Virtualbox

[mavic]

Make virtualbox run on nas so we can install and remote a w2k3 server on nas.

[cyberjunky]

Why would you want this? Most of the stations got approximately 64mb of Ram, which is best being used for the services it already provides. VirtualBox+W2K3 would consume too much memory and ruin the Synology experience. I think you might be better off with a desktop server if you wan to run W2K3.

[mavic]

yes i understand that. I am not going to install big server software on my nas. I just want to run a small win software. I´ts a wast of power and hardware to have a computer running with only 1 small software.

[trinode]

I'd love to see this on my 509, would be really useful to me. I'm sure the 509 can spare some of it's 1GB ram for a VM

[tjzeeman]

There's a more fundamental problem. Win2k3 needs an x86-family cpu and AFAIK all Synology NAS use either a Power or an ARM-based cpu.
You may emulate an x86 cpu with Qemu on top of either of those, but the speed at which the resulting vm will run is very likely too low to be useful.

If you really want to run win2k3 you are probably better of with a windows home server (which is based on 2k3), but those cost a bit more than a low to mid-range DS and use significantly more power.

[Frankh]

Is this serious? Running top heavy Windows server on a box of carefully tweaked software and energy efficient hardware? LOL

[mavic]

Yes this is serious. Unserious things i think you should put in other forums, comments like this ....
It´s not important to run on w2k3 for me. It could be ok with the thin xp version(cant remember its name).

[syno_user]

-1 foolish...

[tjzeeman]

Yes this is serious. Unserious things i think you should put in other forums, comments like this ....
It´s not important to run on w2k3 for me. It could be ok with the thin xp version(cant remember its name).

If you really are serious, you could have checked a little bit more before posting here. VirtualBox itself says they are a 'virtualizer' for x86 (http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/VirtualBox) and if you checked a little deeper, you would have come across them mentioning it only runs on 'reasonably powerful x86 hardware' (http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/End-user_documentation). In other words: no way it will run on a lowly specced DS. Not even an XP Lite edition (heck, Win98 would probably be too much for most of the current DSs).
The same holds true for the other para-virtualisation solutions like VMware or Parallels.

Now, if we would be talking about KVM or Xen or even chroots for that matter. That's a whole different ballgame. Those do offer interesting virtualisation opportunities even on lowly specced ARM or PowerPC cpus like those in DSs. You just won't be able to run Windows on those, only OSs with an ARM/PowerPC for those particular chips (which brings in a bag of hurt of its own unfortunately).

[mavic]

Well, then we got the answer. It seems almost impossible. I could have found this info myself perhaps, but since you already had the knowledge, then you saved me and some other a lots of time. Thx....

Perhaps my skill is to low, and if

Yes this is serious. Unserious things i think you should put in other forums, comments like this ....
It´s not important to run on w2k3 for me. It could be ok with the thin xp version(cant remember its name).

If you really are serious, you could have checked a little bit more before posting here. VirtualBox itself says they are a 'virtualizer' for x86 (http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/VirtualBox) and if you checked a little deeper, you would have come across them mentioning it only runs on 'reasonably powerful x86 hardware' (http://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/End-user_documentation). In other words: no way it will run on a lowly specced DS. Not even an XP Lite edition (heck, Win98 would probably be too much for most of the current DSs).
The same holds true for the other para-virtualisation solutions like VMware or Parallels.

Now, if we would be talking about KVM or Xen or even chroots for that matter. That's a whole different ballgame. Those do offer interesting virtualisation opportunities even on lowly specced ARM or PowerPC cpus like those in DSs. You just won't be able to run Windows on those, only OSs with an ARM/PowerPC for those particular chips (which brings in a bag of hurt of its own unfortunately).

[DevineMe]

Hmm, Mavic needs a Windows based NAS, not a Linux one.

[chum]

I did post this a while ago.

http://forum.synology.com/enu/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=12034

There does seem to be a lot of people out there that would like to be able to run their own virtual machines on these NAS's. However, I think those people may be missing the point. Generally speaking to run a VM you need a reasonably powerful CPU, and you a fair amount of RAM (as already mentioned). Obviously none of these NAS's are designed this way. They are low power storage devices with a bunch of extra features. First an foremost I think there could be a few more storage features added or improved.

For a NAS to act as a Host for VMs, it would have to be designed from the ground up for this, and you would definitely lose the advantage of these being low powered devices.

Have a read of my post regarding a design for a NAS that could be a VM host. What are people's thoughts on that?

[DevineMe]

Comment retracted.

[mavic]

[DevineMe]