Sony Vaio SZ28GP/C and Intel VT technology -- help needed

Hi, friends, I need some help!

Does anybody have any idea whether Phoenix BIOS R0083N0 on Sony Vaio laptop SZ28GP/C (Intel Core Duo Processor T2500, Intel 945GM Express Chipset) has Intel VT (virtualization technology) enabled by default?

When I check BIOS (after power on the machine, did F2), there is no such option either to enable VT or disable VT.

Thank you in advance!

 

Btw, according to Intel, T2500 processor is VT capable. It just needs BIOS support etc. But I really don't know how to do that with my BIOS...

 

Yeah, I was a little disappointed about this also. Have the same model (Aus, SZ28GP). Even went to the extent of sending a query off to Sony...

Whether or not this ever happens is anyone guess. Interestingly enough, if you chuck a linux live CD in the cpuinfo shows the "vmx" cpu flag, indicating that it does actually support hardware virtualisation. I have yet to test it under linux, however I was reading somewhere that someone got Xen to boot up windows (which requires HW virtualisation).

 

Thanks for your info, locks! We should launch a multi-national request to urge them to upgrage BIOS!

As to linux, I don't know whether a live CD is different, but I am running installed SUSE 10.0 and /proc/cpuinfo does not show vmx flag on. Each time I try to run a linux domain in true virtualization mode, my laptop just shows me black screen and reboots!

I will try live CD a bit later just in case it works...

BTW, please allow me to quote your post in forums.suselinuxsupport.de where I posted same question.

 

I've got a SZ260P and have the same problem. Virtual PC 2007 says VT is disabled on my system. I emailed sony about it as well and posted a msg about it on a Microsoft employee blog. He said they're working on getting laptop manufacturers to provide that option.

 

i have bought the AR-21S _because_ of the core 2 duo VT technology! It's not working with VM Ware Server under Windows-XP. I need to try it with linux (but the raid controller is not supported under linux: i see 2 seperate harddisks)

can you post a link/email address where i can send my query to?

cheers,
treb

 

does this mean that VT is enabled by default:

processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 15
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz
stepping : 6
cpu MHz : 1000.000
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 1
core id : 255
cpu cores : 1
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe nx lm constant_tsc pni monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 cx16 xtpr lahf_lm
bogomips : 3997.81

processor : 1
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 15
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz
stepping : 6
cpu MHz : 1000.000
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 1
siblings : 1
core id : 255
cpu cores : 1
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe nx lm constant_tsc pni monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 cx16 xtpr lahf_lm
bogomips : 3990.41

 

I bought my laptop in Singapore and query can be sent to [email protected].

 

This also puzzles me. I thought flags are static in the sense that no matter what operating system you use you will always see the same set of flags. When I boot into SUSE 10.0, I cannot see the magic vmx flag so I was once very disappointed since without vmx flag I thought VT could not have been enabled in BIOS.

However, recently I followed locks' suggestion and tried booting with SLED 10 live CD. After booting, vmx flag showed up in cpuinfo!

So I really don't know what to do.

If your cpuinfo has vmx flag and you are not using live CD, would you like to install a virtual domain and see if it works? Hope you have good news for us!

 

this confuses me too!

i'm not very experienced with vt technology so what do you mean with a virtual domain?

i plan to install ubuntu linux (6.10 desktop) onto an external usb harddisk. then i'll install vmware server and see whats happening. is there anything i have to care about when installing linux on a external drive e.g. bios settings for booting from usb? otherwise i have to repartition my whole raid0 and that will take a looong time ;-)

 

I had no luck installing ubunt on a external USB harddisk. After that it was quite hard to get a WindowsXP Boot CD which was able to access the Raid to run "fixmbr" ....

 

Good to see the fight is still continuing! Would like to urge all those with Vaio's interested in virtualisation to email sony support.

Virtual_Square: Not sure what the deal is with Suse 10.0. Your right, whether your using a live CD or not shouldn't matter at all. Finally got around to partioning my hard drive for ubuntu 6.10, and "cat /proc/cpuinfo" still shows the vmx flag.


Finally found that link with Xen/WinXP/SonySZ

If you scroll down to the comments he's got a link to the installation process he used for Ubuntu on a Sony SZ.

One of these days I'll give into the temptation to mess with my kernel and get Xen going. Its just all running so nicely now - Ubuntu 6.10, beryl, VMware.

 

i'll try a life cd for XEN 3.0.3 :
http://www.xensource.com/download/dl_303cd.html

the results will be posted in the near future!

 

Oh, that's just a term used by Xen. The base operating system is called Dom0, on top of which you can run instances of other operating systems and those are called (virtual) domain 1, 2, ..., etc.

Without hardware VT enabled, each of the virtual operating systems has to be Xen-modified, e.g. you cannot simply install Redhat (or Windows, FreeBSD etc) into SUSE base but only Xen-modified Redhat into SUSE base (base is always Xen-modified). This is clearly not ideal.

With hardware support, you can (or at least Xen claims you can) easily install any operating system into base system. People have had success running Windows on SUSE for example.

Now you can see why I am so sad in front of my Vaio?

 

Thanks for letting me know VMware Server is free out there. I was tempted the other way from Xen and installed it on my laptop under SUSE10 and created a virtual machine and installed SUSE10 into it yesternight!

I have not played around with it much but at first sight it looks cool. KDE runs in VGA in vm, much better than text mode I was getting with Xen.

Although not fully open source, I can live with if it is free and cute (and btw without VT)...

 

how can i see if VT is anabled? installing another virtual machine (windowsXP) ist not possible with this CD. so whats now?

 

Bad News:
Intel® Virtualization Technology is not supported on VAIO

found here:
http://www.vaio-link.com/specifications/specifications.asp?l=en&category=0&serie=VGN-AR&m=2418

shame on sony!!!

 

Hi, trebiani, bad news indeed! I also saw somewhere else people urging HP to enable VT in laptop BIOS. Looks like we have to wait for some time.

Meanwhile, you should also try VMware. I followed locks' advise and installed it. It's great and it does not require Intel VT or AMD-V enabled.

 

i use vmware server - it's working great but i heard it could run much better with vt enabled. well, we have to wait ;-)