Re: Query about suitable small servers for Xen / Debian

[Simon <linux@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Chuck Zmudzinski <brchuckz@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> On 9/20/2023 6:40 AM, Leigh Brown wrote:
>> On 2023-09-20 10:45, Jo Mills wrote:
>>> I am considering re-building my home network using a couple of HP
>>> MicroServers in the following manner, and would be very glad of any
>>> advice or comments on the suitability of the proposed hardware.
>>> 
>>> Two off identical HPE ProLiant ML30 Gen10 Plus Intel Xeon E-2314
>>> Quad-Core 2.80GHz MicroServers wired back to back using 1Gb Ethernet
>>> (or faster) for a DRBD connection.
>>> 
>>> Over this will run Xen.
>>> 
>>> Dom0 would be Debian.
>>> 
>>> The server must support at least 4 off Ethernet devices each of which
>>> may be addressed uniquely via passthrough.  VMs will be either Debian
>>> or MS-Windows.
>>> 
>>> I'm not after any great performance, reliability and stability are
>>> what's important.
>> 
>> I ran Debian/Xen on a pair of HP MicroServer N40L servers for a number
>> of years, including a pair of VMs using DRBD as shared storage. It was
>> totally reliable. YMMV :-)

I’ve found the N40L a very reliable device too. Not what you could call high 
powered, but then my needs are fairly modest. At present I have one running 
Xen, and another running MythTV. I’m retiring the one running Xen but only 
because I’ve upgraded to a box with more RAM and a little more CPU horsepower.


> Debian may be OK for your application which is as a server, but I started
> using Debian for Xen virtualization of desktop systems, and Debian was a
> disaster. I migrated to Fedora and end eventually to AlmaLinux using community
> supported Xen builds for RHEL 9 and its downstreams such as AlmaLinux which
> I use as Xen dom0. The Fedora / Red Hat ecosystem will provide much better
> stability than Debian, IMO. The Debian Xen team still refuses to ship systemd
> units even though the default init system on Debian is systemd! See this
> for proof:
> 
> https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1028251#59

At this point, I’ll give a plug for Devuan https://www.devuan.org/ What’s good 
about Debian, but without SystemD. It’s what I’ve switched to since the Debian 
project abandoned sanity (IMO).
The way RedHat has gone recently, I think anyone needs to be quite cautious 
about shackling themselves to their whims.


Simon