When you run the new unraid beta in a VM it is accessing the local drives on that computer for the array, right? If yes, then why would you need to run it in a VM? I've been planning for a small upgrade for such a long time I lost the "feel" of where things were going. Right now I boot off of a USB stick, loads unraid and then I have my array. When it is ran from a VM, what's the benefit if all the drives are used within the array anyway? I "think" I'm thinking that correctly, right? I do use a couple VM's now, using VMWARE ESXi, but just to load a couple of Windows operating systems for certain things.

 

 

The current beta is a Xen hypervisor. unRAID doesn't run in a VM, it hosts VMs. There is a whole subforum on this.

 

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?board=52.0

 

Also

 

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?board=54.0

read the links from prev. poster but here is a quick recap.

 

if you are talking about the UnRaid v6 beta:

the difference is that all previous unraid versions where not Virtualization aware and required special

compilations (provided/supported by other users) to run inside a VM.

also the virtualization hardware had to support virtualization instructions (VT-d/IOMMU)  and be compatible with the hypervisor to allow hardware pass through for unraid to access local controller/HDD

to be used in array. there were workaround in the form of "Raw Disk Acess" or something like that.

 

so the new V6 of unraid (currently in beta) is

#1 A 64 bit OS. yes this is the first official version based on 64 bit architecture as far as I know.

#2 this version is a virtualization aware from the get-go, meaning all needed virtualization extensions and modules for the popular Hypervizors like (VMWare,Xen,KVM) are enabled and available.

as well as version of Xen hypervisor included with in the setup.

this means that UnRaid v6 can be used as Xen based VM Host.

thus you can create and run VMs directly on the unraid setup just as you would on other HV , like KVM or VMWare

 

and if you want to run unraid it self in a VM  you do not need recompile the kernel to enable all of it for your HV of choice.  or wait for some one to do it for you. you can just create the VMD/VMDK mount and copy same files you have on your flash drive onto it, run the make boot-able bat. or system..whatever to make the drive bootable

add it to your VM and boot up.(well of course there are more things involved but you get my drift)

 

 

 

Yea, starting to click I think. I read some of the previous links above tonight if I get the chance. I currently run everything off of a USB stick, which to me is the most efficient way to go, at least in my opinion.

 

Thanks again.