[plug] Request for Comment - need suggestions and clue-bats

[Onno Benschop]

Hi Steve, thank you for your thoughts. How would I run VMware in this
scenario?

On 27 February 2017 at 13:54, steve boak <sboak at westnet.com.au> wrote:

> Hi Onno
>
> I think Linux has changed a bit since your early experiences :-)
>
> I've been running Debian on everything from a Raspberry Pi to several
> different desktop systems for years and can't remember the last time I had
> stability issues. There were some early glitches with skylake on my current
> Asrock B150M Pro4 motherboard, but that was only to do with slow booting
> and after a firmware update they have 'gone away' now.
>
> I'd recommend you give Linux a go on new hardware, especially if you can
> get your hands on a system to do a test run for a while.
>
> I'm sure others will have recommendations of laptop / desktop hardware
> that is proven to work.
>
> Steve
>
> On 27/02/17 13:31, Onno Benschop wrote:
>
> As a Linux user for many years - debian potato anyone? I've had my fair
> share of "fun" in relation to making a stable environment. In 2009 after
> too many crashes I bit the bullet and virtualised my Linux experience. I
> bought a 17" MacBook Pro, installed VMware Fusion on it and ran my Linux
> desktop inside VMware. I still do. Best business decision I ever made.
>
> Based on that track record, I'm reluctant to depreciate my use of VMware
> on a Mac, but my last 8 months have been less than optimal. I purchased a
> late 2015 27" Retina iMac and loaded it up with 64Gb of RAM. It's currently
> running El Capitain.
>
> It crashes an awful lot. OWC have swapped out the RAM and tell me that
> there is nothing wrong. Apple told me that they don't support 64Gb of RAM,
> OWC says othewise. VMware tells me that the microcode on the SkyLake
> processor is out of date, Intel agrees and Apple waves its hands in the air
> in the hope I won't notice that they're not actually doing anything.
>
> I'm loathe to run Windows as my Host OS, and it's unclear if the boot
> process would load a microcode update for the processor, so I could
> actually see if that made a difference. Similarly, I'm not keen to go to a
> Linux Host, since prior to 2009, that resulted in countless days and weeks
> of downtime when <insert random hardware> stopped being supported or wasn't
> quite compatible with my hardware and again I'm not sure I'll get a
> boot-level microcode update via that mechanism.
>
> I'm at a loss what to do next and I'm looking for suggestions.
>
> Functionality I use daily:
>
>    - Linux as my Desktop
>    - VMware snapshots to test new software / test updates
>    - VMware machines for different clients
>
> I'm seriously contemplating selling my near new iMac and starting again,
> but I'm not at all sure what that might look like. I have work to do and my
> current set-up just isn't helping.
>
> Is there something I should investigate, some aspect of what I'm doing
> that is in need of review?
>
> From a troubleshooting perspective, I've swapped out RAM until I was blue
> in the face. So far I can make Memtest86 pass if I turn off all but one CPU
> core. I can reliably make my machine crash by running OSX Photos and
> exporting a 1080p slideshow and VMware randomly crashes with spurious
> errors - sometimes killing VMware, sometimes the login session, sometimes
> the kernel.
> --
> Onno Benschop
>
> ()/)/)()        ..ASCII for Onno..
> |>>?            ..EBCDIC for Onno..
> --- -. -. ---   ..Morse for Onno..
>
> If you need to know: "What computer should I buy?" http://goo.gl/spsb66
>
> ITmaze   -   ABN: 56 178 057 063   -  ph: 04 1219 8888   -
> onno at itmaze.com.au
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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>
>
> --
> Steve Boak, VK6HSB, 0411 255 789, P.O. Box 240, Nannup, WA 6275
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> PLUG discussion list: plug at plug.org.au
> http://lists.plug.org.au/mailman/listinfo/plug
> Committee e-mail: committee at plug.org.au
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>



-- 
Onno Benschop

()/)/)()        ..ASCII for Onno..
|>>?            ..EBCDIC for Onno..
--- -. -. ---   ..Morse for Onno..

If you need to know: "What computer should I buy?" http://goo.gl/spsb66

ITmaze   -   ABN: 56 178 057 063   -  ph: 04 1219 8888   -
onno at itmaze.com.au
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