[PLUG] Virtual Setup Suggestions Wanted

[Casey Bralla <MailList@nerdworld.org>]

I'm thinking of replacing most of my servers with a single machine running 
virtual servers.

I'm looking for suggestions from the group on which hypervisor to use.   here 
are my current thoughts:

Virtualbox

1.  I already know it well from the desktop version
2.  I could use the open-sourced version, so no licensing issues
3.  Requires a full GUI to run under (at least to run it easily)
4.  Requires a normal Linux distro to hold the hypervisor


VMWare Server

1.  Not open source, but free, and likely to remain available for a good while
2.  I'm not that familiar with it
3.  Requires a normal Linux distro to hold the hypervisor


Xen

1.  I'm not at all familiar with it
2.  Would need a new CPU ($$ - I've got old hardware) to enable it to run 
without a separate Linux distro as hypervisor
3.  Doesn't produce a "pure" virtual machine unless you have a modern CPU, 
which I don't have at the moment


QEMU

1.  I'm not familiar with it at all



Ideally, I'd like to experiment with the system, then purchase some upgraded 
hardware to run in production.  That pretty much screws Xen.  I really like 
Virtualbox, but would prefer for the virtualizing software to be the 
hypervisor.



Any suggestions from the group?

-- 

Casey Bralla
Chief Nerd in Residence
The NerdWorld Organisation

http://www.NerdWorld.org
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