VirtualBox under FreeNAS?

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Stilez

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My current Windows server does file serving and a few other minor server things. I'd like to move to FreeNAS and put Windows under VirtualBox on FreeNAS for the minor tasks (it has plenty of CPU/RAM). I've got a few questions:

  1. Is running Windows in VB under FreeNAS as simple as "install VB, run phpVB, follow the prompts, and optionally do any other config", or is there more to it?

  2. I've read about jails and have the basic concept. Do I need to set VB to run in a jail for best protection/isolation of the main FreeNAS system+zfs file server processes/storage volumes, if so how?

  3. Are the VM containers kept on the main zfs volume or isolated on a separate volume? Any advantages to the latter?

  4. How do I arrange specific device passthrough for exclusive use of a given VM? Four kinds of devices I would actually use:
    * Dedicated HDD for a specific VM (so the HDD is actually NTFS/ReFS and not just NTFS/ReFS-in-a-virtualised-container)
    * USB mouse/kb/flash stick
    * Dedicated video card (so I can manage FreeNAS on one display and direct Windows VM to another)
    * A not-so-common PCIe card used by Windows s/w, which won't have a FreeBSD driver and needs to be 'seen' directly by the VM.
Much appreciated - thank you!
 
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Ericloewe

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  • How do I arrange specific device passthrough for exclusive use of a given VM? Four kinds of devices I would actually use:
    * Dedicated HDD for a specific VM (so the HDD is actually NTFS/ReFS and not just NTFS/ReFS-in-a-virtualised-container)
    * USB mouse/kb/flash stick
    * Dedicated video card (so I can manage FreeNAS on one display and direct Windows VM to another)
    * A not-so-common PCIe card used by Windows s/w, which won't have a FreeBSD driver and needs to be 'seen' directly by the VM.
I'm fairly certain you don't.
 

pirateghost

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1. Yes?
2. The VB plugin is a jail.
3. Jails are placed wherever you want them as long as it's on a pool that the freenas OS isn't installed on.
4. You don't
 

Stilez

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Thanks, that helps a lot!
Pity about pass-through. What's the issue there - I understand VB generally can handle passthrough, is this wrong, or is it possible but "out of scope" for discussing on the forum here?
 
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