and that it's easy to break. Now CIFS is officially unsupported, but this was a recommendation on TechNet, and the point is not really about CIFS, it's about how easy it is to get it to blue screen.

Comments

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Did you try Citrix XenServer yet ?

#1 Anonimous on 2009-04-04 14:37 (Reply)

Why? Xen is dead anyway. Red Hat ditched them for good. Now they all but admit Xen is becoming little more a management tool for H-V. If I'm going to play with dead tech, it should at least be fun like an old Atari.

#1.1 Pablo on 2009-04-04 19:10 (Reply)

If you read the technet article, the blogger made a comment on June 24, 2008 indicating that Microsoft does not support storing VHD files on file shares. The same is described here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/windowsserver2008r2virtualization/thread/2007eb67-191a-4576-813d-9ef6330e4b1a/ Although I'm not thrilled about Hyper-V, the discussion should remain fair.

#2 Erwin Zoer on 2009-04-08 22:48 (Reply)

Yes, Microsoft does state that it is unsupported but fail to mention what might result if anyone did try this. Many people, including myself find TechNet articles very useful and reliable at times, so it disturbs me that MS doesn’t warn people of the destruction they’re about to cause on their host. At least mention it or pull the article all together. Many people on the technet forums have tried it and get the same exact blue screen. As Eric Sloof mentioned, it wasn’t about running an unsupported configuration but how easy it was to blue screen the host. Just think…what would happened if someone compromised your Windows Hyper-V host and wanted to bring it down. All they would need to do is create a VM on a CIFS. It would be that easy! I know I know there could be permission issues on the CIFS, but you see my point.

#2.1 Michael Hong (Homepage) on 2009-04-10 08:40 (Reply)

Here's another reason to feel blue: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlLPmWwzHzM Another BSOD from Hyper-V.

#3 Michael Hong (Homepage) on 2009-05-02 02:38 (Reply)

By the way, it's not a bad thing the blue screen because the update asked you to reboot the server, may be the blue screen is an "automated reboot"

(So, basically, we can say it's a "function" now).

#4 St Rider on 2009-06-19 11:49 (Reply)

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NTPRO.NL - Eric Sloof

Friday, 3 April 2009

When I’m feeling blue

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