Which version kvm/libvirt on which distros?
 

Is there a list anywhere of which versions of KVM & libvirt thje various current distros are each using?

I am testing out virtualization on various different host distros. Results range from some which simly don't work to others that are much faster than the rest. Just wondering if there is such a list anywhere, if so I could concentrate on testing out just those which are using the latest code.

The ones using the latest code will be 'testing' releases .. or were you looking for a list of stable releases and their versions of kvm/libvirt ?

Well maybe both so I can make an informed guess at which to try first. Just going with the stable isn't necessirily any good because as I am finding KVM virtualization doesn't actually work properly in many of the stable releases.

Just wondering if I might have more sucess using newer kvm/libvert code in a testing build. Not that I really want to get involved in the instability of a testing distro but if the stable ones don't work for this purpose then I might have to.

I can't say I've had many issues .. the only one that comes to mind was a guest I had that kept pushing qemu-kvm to %100 cpu but I never tracked down the cause and haven't seen it since. Can you elaborate on the issues you're having ?

kbp, a brief summary of where I am at with running KVM on various distros:

Arch Linux - one problem/fix after another, eventually all apears working but try and create VM fails with: Unable to complete install: unable to read from monitor: connection reset by peer

Fedora - Problems with size of VMM default storage pool, Very slow VM windows install: expanding files takes many hours

Ubuntu - many issues getting graphics driver and dual-screen working, Very slow VM windows install: expanding files takes many hours

Debian - Issues with installer taking ages to format partitions with no status bar updating, no ability to do quick format during install, virtual machine manager connection failure libvirt permission error, Very slow VM windows install: expanding files takes many hours

Salix - Problems with dual-screens being recognised, no Virtual Machine manager available (albeit suggestion to use aqemu but never got that far).

CentOS - Problems getting ntfs-3g installed, problems with size limit of virtual storage pool

openSUSE - never even got as far as a working GUI.

Were these all on the same hardware?

Yep, all on same hardware:

CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 - 2.8GHz, 9.0Mb cache
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-890FXA-UD5
RAM: 2 x 4Gb DDR3
Graphics: nVidia Quadro NVS295 - dual screens
Disks: various SATA - 80Gb, 320Gb, 500Gb, 1Tb
SCSI: Adaptec ASC29320A - various DAT tape streamers
BIOS already upgraded to latest (F6)

Virtualization: enabled
AMD C1E Support: Auto
AMD K8 Cool&Quiet control: Auto
HT Link Width: Auto
HT Link Frequency : Auto (2000Mhz)

Are you thinking that all my problems might be hardware related?

Several times you mentioned "expanding files takes many hours", this isn't normal behaviour. I'd suggest you try a different system and redo the tests.

When I first encountered this problem I searched about and got the feeling that this was normal behaviour, lots of people complaining about it but no solid solutions. There are many pages describing it but here is one: http://forums.fedoraforum.org/archiv.../t-275865.html

Mention was made of using virtio drivers instead but when I tried that I found only a small increase in speed. Still multiple times slower in KVM than in hyper-v which is reasonably close to native speed.

you can try RHEL6.2, and make sure you using kvm, because i had same problem, RHEL5.6 kvm, and when ever i create VM it seem to qemu type, and i have to edit the xml config file and then start getting better performance

Personally, I don't like setting up KVM (mainly building bridges...) - but I like KVM once it's running.
I also make use of KVM in such a way that it hosts various servers that people on a network rely on (like my a media server and my wife, for example).

Therefore, I would recommend a stable distro to run it on.
One where some update isn't likely to cause me to have to figure out why things have stopped working.

I recommend using RHEL 6.x (or CentOS/Scientific), or Debian 6 to host KVM.
I would stay away from unstable distros like Ubuntu and Fedora
I would definitely stay away from rolling distros like Arch.

thanks for your comments ba.page. Well so far I have had good success with CentOS apart from a couple of outstanding bugs that I am still searching for solutions to.

My main issue against CentOS at the moment is that I need USB support in virt-manager and this is not available in the version of virt-manager which CentOS 6.2 uses. I am currently looking into seeing if I can find some way of getting a later version of virt-manager and probably libvirt installed.

I didn't have much success with Debian as a KVM host when I tried it. It suffered from the same very slow Windows installer expanding files problem as many of the other desktop distros that I tried. I wonder if CentOS is so much faster at this because it is using a server rather than a desktop kernel.