Installing on a SAP WAS on a Virtual Server running on a laptop

[Former Member]

Hi,

I am considering installing the WAS preview edition on a new very well-speced laptop (New Centrino Duo & 4GB RAM). I also wish to use the laptop for normal mobile computing purposes - so I am thinking it would be worthwhile investigating setting the WAS in a Virtual PC environment. The laptop's Santa Rosa chipset apparently includes support for virtualisation.

Microsoft has a new free piece of software called "Microsoft Virtual PC 2007" that can be installed on a Windows Vista PC and which I believe would allow me to run a virtual server of windows server 2003 + SAP WAS + MaxDB.

I assume with Virtual PC, you can turn off the virtual SAP server if you want to - so as not to affect the PC performance. It would also be convenient if the 180 trial expires, I just need to create a new virtual server.

I am completely new to virtualization so I'm interested to know whether anyone else tried doing this type of thing, whether this approach would work and if there are any tips/tricks to consider. Has anyone tried Virtual PC 2007 or should I use something like VMware?

Thanks

Adrian

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Adrian,

shouldn't be a problem, but don't expect blazing performance (but your configuration's quite appealing...).

I didn't try 2007 but the previous version (I think it was called 2003). No problems there, but we switched to VMWare since it could handle USB (which MS couldn't at that time). No problem there either...

Just go for it...

Peter

--

Points always appreciated

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Actually Microsoft's Virtual PC2007 is a REAL DOG compared with VMWARE workstation or Parallels.

I'm running VMWARE workstation 6 on a 1GB laptop with intel core 2 Duo processor. Host is W2K3 server standard edition (customised to run as a workstation) whilst guest is a 512MB XP Pro system. Provided nothing much is running on the host you get more than acceptable performance from the ABAP trial version.

However don't even THINK of running the JAVA trial unless you can give your VM 2GB of RAM.

Cheaper options for running a VM are Parallels (around 40 USD), VMWARE SERVER - Free, and VBOX the open source free virtualisation product.

I use VM's since it saves all the hassle of uninstalling / registry cleaning etc etc.

I have a base Windows XP PRO (already activated) VM system which I just clone and then re-install the relevant SAP Netweaver components.

Incidentally if you have enough horsepower and RAM you can run 2(or more) VM's concurrently such as JAVA and ABAP (or 2 ABAP machines or a BW server etc) without the problems of tryng to get both machines on the same stack.

Communication between them can be done via standard networking since most VM systems provide virtual Network Interface Cards (VNIC's) so this is also a great way to go. I Wish I had 4GB on my laptop.

BTW nice spec for that machine --I'm jealous.

Consider this as well -- DON'T USE VISTA as a HOST.

The problem with VISTA is that it tries to be too clever by half. It tries to "Optimise" I/O based on what you have been previously doing. Now if you've been running SAP on a VM you are usually accessing large databases.

So Vista (remember running a VM is just an application as far as the host is concerned) will "Pre-fetch" the I/O just done and what you'll see is the disk(s) being extremely heavily used effectively slowing your machine down to a crawl for a LONG time even though you've shut down the VM.

As far as the HOST is concerned your SAP MAXDB is just another "discrete file" so the VISTA host will try and pre-load a HUGE chunk of it - and there's NOTHING you can do to stop this.

The original optimisation idea was actually quite good but like all these things wasn't properly thought out especially when running virtualisation applications.

Re-installing XP / W2K3 server on a new laptop is also fraught with difficulties as win XP won't initially recognize new SATA drives. You'll get the famous "Windows cannot find any hard disks" message.

However by Slipstreaming SP2 together with the SATA XP drivers it can be done and is well worth the effort if you want to run VM's.

Slipstreaming is beyond the scope of this post but can be done easily with the help of a free utility program nLite. Just google for slipstreaming. You'll see loads of references.

Also note that your VM's can be located on external USB disks so you don't have to use the internal laptop drive.

Most modern machines (including Laptops) have enough CPU power for running virtualisation products assuming you are not running too many applications concurrently (especially on the HOST OS).

The biggest requirement for a VM is RAM. This can't be stated enough. If you don't have enough RAM then forget running VM's.

VM's just GOBBLE RAM for Breakfast. Disk space is also required but even modest laptops have 80/100/120GB drives sothis is really not an issue anymore and as I have posted above you can run VM's from USB external disks anyway.

Cheers and have fun with this stuff.

Jimbo

[Former Member]

Many thanks Peter and James for your suggestions.

RE: DON'T USE VISTA as a HOST.

>The problem with VISTA is that it tries to be too clever by half. It tries to "Optimise" I/O >based on what you have been previously doing. Now if you've been running SAP on a >VM there tends to be large databases. So Vista (remenber running a VM is just an >application as far as the host is concerned) will "Pre-fetch" the I/O just done and what >you'll see is the disk(s) being extremely heavily used effectively slowing your machine >down to a crawl for a LONG time even though you've shut down the VM.

Unfortunately, the laptop I have just ordered (Dell XPS M1330 with Core Duo 2.2Ghz T7500 processor, 4GB RAM & 160GB 7200RPM HDD) didn't have Win2K3 Server as an option, and I went with Vista Ultimate 32-bit.

Would there be any way that I can turn off the I/O optimisation while I am running the virtual machine under Vista? I will only be running the server intermittently - demos etc. That being the case, when you say LONG time -would the performance return to normal after a couple of days of not using the VM. I expect that given the spec of the notebook, that a slowed machine would still be acceptable for day-to-day stuff like Word, Excel & Outlook.

More often than not the notebook will be doing things that normal notebooks do - so I'd prefer it ran Vista which I think is a bit nicer. The high-end spec is just so I can run the occasional demo of a NetWeaver-based application. I guess I could always look making it dual-bootable, but that would also necessitate me purchasing another Win2K3 server license.

Regards

Adrian

[Former Member]

I was lucky with my W2K3 license --I got the Student version for training so it's free. However whilst W2K3 is a bit snappier than XP there's nothing wrong in using XP in place of W2K3 -- you'll still have the same issues "downgrading" from VISTA.

Your machine might run acceptably with VISTA since the 4GB RAM will alleviate a lot of the physical I/O.

Just try it and see.

On my machine (Philips Freevents X59) Vista Home Premium was pre-installed and it ran like a flea trying to swim in a bowl of Golden Syrup. The machine is actually quite a decent laptop with the more than acceptable Intel Core 2 DUO T5550 (1.66GHZ) processor. I like the small footprint -- especially as I travel a lot.

"De-vista-ing" the system to W2K3 actually makes the thing FLY and for me I didn't actually like the Aero glass and all that stuff anyway.

Cheers

jimbo

[Former Member]

Thanks James,

I'll give it go, and will report back to forum on how it went. A couple off weeks before the new newbook arrives. Waiting, waiting...

Cheers

Adrian

[Former Member]

Hey James.

What drivers did you use to get the chipset working?

I used the drivepacks at http://driverpacks.net/DriverPacks/ but the install would't locate my harddrive.

Hope that you read this.

Regards Hakan

[Former Member]

Hi there

First (even before using Driver packs) you need to "Slipstream" SP2 into your Windows installation CD (you'll probably have to make a DVD as including the Driver packs will make the install "CD"around 750 - 800 MB.

Do this using nLITE or any other tool --loads of info on the Web.

Now extract the "Slipstreamed" data from the CD to a directory and THEN add the driverpacks using the method shown in the DRIVERPACK forum.

Just select most of the driverpacks -- the one essentially for your disk drives (usually SATA in modern laptops) will be the Mass storage driver pack.

Create a bootable CD as per the web site instructions and it Should work unless you have a very strange laptop / motherboard.

If you don't slipstream SP2 first then Windows won't load the SATA drivers even if you made a CD with the drivers included.

Note you will have to use an ORIGINAL INSTALL CD -- just copying the i386 directory from your current Windows installation is very unlikely to work.

An OEM Windows install CD will also work provided it is a "Real" windows install with a serial number. A recovery Image type of disk is no good. It has to be a bootable ORIGINAL Windows CD.

If you have an internal card reader you probably will need to find the driver from the manufacturer's site but that's another problem. A lot of Card reader stuff can be found fron avaratec.

IMO it's well worth "De-Vista-ing"a computer especially a typical laptop as VISTA IMO is not really ready for prime time yet, and in any case M$ will support W2K3 until around 2012 so plenty of time to upgrade to VISTA once the initial quirks have been fixed.

Cheers

jimbo