▷ What is hyper

Virtualization is an increasingly widespread and indispensable reality for large companies. There are many famous virtualization applications like VMware or VirtualBox. Microsoft did not want to be less, today we will talk about the Hypervisor Hyper-v Windows 10 in detail and what features this hypervisor natively installed on our system gives us.

Index of contents

If they are introducing you to the world of virtualization and you want to try and experiment with different tools, the problem Hyper-v, the Microsoft native Hypervisor for your most current operating systems, is a must.

What is Hyper-v Windows 10

Hyper-v Windows 10 is an application that is natively available in different versions of Windows 10 and Windows Server. With this program we can create and run virtual machines on top of a host operating system as if they were physical computers.

The role of a Hypervisor like Hyper-v is to manage the access and operation of virtual systems, as well as the resources of the physical hardware of the host computer. Hyper-v, like other applications such as VMware or VirtualBox will allow us to be able to work simultaneously with an operating system installed on another physical one and to be able to carry out tests on it without our physical equipment being modified in any way.

Hyper-v provides support for hardware virtualization, which means that each virtual machine that we run, will run on a virtual hardware made up of the typical devices that a computer needs: hard disk, network card, CPU, RAM and others.

Operating systems that Hyper-v Windows 10 supports

Regarding the client operating systems that Hyper-v supports, we will have the following:

Windows:

• 10 in 32 and 64 bits8 /8.1 32 and 64 bits7 / 7 service pack 1 in 32 and 64 bit versionsView SP2Server 2016 / 2012R2 / 2012/2008 SP1 and 2 of 32 and 64 bits available versions

Linux and Free BSD

• UbuntuCentOS and Red HatSUSEDebianOracle LinuxFree BSD

Limitations and conditions that we must take into account

To run the virtual machines on Hyper-v we will have to take into account certain limitations that also coincide with the rest of the hypervisors on the market, to a greater or lesser extent.

• Machines with specific hardware: for certain utilities such as games or other programs that require the use of dedicated graphics cards or other hardware devices, we will encounter problems with their correct performance. Ultimately, these applications do not have hardware with all the functions of a real one. Playable problems on the host system: In addition to experiencing problems on the physical machine, they can be reproduced on the physical machine itself. The reason for this is because Hyper-v once activated also influences how the host accesses the machine's hardware resources. Incompatibility with other virtualization programs: if we have Hyper-v Windows 10 activated, it is quite likely that we will experience compatibility problems with other virtualization applications. For example, we have had a limitation in the installation of 64-bit virtual machines in VirtualBox and in VMware Workstation Player 15 Problems with the physical hardware of the computer: in addition to the above, compatibility problems with applications could cause the incorrect operation of devices like keyboard and mouse. We have experienced these problems ourselves, requiring the reinstallation of the operating system.

For all the above, we recommend not to install any other virtualization application once we have Hyper-v activated in Windows 10.

Hyper-v version on Windows Server

There are users who, being a less common user-oriented operating system, decide to use Windows Server to practice virtualizing their machines. For this reason, we are going to see some of the fundamental differences that exist for Hyper-v in Windows Server:

• Live migration of machines Hyper-v replication Support for virtual fiber channel SR-IOVVHDX network configuration in shared mode Advanced memory management for virtual machines

As for the functions that we will only have available in Hyper-v Windows 10 they will be:

• Quick creation mode of virtual machines and VM gallery folder Shared network mode with NAT type host

Minimum requirements to run Hyper-v Windows 10

Another very important section that we must know to know if our virtual machines will run correctly will be the minimum requirements:

• Have one of the Windows 10 64-bit versions installed: Pro, Education Enterprise. Have a version of Windows Server 2008 R2 installed (we will need to download the package to install it) Have a version of Windows Server 2012 or 2016 4 GB of RAMCPU memory 64-bit with at least two or more cores At least 100 GB hard disk Intel VT-x support

The requirements will be variable depending on the virtual machine that we want to create and how many of them we want to have running on the host system. The greater the number, the more resources will be necessary.

This is all about what Hyper-V Windows 10 is, it is very useful to have a tool implemented natively in our operating system to be able to use it whenever we want. The next thing we should do is enable it.

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Did you have any problems activating Hyper-v? leave us in the comments your impressions about Hyper-v