# With the advent of KVM, Xen is dead....



## Damian (May 17, 2013)

...for anyone who doesn't already offer Xen.

You're probably aware that we're currently architecting a replacement VPS panel that we'll eventually license to anyone who wants to use it. 

We're seriously considering not implementing Xen, as we don't use it ourselves.

Tell me how i'm wrong. Go!


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## BradND (May 17, 2013)

inb4 antonysmith

Kvm > xen


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## GVH-Jon (May 17, 2013)

Xen PV > KVM > OpenVZ/Virtuozzo   

We're deploying a new Xen node this week (and discontinuing the public sale of OpenVZ, hence the ad) I'm honestly so pumped for it!


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## Damian (May 17, 2013)

GVH-Jon said:


> Xen PV > KVM


Tell me why... that's what i'm trying to understand, as we do not do Xen ourselves nor do I have any Xen VMs.

What does Xen do that KVM does not?


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## wlanboy (May 17, 2013)

KVM is part of the Linux Kernel, it is supporting VT. And it is as fast as XEN - if you believe the benchmarks.

I have started a XEN vs KVM thread too.


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## GVH-Jon (May 17, 2013)

Damian said:


> Tell me why... that's what i'm trying to understand, as we do not do Xen ourselves nor do I have any Xen VMs.
> 
> What does Xen do that KVM does not?


It prevents memory from being oversold.


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## telephone (May 17, 2013)

Stick with KVM, then expand.

^ Plan for multi-platform in advance -> Make use of interfaces and abstract classes.


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## Ash (May 17, 2013)

GVH-Jon said:


> It prevents memory from being oversold.


To be fair you can probably oversell 1GB KVM RAM at the most and HDD cannot be oversold.


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## GVH-Jon (May 17, 2013)

GetKVM_Ash said:


> To be fair you can probably oversell 1GB KVM RAM at the most and HDD cannot be oversold.


You know that, I know that, many experienced providers know that, but do inexperienced consumers know that?

Using Xen, it's more beneficial for marketing purposes as you can advertise "Never oversold resources" (If you're excluding bandwidth, which obviously can be oversold) which will attract more people who don't know really the differences between Xen and KVM, etc.


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## vanarp (May 17, 2013)

I think you can run multiple KVMs on top of a XEN node if I remember well (from the LET thread)... lol


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## GVH-Jon (May 17, 2013)

vanarp said:


> I think you can run multiple KVMs on top of a XEN node if I remember well (from the LET thread)... lol


Of course, Xen is full virtualization (Well unless you're using PV.. then that's a different story and topic..) You can have an OpenVZ node inside of a Xen VPS as well but the issue is that you're creating a virtualized environment inside of a virtualized environment. Although it may be an option if you're seriously budget strapped, I wouldn't do it because you'd be taking away performance for the sake of saving a few bucks.


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## sleddog (May 17, 2013)

Damian said:


> Tell me how i'm wrong. Go!


You're wrong because *alternatives* and *freedom of choice* are good things. Both Xen and KVM are excellent technologies and we are fortunate that both exist.

Should there be just one Linux distro?

Should there be just one computer operating system?

You've made your choice and that's fine. Let other people do the same without requiring justification.


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## Damian (May 17, 2013)

Isn't part of the problem with Solus is that they're not users of the system, and therefore their development doesn't align with the needs of providers? Which would be what we're avoiding with not implementing Xen into the panel.


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## qps (May 17, 2013)

We really like Xen.  Xen PV is great and is something that KVM does not have.

Xen is widely used by cloud providers (Amazon, OnApp, etc).

Xen on SolusVM works pretty well.


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## xBytez (May 17, 2013)

I really like KVM. KVM is great and is something that Xen does not have.

KVM is widely used by cloud providers (DigitalOcean, etc).

KVM on SolusVM works pretty well.


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## Damian (May 17, 2013)

I'm indeed seeing that plenty of people like Xen. This is fine, of course, because emotion and opinion is what drive a lot of what all of us do.

I'm looking for facts here. What does KVM do that Xen doesn't do, and vice versa. Near as I can tell, both do the exact same thing, which is why i'm looking for education.


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## Damian (May 17, 2013)

http://vpsboard.com/index.php?/topic/114-xen-hvm-vs-kvm appears to be what i'm looking for. Will watch that thread instead.


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