Thursday, 20 October 2016

Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 5 - Nested Virtualization (New Feature) - Part 5

Hello Everyone,

In this post, I will share another new feature of Win 2016 TP5 called as Nested Virtualization.

This will be mostly helpful in DEV or Testing Environment where You can give only 1 VM with required dedicated resources to team to test whatever they need to test. 

With this feature, You can enable Hyper-V feature within a virtual machine and can create Virtual machines inside a Virtual Machine. Only point to keep in mind that calculate all resource requirements for total no of VMs You want to use for VMs within VM. Because if later You need more resources then You will need to shut-down all setup and then assign the resource.
Let's see the process with steps to follow to configure nested virtualisation.

To see Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 5 Overview, Click Here!

To see Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 5 Hyper-V Installation, VM Deployment & What's New in VM Settings, Click Here!

To see Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 5 Failover Clustering Installation, Configuration & Post Configurations Process, Click Here!

To see Guest Clustering Installation & configuration using Shared VHD (new feature), Click Here!


PREREQUISITES:


There are some prerequisites which You must follow to configure Nested Virtualisation:

  • Hyper-V Host running on Windows Server 2016 or Windows 10 Anniversary Update
  • Hyper-V VM running Windows Server 2016 or Windows 10 Anniversary Update
  • A Hyper-V VM with configuration version 7.1 or greater
  • An Intel processor with VT-X or EPT technology
  • Supported VM Configurations: 7.1, 7.0, 6.2 & 5.0

Other Prerequisites:



Before configuring Nested virtualisation, make note:

  • Enable nested virtualisation using power-shell script.
  •  If VM is running hyper-V then Memory assigned can not be changed until it is turned off. Even memory assigned is Dynamic, still You can't change it.
  • Need to enable MAC Address spoofing using power-shell script.


Check VM Configuration Version using below power-shell script:



Get-VM * | Format-Table Name, Version




Enable Nested Virtualisation on VM using below Powershell script:



Set-VMProcessor -VMName <Give VM Name> -ExposeVirtualizationExtensions $true




This will give You warning:





Enable MacAddressSpoofing on VM using below Powershell script:



Get-VMNetworkAdapter -VMName Win2016TP5 | Set-VMNetworkAdapter -MacAddressSpoofing On:




Enabled:




Once all prerequisites completed, Start the Virtual Machine:




NESTED VIRTUALISATION CONFIGURATION:


Install Hyper-V Role on VM using Server Manager Console:




Click Next till Role Configuration page and Click on Hyper-V Checkbox:




Click on Add Feature:




Click Next Till last:




Click on install:




Click Close once done:




Now Open Hyper-V Manager within Virtual Machine:




Hyper-V Console is installed on Virtual Machine, now You can create VMs inside VM:




Create a VM within VM itself with same steps as You follow for creating any new VM on physical server and VM will be successfully created within VM:





This is how You can create multiple VMs inside a VM using Win Server 2016.

NOTE: I didn't shown network configuration for Hyper-V inside VM because it is the same process which You follow for physical server. If You want to see network configuration then refer my Hyper-V Blog series by CLICKING HERE!



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1 comment:

  1. Interesting feature. Looks like VM version of Inception :)

    ReplyDelete