KVM Virtualization in Ubuntu 10.10

I was going to write a quick howto on Virtualization within Ubuntu 10.10 and KVM, then ran across this:
http://www.howtoforge.com/virtualization-with-kvm-on-ubuntu-10.10

No point in replicating effort, so have a gander. It's pretty concise.

Ubuntu 10.10 Nvidia driver update to fix "NVRM: os_raise_smp_barrier(), invalid context!" message

Ok, so after addressing the previous ips spamming woes to my syslog, I have now a fix for the Nvidia "NVRM: os_raise_smp_barrier(), invalid context!" errors, should you be so unlucky to have this gawd-aweful chipset.

Get the driver here:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/unix.html

And do the following (from Nvidia's site: http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux-display-amd64-260.19.36-driver.html)
"Once you have downloaded the driver, change to the directory containing the driver package and install the driver by running, as root, sh ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-260.19.36.run

One of the last installation steps will offer to update your X configuration file. Either accept that offer, edit your X configuration file manually so that the NVIDIA X driver will be used, or run nvidia-xconfig."

Note that you want to do this from a console and not X (KDE, Gnome, whatever).

Ubuntu 10.10 kernel update (fix ips power exceeded issue)

So, after new install and updates of the Qosmio, I noticed my sysmessage log being spammed with the following message about every 5 seconds:

Jan 22 06:17:59 wrex-Qosmio-X505 kernel: [ 1198.323814] intel ips 0000:00:1f.6: MCP power or thermal limit exceeded

Annoying. No relevant fix as after a quick Google search, it appears to be a bug and quite common amongst several Laptop vendors (Again, annoying. Ubuntu devs needs to fix that sh*t).

So, updating my current kernel (2.6.35-24-generic) should fix, according to some.

Here's the process (files found at: http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v2.6.37-natty/):

1. Download Generic kernel headers package:
linux-headers-2.6.37-020637_2.6.37-020637.201101050908_all.deb
2. Download Arch Headers:
- I386: linux-headers-2.6.37-020637-generic_2.6.37-020637.201101050908_i386.deb
- AMD64: linux-headers-2.6.37-020637-generic_2.6.37-020637.201101050908_amd64.deb
3. Download compiled kernel:
- I386: linux-image-2.6.37-020637-generic_2.6.37-020637.201101050908_i386.deb
- AMD64: linux-image-2.6.37-020637-generic_2.6.37-020637.201101050908_amd64.deb
4. Install the files in the same order (If you do them out of order, you will be sad).
5. Open a terminal window and run:
sudo update-grub
6. Reboot and select the kernel from the bootloader menu
If it`s not there check your steps.
7. Check to ensure new kernel has been applied:
root@wrex-Qosmio-X505:~# uname -r
2.6.37-020637-generic

That seems to have fixed the issue as I am not getting the message, any more, but now...

I'm getting this:

Jan 22 06:44:23 wrex-Qosmio-X505 kernel: [ 585.007396] NVRM: os_raise_smp_barrier(), invalid context!

Lol!!!!

I'm sure it's my (OMG_I_HATE_THIS_POS_VIDEO_CHIPSET_FRAK_NVIDIA!!!!) Nvidia. I'll post the fix after this, once I hammer it out. Ugh.

Stoopid Nvidia (Toshiba Qosmio 505 Linux Install)

Everyone always hails Nvidia as being so great. I've always had issue with their chipsets and it seems today is no different.

Went to install Ubuntu (Yeah, I know) on my Qosmio 505 and I get scrambled video on the Live CD of 10.10.

nomodeset did the trick.

This also happened with the OpenSuSE 11.3 live CD and CentOS 5.5 Live CD. Meh. Fedora was no issue. Go figure that.

In case you need it, here's what you should do:

1. boot computer with livecd
2. when you see it get to the actual booting hit f6
3. select language
4. hit f6 again
5. select nomodeset
6. hit esc
7. install Ubuntu as usual and reboot
8. when you get to the grub boot menu make sure to hit e so you can edit the kernel commands
9. add nomodeset to the kernel args again
10. cntrl X to boot
11. sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade
12. reboot
13. Repeat 8-10 again
14. start the restricted drivers program
15. install the restricted driver for the 360m
16. reboot

You can use a remote drive in Windows 7 Home Premium

MS and their wisdom of removing features from past releases of their OS, never ceases to amaze me and file them under the WTF where they thinking files. Well, I guess I do know: They're greedy bastards.

Anyway, if you want to ba able to backup your Win 7 system remotely, I found a nice howto, here:

http://www.roflxd.com/index.php?q=node/3

I'm copying it from there and posting here, in case the directions should ever go away:

Backing Up Windows 7 Home Premium to a Network Share

Fri, 04/16/2010 - 23:29 — PlasmaFlow

Well many people are complaining that Microsoft decided that allowing people to perform backups on their Windows 7 Home Premium to a Network share should be a paid Feature.

Well Uncle Bill was unaware that his little elves gave us something called Virtual Hard Drives on Windows 7 Home Premium.

To perform a system backup to a network drive you simply do the following.

First Asses the location of your Network Backup.

Second Make sure you can map the Drive using an UNC name Share, I/E \\ComputerName\Folder.

Third Create a Local Drive by Mapping the Network Location using the UNC to said drive so that the machine can remember the login information to the network share thus aiding in authenticating you whenever the machine is connected to the network share.

Fourth Open your Computer Management Panel and Select Actions>>Create VHD.
Here you have two options to map the new VHD.
A)Enter the UNC Path in the Location Box as \\ComputerName\Folder or B)Use the Drive letter to the newly mapped network share drive you just created.

Next Select the Virtual Hard Drive Size and the designated allocation information MB - Mega Bytes, GB - Giga Bytes or TB - Terabytes.

The window suggests to use a Fixed size drive but Since I know how these drives work in the Hyper-V server (and yes it’s the same type of drive) setting it to dynamically expanding will allow you to make the drive Up to the size requested but if you backup only takes half the space, your virtual drive will not exceed the amount allotted. All in all this is your choice and I recommend familiarizing yourself with the technicalities if you wish to make a different decision.

Once the options are entered click ok on Create and Attach Virtual Hard Disk
Window.

The new drive is created.

Now right click on the drive on the left side of the pane where the Disk Designation is on the window. Since I only had one physical drive my new VHD was called DISK 1.
Select Initialize Volume from the menu options.
Once the init is complete, right click on the drive and select to create a simple volume. Some options will come up, you can choose the defaults all the way, or choose whatever settings make you happy, including a label for the volume and the drive letter.

Once the configuration is complete the drive will be automatically formatted and mounted. A message stating that the drive has now been successfully mounted will come up.

After this you will be prompted with a menu that will contain an option to use this newly created VHD as a backup disk. This will in turn open the backup wizard and allow you to perform your backup of your user files, settings and more importantly a recovery image.

Once your backup is completed, make sure to create a recovery disk form the menu option on the left side of the backup page. This disk will allow you to boot to it since it is created as a CD that is bootable. It will also allow you to restore the system and or any missing files that you may want to recover.

And Viola! You now have Network Backup once more in Windows 7 Home Premium.

And this my friends is the ROFL of the day Courtesy of ROFLXD!

Making fun of technology foibles!
Aren’t I a Stoinker?

PlasmaFlow