Posts Tagged ‘Virtual Hardware’

USB Auto mapping to Windows VM under KVM does not work

Wednesday, November 21st, 2018

Let me first say, that it does work for Linux guest. It doesn’t work on Windows guest because there is a know bug (/issue) with the default hardware layout – made of i440FX BIOS. VirtManager would not allow us to replace the settings, so we need to create the VM ourselves using XML. You can export your XML settings (of an existing VM) using the command

virsh dumpxml  > /tmp/VM_NAME.xml

There are relevant fields there which you might want to save for later, like MAC addresses, network settings, and so on.

You can use this XML file to build your VM anew. Note that you will want to modify the network settings, the name and the UUID. Also – you will need a newer QEMU command (through the package qemu-system-x86), you can find in the Centos updates repository, . It has been providing me with /usr/bin/qemu-system-x86_64 command, which I am using, instead of the default qemu command used by default by VirtManager.

My Windows VM XML file (as a reference you can copy and use) is provided below. Major modifications are required to the hardware settings of the Windows VM – moving from PCI to PCIE, changing from IDE to SATA or VirtIO – and the provided XML gives a good reference of how this file should look like. This was taken from a machine tested to allow USB hot-add/remove via the method provided in my previous post.

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<domain type='kvm' id='1'>
  <name>Windows</name>                             <!-- Change the name to match your settings -->
  <uuid>9a10dc43-5c39-411d-8dc9-f6c6b849d212</uuid> <!-- Make sure you change the UUID. Dont have duplicates -->
  <memory unit='KiB'>4194304</memory>
  <currentMemory unit='KiB'>4194304</currentMemory>
  <vcpu placement='static'>2</vcpu>
  <resource>
    <partition>/machine</partition>
  </resource>
  <os>
    <type arch='x86_64' machine='pc-q35-2.0'>hvm</type> <!-- This is the key part - using different machine type -->
  </os>
  <features>
    <acpi/>
    <apic/>
    <hyperv>
      <relaxed state='on'/>
      <vapic state='on'/>
      <spinlocks state='on' retries='8191'/>
    </hyperv>
  </features>
  <clock offset='localtime'>
    <timer name='rtc' tickpolicy='catchup'/>
    <timer name='pit' tickpolicy='delay'/>
    <timer name='hpet' present='no'/>
    <timer name='hypervclock' present='yes'/>
  </clock>
  <on_poweroff>destroy</on_poweroff>
  <on_reboot>restart</on_reboot>
  <on_crash>destroy</on_crash>
  <pm>
    <suspend-to-mem enabled='no'/>
    <suspend-to-disk enabled='no'/>
  </pm>
  <devices>
    <emulator>/usr/bin/qemu-system-x86_64</emulator> <!-- This is important! -->
    <disk type='file' device='disk'>
      <driver name='qemu' type='qcow2'/>
      <source file='/var/images/Windows-test1.qcow2'/>  <!-- Point to the right file. It can be raw or qcow2, so change the line above accordingly -->
      <backingStore/>
      <target dev='sda' bus='sata'/> <!-- I have used SATA and not VirtIO, because the later requires drivers on Windows. I will need to handle that in the future, but for our example, it should work -->
      <alias name='sata0-0-0'/>
      <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='0' target='0' unit='0'/>
    </disk>
    <disk type='file' device='cdrom'>
      <driver name='qemu' type='raw'/>
      <backingStore/>
      <target dev='sdb' bus='sata'/>
      <readonly/>
      <boot order='1'/>
      <alias name='sata0-0-1'/>
      <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='0' target='0' unit='1'/>
    </disk>
    <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-ehci1'>
      <alias name='usb'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x05' function='0x7'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-uhci1'>
      <alias name='usb'/>
      <master startport='0'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x05' function='0x0' multifunction='on'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-uhci2'>
      <alias name='usb'/>
      <master startport='2'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x05' function='0x1'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='usb' index='0' model='ich9-uhci3'>
      <alias name='usb'/>
      <master startport='4'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x05' function='0x2'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='pci' index='0' model='pcie-root'>
      <alias name='pcie.0'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='pci' index='1' model='dmi-to-pci-bridge'>
      <model name='i82801b11-bridge'/>
      <alias name='pci.1'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x1e' function='0x0'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='pci' index='2' model='pci-bridge'>
      <model name='pci-bridge'/>
      <target chassisNr='2'/>
      <alias name='pci.2'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x00' function='0x0'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='pci' index='3' model='pcie-root-port'>
      <model name='ioh3420'/>
      <target chassis='3' port='0x10'/>
      <alias name='pci.3'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x02' function='0x0'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='virtio-serial' index='0'>
      <alias name='virtio-serial0'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x06' function='0x0'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='sata' index='0'>
      <alias name='ide'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x1f' function='0x2'/>
    </controller>
    <interface type='bridge'>
      <mac address='11:12:14:12:a1:03'/>  <!-- Change the MAC address! -->
      <source bridge='bridge'/>
      <model type='rtl8139'/>    <!-- Also wanted VirtIO, but needs drivers -->
      <alias name='net0'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x02' slot='0x03' function='0x0'/>
    </interface>
    <serial type='pty'>
      <source path='/dev/pts/10'/>
      <target port='0'/>
      <alias name='serial0'/>
    </serial>
    <console type='pty' tty='/dev/pts/10'>
      <source path='/dev/pts/10'/>
      <target type='serial' port='0'/>
      <alias name='serial0'/>
    </console>
    <channel type='spicevmc'>
      <target type='virtio' name='com.redhat.spice.0'/>
      <alias name='channel0'/>
      <address type='virtio-serial' controller='0' bus='0' port='1'/>
    </channel>
    <input type='tablet' bus='usb'>
      <alias name='input0'/>
      <address type='usb' bus='0' port='1'/>
    </input>
    <input type='mouse' bus='ps2'>
      <alias name='input1'/>
    </input>
    <input type='keyboard' bus='ps2'>
      <alias name='input2'/>
    </input>
    <graphics type='spice' port='5900' autoport='yes' listen='127.0.0.1'>
      <listen type='address' address='127.0.0.1'/>
      <image compression='off'/>
    </graphics>
    <sound model='ich6'>
      <alias name='sound0'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x04' function='0x0'/>
    </sound>
    <video>
      <model type='qxl' ram='65536' vram='65536' vgamem='16384' heads='1' primary='yes'/>
      <alias name='video0'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x01' function='0x0'/>
    </video>
    <redirdev bus='usb' type='spicevmc'>
      <alias name='redir0'/>
      <address type='usb' bus='0' port='2'/>
    </redirdev>
    <redirdev bus='usb' type='spicevmc'>
      <alias name='redir1'/>
      <address type='usb' bus='0' port='3'/>
    </redirdev>
    <memballoon model='virtio'>
      <stats period='5'/>
      <alias name='balloon0'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x01' slot='0x07' function='0x0'/>
    </memballoon>
  </devices>
  <seclabel type='none' model='none'/>
  <seclabel type='dynamic' model='dac' relabel='yes'>
    <label>+107:+107</label>
    <imagelabel>+107:+107</imagelabel>
  </seclabel>
</domain>

Now just import the VM using

virsh define /tmp/NEW_MACHINE.xml

and your changes are available via VirtManager, where you can edit (some of them).

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