AMD annonserer "Pacifica"

[int20h]

AMD annonserer "Pacifica"

AMD har løftet sløret av sin kommende virtualiseringsteknologi, "Pacifica". Teknologien gjør at man kan kjøre flere operativsystemer samtidig og vil bli lansert i 2006.

 

Les artikkelen her

[Simen1]

Jeg har lurt litt på hvordan dette fungerer, men stemmer det at man f.eks kan kjøre Winodows og Linux samtidig og veksle mellom de to OS'ene med et tastetrykk? Og at hvert OS får tildelt hver sin logiske CPU i dobbeltkjernen?

[Malvado]

Ser ut som det stemmer dette ja Siemen.

Men man må vell ha dobbelt med systemminne for at dette skal gå knirkefritt tenker jeg, 512 / 2 OS blir vel i knappest laget hvis man har et resursulten wxp som et av osene.

 

Kan jo godt være at det nå blir mer aktuelt å ha Linux på pcen, WXP for spillingen og Linux for litt mer seriøst arbeid.

[snorreh]

Jeg har lurt litt på hvordan dette fungerer, men stemmer det at man f.eks kan kjøre Winodows og Linux samtidig og veksle mellom de to OS'ene med et tastetrykk? Og at hvert OS får tildelt hver sin logiske CPU i dobbeltkjernen?

Støtte for virtualisering skal såvidt jeg vet komme i form av ekstra instruksjoner på prosessoren, der man lar flere operativsystem dele alle ressurser ved oppstart. Jeg vil videre anta at støtten for dette i operativsystem vil komme i form av en driver, men foreløpig er det ikke noe x86-operativsystem som støtter dette ennå selv om man trygt kan anta at Linux vil få det iløpet av året ettersom spesifikasjonene blir klare.

 

Les mer om "Pacifica" m.v. i disse PDF-dokumentene:

http://enterprise.amd.com/downloadables/32...tualization.pdf

ROADS TO VIRTUALIZATION

Server virtualization strategies typically revolve around three approaches:

 

1. Software-only virtualization. The virtualization software manages resources and acts as a “translator” between the host operating system and guest operating systems. Using this approach, there is no need to modify the host OS for virtualization. However, applications often suffer decreased performance due to the added overhead.

 

Examples: VMware Workstation, GSX Server products, Microsoft Virtual PC 2004

 

2. OS-enabled virtualization. Using this approach, the host OS and virtualization software are integrated and/or consist of the same software. This tight integration offers improved software performance.

 

Examples: VMware ESX Server, Microsoft Virtual Server 2005

 

3. Processor-enabled virtualization. Under this scenario, processors directly support virtualization. The machines reserve memory locations that only virtualization software can access, thus creating a physical partitioning of resources. By decreasing software overhead, the result is accelerated performance and better security.

 

Example: AMD processor-enabled virtualization solutions will complement software-based approaches, helping companies to build the strongest virtualization platform possible.

http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/content_ty...aper_vFINAL.pdf

Virtualization – the use of software to allow workloads to be shared at the processor level – by providing the illusion of multiple processors – is growing in popularity. Virtualization balances workloads between underused IT assets, minimizing the requirement to have performance overhead held in reserve for peak situations and the need to manage unnecessary hardware.

 

AMD multi-core processors are well suited to help companies implement virtualization because they offer the increased performance necessary to counter performance penalties. The architecture of AMD multi-core processors offers a critical advantage when building ‘virtual machines’ by leveraging Direct Connect Architecture to deliver very high performance memory-sharing between virtual machines hosted on multiple cores within a single processor.

 

AMD is leading the processor industry to help simplify the implementation of virtualization with new technology, called “Pacifica,” scheduled to be launched in 2006. In cooperation with leading software companies offering virtualization solutions, like Microsoft and VMware, AMD “Pacifica” is designed to remove some of the complexity involved in implementing virtualization.

 

With help from AMD multi-core processors, companies can more easily implement virtualization across the entire corporate enterprise. Virtualization enables running different operating systems and applications on the same servers, greatly reducing hardware requirements and, perhaps more importantly, the strain on already

overloaded IT managers. AMD multi-core processors can enable this powerful

technology to be used more universally and with greater success.

Endret 31. mars 2005 av snorreh

[snorreh]

eWeek skriver også mer om dette her:

 

AMD Previews 'Pacifica' Virtualization Technology

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. is giving the industry a look at its upcoming chip virtualization technology during a Reviewer's Day on Wednesday.

 

The event, in Austin, Texas, is designed to give analysts and software developers a look at "Pacifica" before the first specification of the technology is released next month.

 

The technology is designed to enable users to run multiple operating systems and applications in separate partitions on a single processor. Like virtualization software from such companies as VMware Inc. and Microsoft Corp., Pacifica will enable customers to create multiple virtual systems.

[...]

AMD officials said the technology in Pacifica and Intel Virtualization Technology is similar enough so that hypervisor makers will be able to run their software on both without any tweaking.

 

In addition to Pacifica, AMD, of Sunnyvale, Calif., last month announced a partnership with XenSource Inc. to port its Xen open-source virtualization package to AMD's 64-bit Opteron chips later in the first half of this year.

[efikkan]

Er det mange fordeler med virtualisering? Er det praktisk å kjøre flere operativsystemer på en gang?

[tørrfisk]

Oppkalle prosessoren etter en møkkagitar, makan!

[snorreh]

Er det mange fordeler med virtualisering? Er det praktisk å kjøre flere operativsystemer på en gang?

Ja, så absolutt som du kan lese mer om her:

http://forum.hardware.no/index.php?showtop...0entry3742408

Imagine an OS that you can load in nearly no time, and if it crashes, you can simply throw it out, and quickly load a new one. If you have several of these running at the same time, you can shut one down and shunt the work off to the other ones while you are loading a fresh image. If you have five copies of Redhat running Apache, and one goes belly up, no problem. Simply pass incoming requests to the other four while the fifth is reloading.

 

If you save 'snapshots' of a running OS, you can reload it every time something unpleasant happens. Get hacked? Reload the image from a clean state and patch it up, quick. Virused? Same thing. Virtualisation provides the ability to reinstall an OS on the fly without reimaging a hard drive like you would with Ghost. You can simply load, unload and save OSes like programs.

 

It also allows you to run multiple different OSes on the same box at the same time. If you are a developer that needs to write code that will run on 95, 98, ME, 2000 and XP, you can have five machines on your desk or one with five virtual OSes running. Need to have every version of every browser to check your code against, but MS won't let you do something as blindingly obvious as downgrading IE? Just load the old image, or better yet, run them all at once.

 

Another great example would be for a web hosting company. If you have 50 users on an average computer, each running a low level web site, you can have 50 boxes or one. 50 servers is the expensive way to go, very expensive, but also very secure. One is the sane way to go, that is until one person wants Cold Fusion installed, but that conflicts with the custom mods of customer 17, and moron 32 has a script that takes them all down every Thursday morning at 3:28am. This triggers a big headache for tech support as they get hit with 50 calls when there should be one.

 

Virtualisation fixes this by giving each user what appears to be their own computer. For all they know they are on a box to themselves, no muss, no fuss. If they want plain vanilla SuSE, Redhat with custom mods, or a Cold Fusion setup that only they understand, no problem. That script that crashes the machine? It crashes an instance, and with any luck, it will be reloaded before the person even notices the server went down, even if they are up at 3:28am. No one else on the box even notices.

[Simen1]

Så man kan altså kjøre så mange OS man vil uansett antall CPU-kjerner? Man er altså ikke bundet til max 2 samtidig kjørende OS på 1 stk dobbeltkjerne?

[snorreh]

Så man kan altså kjøre så mange OS man vil uansett antall CPU-kjerner? Man er altså ikke bundet til max 2 samtidig kjørende OS på 1 stk dobbeltkjerne?

Nei, for selv kommende enkeltkjerne-prosessorer skal få støtte for maskinvare-virtualisering såvidt jeg har fått med meg. Flerkjerne-prosessorer vil bare kjøre det enda raskere.

Endret 31. mars 2005 av snorreh

[Kimble]

Da vil vel ekstremversjonen av intels prosessor med 2 kjerner + hyperthreading ha enda mer for seg? Den må da ha nok av tråder å jobbe med to eller flere operativsystemer kjørende..

[snorreh]

Da vil vel ekstremversjonen av intels prosessor med 2 kjerner + hyperthreading ha enda mer for seg? Den må da ha nok av tråder å jobbe med to eller flere operativsystemer kjørende..

Tja, jeg er ikke så sikker på det akkurat:

 

Intel Pentium D XE criticised for poor hyperthreading

The "D", we're told, stands for different, while XE confirms it as a member of the Extreme Edition family.

 

Unlike Intel's "Smithfield" family, this expensive member of the Pentium stable will include not only a dual "Prescott" core, but also be kitted out with hyperthreading.

 

The reason for this is purely marketing, as far as we can see. The Smithfield "non D" processors are also priced far more reasonably than Mr D XE.

 

Now a chap has claimed online that overall performance for the Pentium D XE is poorer with HT turned on for this chip than when two separate CPUs are used.