Issues getting Hyper-V Dynamic Memory to work in Win 2008 R2 SP1
On Wednesday Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7 Service Pack 1 was made available for Technet and MSDN subscribers. It will be available as a public download Feb 22nd.
The dynamic memory feature is a huge benefit to our business model at Vaasnet so I was eager to download and try it out. During the beta and RC cycle, dynamic memory only worked for certain operating systems and editions. Web and Standard editions weren’t supported, but were promised for final release.
First off, the download is large and the install is very slow. In fact it takes longer to upgrade the Service Pack than it does for the initial installation. Windows 7 SP1 took about 1/2 hour on my new desktop computer, and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 took about 1/2 hour on one server and took well over an hour on two other servers. In fact, a warning message during the install says that it can take an hour or more and require one or more reboots.
The install was very clean and you have the option to have the installer reboot automatically. This means that you can accept the license and a couple next/next buttons to kick it off and walk away and it will complete it to 100% without any further interaction. That makes up for the long install time.
Anyway, back to my real issue.
After upgrading the host I wanted to test dynamic memory on some Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard edition VMs. During the beta cycle you simply needed to upgrade the Integration Services components for editions like Enterprise edition, so I assumed that was all that was needed here.
As a side, there are already many great articles and walkthroughs available on how to do this. Here are some good links for further information on this topic:
- http://www.hyper-v.nu/blogs/hans/?p=433
- http://msmvps.com/blogs/jeffloucks/archive/2010/08/22/dynamics-memory-for-hyper-v-how-to-sp1-for-windows-7-and-2008-r2.aspx
- http://www.jackcobben.nl/?p=915
Try as I might, I couldn’t get the dynamic memory to work. Memory Demand and Memory Status fields didn’t populate and the OS didn’t change the memory level. The new columns appeared on the server after upgrading the Host server, but nothing on the guests.
I read and re-read all posts available to date and I ensured that I had the key elements completed successfully:
- upgraded Integration Services on the guest
- powered off the VM and set dynamic memory range from 512 to 4096
No luck. So, I figured there must be something in the release notes that would give me a clue. Finally, and it wasn’t easy to find, I found my answer.
It turns out that simply upgrading the Integration Services components isn’t enough for certain editions of the OS! You MUST upgrade to Service Pack 1 on the guest for Windows Server 2008 R2 Web and Standard editions. And you may also need to perform one extra reboot after the install.
After that it worked!
I’m sure this information will be easier to find in the coming days and weeks, but for those that find this blog post first, here’s the key link: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff817651(WS.10).aspx
And, here’s my version of the chart summarizing the requirements for the different editions.
Guest OS | Edition (32-bit and 64-bit) | Enlightenment Requirements |
Windows Vista (with SP1) | Ultimate Enterprise | Only - Upgrade Integration Services |
Windows 7 | Ultimate Enterprise | Either - Install SP1 in the guest OS - Upgrade Integration Services |
Windows 2003 Server (with SP2) | Standard Web Enterprise Datacenter | Only - Upgrade Integration Services |
Windows 2003 Server R2 (with SP2) | Standard Web Enterprise Datacenter | Only - Upgrade Integration Services |
Windows Server 2008 (with SP2) | Web Standard | Only - Upgrade Integration Services - Plus install hotfix in article 2230887 |
Windows Server 2008 (with SP2) | Enterprise Datacenter | Only - Upgrade Integration Services |
Windows Server 2008 R2 | Web Standard | Only option (here’s the surprise) - Install SP1 in the guest OS |
Windows Server 2008 R2 | Enterprise Datacenter | Either - Install SP1 in the guest OS - Upgrade Integration Services |
The key takeaway is that Windows Server 2008 R2 Web and Standard Editions require Service Pack 1. Unlike all other OSes and editions, they will not work simply by upgrading the Integration Services.
Furthermore, after installing SP1 on the guest, it still didn’t work for me. I had to do one further reboot after the install completed! It seems that the SP1 upgrade installs everything, but one more reboot was required to activate the new functionality.
When it’s working, it works great! Hopefully this helps someone else that made the same assumptions that I did.