1. Guides & Tutorials
  2. Linode Platform
  3. KVM Reference

KVM Reference

Updated by Josh Sager

Linode’s virtualization stack supports KVM as well as Xen. Along with the increased performance of KVM virtualization, several details are different between Xen and KVM Linodes.

What’s Changed?

Block Device Assignment

Device assignments for Xen Linodes were labeled as:

  • /dev/xvda
  • /dev/xvdb
  • /dev/xvdc

KVM Linodes use the “sd” naming convention:

  • /dev/sda
  • /dev/sdb
  • /dev/sdc

Console

On KVM Linodes, the console device moves from hvc0 in Xen to ttyS0 .

Virtual Machine Mode

Virtual machine mode determines whether devices inside your virtual machine are paravirtualized or fully virtualized. The differences are listed below:

  Paravirtualization Full-virtualization
Block Virtio SCSI IDE
Net Virtio Net e1000
Serial ttyS0 ttyS0

If you’re unfamiliar with these distinctions, choose paravirtualization

Custom Kernel Configuration

If you want to build your own guest kernel, you must include the following modules:

  • KVM Guest
  • Enable Virtio drivers
  • IDE support (for full virtualization)
  • e1000 support (for full virtualization)

For standard paravirtualized KVM Linodes, add the following to your kernel .config file:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
CONFIG_KVM_GUEST=y
CONFIG_VIRTIO_PCI=y
CONFIG_VIRTIO_PCI_LEGACY=y
CONFIG_SCSI_VIRTIO=y
CONFIG_VIRTIO_NET=y
CONFIG_SERIAL_8250=y
CONFIG_SERIAL_8250_CONSOLE=y

For full virtualization, use the following parameters:

1
2
3
4
CONFIG_E1000=y
CONFIG_ATA_PIIX=y
CONFIG_SERIAL_8250=y
CONFIG_SERIAL_8250_CONSOLE=y

You should also move your block device assignments to be sequential, without skipped block devices.

Direct Disk Boot

An upgrade to KVM Linode includes the ability to do Direct Disk booting. Choosing Direct Disk means we will boot the Linode using the Master Boot Record on your boot device:

Direct Disk Boot Mode.

How to Enable KVM

There are two ways to enable KVM mode for your Linodes:

  • Existing Linode: If your Linode is currently running on Xen, go to the Linode’s Dashboard page. In the bottom right of the sidebar is an “Upgrade to KVM” link. Click on the link and follow the instructions to upgrade:

    The KVM Upgrade Button.

  • Future Linodes: You can configure your user account to automatically create new Linodes using KVM. To do this, go to your Linode Manager, then the Account tab, and then click on the Account Settings link. On the Account Settings page is a section called Hypervisor Preference. Set the preference to KVM and submit the form.

    Setting the account settings for the KVM hypervisor.

Troubleshooting

There have been a few minor issues reported when upgrading to KVM. If you’re using any of the Linux distributions listed below and encounter an issue, please read on. If you are running a different distribution, or encounter an issue not listed here, please contact Support.

CentOS 6

There are some reported cases of Linodes running CentOS 6.X that lose network connectivity after upgrading. To resolve this issue, open the LISH Console and run:

1
rm -f /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules

Then reboot the Linode.

Arch Linux

An upstream change to persistent device naming in systemd has resulted in broken connectivity for Linodes running Arch Linux on KVM hosts. The latest version of systemd (226-1+) uses “Predictable Network Interface Names”, which prevent the network interface on our platform from being brought online at boot.

You can disable the use of Predictable Network Interface Names with the command below. 

1
ln -s /dev/null /etc/udev/rules.d/80-net-setup-link.rules

If have already upgraded and lost connectivity to your Linode, you will need to use the LISH Console to regain access to your Linode to run this command. Once you’ve done so, reboot your system.

This guide is published under a CC BY-ND 3.0 license.