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Virtual Machines Rock...

In case that wasn't obvious! So why is Ben saying this today? Well I have been setting up a personal domain environment for playing around in - and to be honest it is getting quite complex. By now I have a domain controller, a file server, an iSCSI server, a SQL server (with SQL reporting), a MOM 2005 server and two desktop virtual machines.

Now if that wasn't good enough - all of these virtual machines are stored on my USB 2.0 disk and I have been able to move the entire environment between work and home. Even better than that - I have put the virtual network file (.VNC) on the USB disk as well and configured my home and work computers with loopback adapters configured the same way - so there is no reconfiguration. I just shutdown the virtual machines, take my USB disk home, and start the virtual machines up again where I was.

Cool...

Cheers,
Ben

Comments

  • Anonymous
    August 16, 2006
    Gosh that's some setup, I have slowly been trying to build something similar, have you got any tips?
  • Anonymous
    August 17, 2006
    What's the loopback adaptor for?  I'd like a sandbox network like this too..  Didn't think you'd need a loopback for a Virtual Network though.
  • Anonymous
    August 17, 2006
    The comment has been removed
  • Anonymous
    August 17, 2006
    Ben,

    Are you running your iSCSI server with Storage Server 2003 R2? Or are you using some other (presumably software) iSCSI target?

  • Anonymous
    August 17, 2006
    The comment has been removed
  • Anonymous
    August 17, 2006
    > What's the loopback adaptor for?

    Allows the host to communicate to the guests through the VM network rather than through the host's physicial network (assuming the guests are on that as well --- useful when the second Tuesday in the month comes around).
  • Anonymous
    August 17, 2006
    Ben, can you give us more info on the way you have set up this VM network? Sounds great!
  • Anonymous
    August 20, 2006
    The comment has been removed
  • Anonymous
    August 21, 2006
    You know, I just thought of something this weekend while setting up (yet again) my dev environment at home after a less then sucessfull Vista experiment... :-)   Why not create my dev environment in a Virtual image and have that everywhere I go?  Then all I really need to travel around with is a USB drive and a copy of Virtual PC.  All my favorites, dev tools, office and everything else I'm used to wherever I go and I don't need to spend a week tweaking out a new machine.  Then also throw in a reference "new machine" image that I can copy to sandbox my app with.  Any reason that won't be awsome?
  • Anonymous
    August 21, 2006
    Tracy thanks. Were setting up a VM network for demos right now and this is indeed nice to know.
  • Anonymous
    August 22, 2006
    Can you speak more to the iSCSI setup? I'm curious what's going on in that VM.
  • Anonymous
    August 22, 2006
    just would like to ask,

    is it possible for me to develop assembly language applications in Virtual PC??? :)
  • Anonymous
    August 26, 2006
    I have you are licensed for all that ;)
  • Anonymous
    August 28, 2006
    Licensing?  That's what an Action Pack is good for.  Or a Technet subscription.  I have both and have enough licenses to sim my entire work network in a sandbox if I wanted to.  An Action Pack is dead-cheap and a the only requirement is a free signup to being a MS partner.
  • Anonymous
    August 29, 2006
    The comment has been removed
  • Anonymous
    August 29, 2006
    yipeee....
    thanks for the answer.... :)
  • Anonymous
    August 31, 2006
    Monday, August 21, 2006 6:09 AM by Tracy.P
    > This type of setup allows the VPC's to use
    > the host loopback adapter as a hub [...]
    > Unless you put additional nics into the
    > VPC's, or setup Internet Connection sharing,
    > you will not have internet access in the
    > VPC's.

    I'm still confused by this.  Using this method and without Internet Connection Series, under Windows XP in the past I did have internet access in the VPCs, but last year it stopped working.  I wondered why but there was no answer.  Meanwhile under Windows 2003 I still do have internet access in the VPCs.
  • Anonymous
    September 10, 2006
    I'm just wondering, what's the point of running a virtual iSCSI server? Apart from the novelty? :V
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