XRv Windows Hardware Requirements

[Phil Clemens]

Hello XR Community,

I recently got XRv running on my Dell XPS 8700 with 16GB RAM and under the VM Workstation Player free hypervisor.  However, when I tried to run a second instance, it kicked back that I don't have enough RAM.  32 is as high as this PC will go, but I don't want to upgrade if I can't run more than two instances, with my preference being three or four, plus possibly some sort of controller down the road.

Any input?

Thanks,

Phil.

[xthuijs]

you'd need about 8G per instance, and ideally possibly 16G for some scaled use. if this is to build lab topo's then you might be fine with 8G. since your machine needs some host mem too, you probably c(r:)ap out at 2 or 3 with 32G installed.

xander

[Phil Clemens]

Thanks, Xander!

I also spoke with Sergio Barragan in TAC who actually recommended purchasing VIRL.  That would be cheaper than RAM, and then I could run up to 20 routers.

[xthuijs]

hi phil,

yeah VIRL is very good for learning and building small topo's to test out the control plane.

XRv is an actual router really that can forward packets as it has a forwarding engine (ok well in cpu threads).

So with VIRL you can test control plane features very easily and very well.

with XRv you get more of a true virtual router to forward with, which means that it is a platform and has forwarding features etc.

where are you looking for mem btw! :) you can pick up DDR3 for ~$200 or less

cheers!

xander

[Phil Clemens]

I was looking on Amazon and Newegg, and did see prices around $200 for the 32GB kits.  Then I saw that VIRL is exactly $200.  Maybe I should bite the bullet and purchase both!

[xthuijs]

hey phil,

you know in all fairness, I wasnt aware of the cost of VIRL, I had expected it to be higher! but hey I don't deal with shift-4's ($) am just building the stuff and keep it running (to some extent at least;) so yeah between the two it is a toss up.

if you ask my engineering heart, and I had only $200 to spend, I would probably go for the XRv and the memory :)

but hey both are reasonable options of course!!

cheers!

xander

[Phil Clemens]

That's a great perspective.  I am more interested in working on the "real" thing, and have had fairly limited luck with simulators.  If I can purchase memory and get three XRv instances running, that would be good.  So, I think I'll make that my first course of action.  Then, if that doesn't work out, I'll have a 32GB PC for all other purposes.

I was looking to the support forums as a way to interact with other XR/9K folks, and certainly did not expect to get a response from one of the fathers of the field.  Thank you very much for your input, and I enjoyed your talk at Live.  Looking forward to next year.

[xthuijs]

haha that is a great perspective too! either way you get some extra mem in your machine :)

and oh! great to hear! thank you, glad it was worth the time joining the session! it is always stressful:) cramping too much info in too short period of time, but we made it happen :)

see you next year and here on the forums :) stay in touch!

cheers!!

xander

[Phil Clemens]

I watched my memory as I booted an XRv router, and it jumps up to around 12GB, so I will only be able to run two routers with 32GB.  However, combined with a small rack of real equipment, this will work for my purposes.  Eventually, maybe move to a PC that can support much more RAM.

[xthuijs]

ok it might be part of the feature pies loaded and config in play. if you have the ability to provide or use virtual memory, I dont think it would slow down the xrv too much, since you are not using for performance testing as much per-se. hopefully vmware is smart enough to leverage teh phy vs virt mem smartly to distribute text/pc to virt and use phy mem for frequent changing memory such as data etc.

xander