
Native virtualization for macOS - hajderr
https://veertu.com
======
mrmondo
I've tried this as I was really excited after hearing about fusions
discontinuation and how incredibly poorly performing virtualbox IO and network
is.

I found it to be even slower than virtualbox which I have no idea how this is
possible. Tested on a late 2015 5k iMac top specced and a late 2015 MacBook
top specced both running OSX 10.11 at the time.

I will re-test the latest version with MacOS 10.12.

~~~
nailer
Totally different results here. I use a Surface Book now but on my Mac (2013
MBA) Veertu _destroyed_ VMware and VirtualBox for interactive latency.

Ie, VirtualBox and VMware were slow to the point I'd consider them unusable
(I'm latency sensitive, eg, I consider Eclipse to the be same and other people
think it's fine). Veertu made me actually test in Edge again.

Did you still have VMware or VirtualBox drivers installed? IIRC VMware doesn't
actually remove itself when you uninstall it, you have to remove the kmods
yourself.

~~~
dguaraglia
That is weird. I've used Virtualbox and VMWare on my MacBook Pros, and
interactive latency has always been indistinguishable from a native
application.

------
dragonshed
Well, I'm excited by the potential of having something better than Virtualbox
available for free.

I tried converting a linux vm I frequently use via vagrant just now, and it
seems to work well except for network bridging: You can't bridge over wifi.
Kindof a deal-breaker.

The relevant page[1] explains it thus: "Due to features of wireless protocol,
level 2 bridges don’t work over Wi-Fi, and so you can’t use wireless interface
of your Mac to route bridge traffic to external network – only among VMs and
host."

[1] [https://veertu.com/knowledgebase/vagrant-setup-
instructions/](https://veertu.com/knowledgebase/vagrant-setup-instructions/)

~~~
grav
I have a current `docker-compose`-based dev-setup, which I'd like to move out
of Docker for Mac because of instability and into a Linux VM.

One dirty detail is that the Docker containers need to communicate with the
host machine (the dev-Mac). Would this be achievable with the limited bridge
that Veertu supports?

~~~
mikewhy
I haven't tried it, but this has been around for a little while:
[https://github.com/zchee/docker-machine-driver-
xhyve](https://github.com/zchee/docker-machine-driver-xhyve)

------
maykr
I wonder what are its benefits in comparison to an OSS solution
[https://github.com/mist64/xhyve](https://github.com/mist64/xhyve) Here's the
link to the previous discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9690846](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9690846)

~~~
stephenr
My understanding is that xhyve isn't a "click and go" solution for most users.

Also, Veertu Desktop _is_ now free:
[https://github.com/veertuinc/vdhh](https://github.com/veertuinc/vdhh)

~~~
mayoff
The README indicates that repo is not for the entire product, just part of it:
“Veertu Desktop Hosted Hypervisor(VDHH) is the core hypervisor platform for
Veertu Desktop product." “… but to achieve full set of features, it have to be
launched by Veertu Desktop app.”

~~~
stephenr
Yeah that part threw me too, but their website does say:

"We are making Veertu Desktop Open source. It will be available on
[https://github.com/veertuinc/vdhh](https://github.com/veertuinc/vdhh) and
will continue to be developed and maintained."

Maybe a wording issue in the README, and the desktop app is intended to be
open source and built from (the|another) repo too?

~~~
izik_e
Hi, currently the hupervisor was opensourced, we are looking to open the ui
and the vagrant plugin as well, the reason we didnt put the ui in that project
was that wr beleived ot would be cleaner for the opensource community to have
cli hypervisor project. the only part we might have issue to opensource is our
windows drivers

~~~
bonzini
Izik, now that you open-sourced it, why don't you say that it is based on
QEMU? _Everybody_ knew it was, and anybody could have asked Apple to pull your
app from the store. It would be nice if you guys showed some appreciation for
the fact that QEMU developers didn't do that right away.

~~~
izik_e2
We will be happy to give credit, let me contact you to see how to do this the
best

~~~
bonzini
Thanks!

------
aroman
Awesome! Was hoping something like this would come along — has anyone used
this and can speak to their experience with it? In particular, what about
graphics performance?

~~~
hajderr
Just installed Debian with 1GB and 2 CPU, default settings. Runs smoothly and
install was easy. Haven't dived into advanced use yet though :). Definitely
promising!

~~~
aroman
Thanks for replying! Just to be clear, was this a text-only install, or a
graphical/GNOME one? I'm not sure what Debian's defaults are.

~~~
hajderr
Text only install. However I installed the GNOME desktop environment and it's
working fine.

------
thoughtsimple
Doesn't even minimally support macOS guests. This makes Veertu mostly useless
to me. Fusion support of macOS guests is pretty minimal but it does work.

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falcolas
How is support for this going to be funded? Will there be a commercial license
which will pop up later? Paid features? It would be great to have some
information.

I'm always leery of adopting a technology which will be fundamental to my work
environment when I don't know how long it will be supported, or if I will have
to change my use of it due to licensing issues.

~~~
gaius
The version that can run only images from their library is free-as-in-beer.
The version that you can create your own VMs with, is paid.

~~~
izik_e2
This version support everything that was in the paid version, so you get it
all for free.

~~~
gaius
Very cool! But what's the business model then?

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riobard
This is very nice! HiDPI mode works perfectly for Windows 10 guest (unlike
VirtualBox, which has weird graphic issues).

Unfortunately macOS Hypervisor.Framework does not support USB devices
([https://veertu.com/knowledgebase/usb-
support/](https://veertu.com/knowledgebase/usb-support/)), which makes Veertu
useless to me, as the only reason I use Windows VM is to attach stupid USB
tokens for certain banking use cases.

~~~
izik_e
We now support usb, try it. Note that we have a bug that make it work only
with mass stirage device, but we will release fix soon.

~~~
blacksmith_tb
Are you intending to offer a shared clipboard? That is quite useful for
running a guest OS with a GUI...

~~~
izik_e2
There is copy paste tools both for windows and linux

~~~
blacksmith_tb
Ah, I see the option now, which appears to be on by default. The test VM I
just set up (a clean install from ubuntu-gnome-16.04-desktop-amd64.iso)
doesn't copy or paste from host to guest or vice versa. I would be happy to
log an issue in Github, is there any debug info I should provide?

~~~
blacksmith_tb
I reached out to get their unreleased fix for this, after combing through the
knowledgebase[1] and it works! Overall it performs a little better than
Virtualbox in general for me, so far.

1: [https://veertu.com/knowledgebase/copypaste-linux-
vms/](https://veertu.com/knowledgebase/copypaste-linux-vms/)

------
gigatexal
I use this on my mac as well. Runs as good or better than virtual box or
vmwares offerings.

------
jhack
No support for storing VMs on an external drive? Not even symlinking seems to
work (VMs don't get saved to the list).

~~~
tmikaeld
Have you checked so it's not a user permission issue?

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weitzj
I just had an idea: What if the hypervisor framework prepares macOS to add a
future compatibility layer to run apps on X64 and ARM. "Like" a new version of
Rosetta (PowerPC on X86). But now maybe you can run iOS apps on macOS (you
probably could do this with BitCode ?)

~~~
petecox
The Verge have speculated [1] that the new Touch Bar found in the latest MBPs
is a gateway to running iOS apps natively, with no emulation.

[1] [http://www.theverge.com/2016/10/28/13454052/apple-macbook-
pr...](http://www.theverge.com/2016/10/28/13454052/apple-macbook-pro-touch-
bar-apple-watch-features)

~~~
sjwright
Almost certainly wrong. Someone's imbibing far too much what-if-juice.

------
raihansaputra
I know gaming is not the main pull of this, but would this be better than
parallels and fusion for gaming?

~~~
m_eiman
I don't think they have accelerated 3D graphics, so probably not. Unless you
play 2D games, of course :)

~~~
csydas
yeah, they don't look to have support for the graphics drivers like parallels
does, but for some older games that just need a lightweight Windows VM to run
on, it'd be fine. If it gets more active development, I'm sure it can grow,
but the idea seems to be using macOS's native hypervisor function instead.

------
maxforce
Site's down - here's the download link:
[https://d2sje6b9huarvp.cloudfront.net/VeertuDesktop.dmg](https://d2sje6b9huarvp.cloudfront.net/VeertuDesktop.dmg)

~~~
raihansaputra
Heads up, site is up again right now.

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rcarmo
Anyone know if this interacts OK with Docker beta? that uses xhyve as well, so
before I install both I'd like to make sure nothing breaks.

~~~
izik_e2
yea, it is working togather

~~~
shykes
If you hit any issues on the Docker side, let us know on the support forums
and we'll fix it.

------
tedmiston
Veertu looks interesting and very lightweight. Can someone help me understand
how it relates to the Docker for Mac beta app?

------
Graphon1
Why would I switch from VirtualBox ?

~~~
oddevan
In theory? Veertu uses the built-in Hypervisor.framework from macOS, so it can
run without installing a kernel extension. I think they're still working on
building out features, but for my basic needs I prefer it on that basis alone.

