VMware workstation Cores and thread. Explanation?

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I was running Ubuntu on my vmware workstation. I have an i7 Desktop with 16GB ram. I had allocated around 3GB for running ubunu on my vmware workstation. I was facing issues when loading folders with large number of files. i started facing issues when dragging windows and it started to hand.

Now i am using Xubuntu and the problem is a bit less but still facing problem.

I would like to know if its to do with the cores and threads. Using an OS inside a vmware workstatison doesn't feel as smooth as working on a host environment.

Initially i set the cores to 1 and threads to 4. Performance (i mean when opening folders with large number of files / when running multiple applications) was laggy

Then i set the cores to 2 and threads to 2 . Performance seems to be ok But i am not satisfied when opening multiple applications. ALT tab started to get buggy.

Then i set the cores to 4 and threads to 1. Perfomance was very buggy.

What is the proper cores and thread configuration and how is it related to the guest machine performance ? can any one explain it please.

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vmwarevmware-workstation

1 Answers

1
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I would like to know if its to do with the cores and threads. Using an OS inside a vmware workstatison doesn't feel as smooth as working on a host environment.

Well, you've got the point: you are using a virtual guest. Of course a lot of things don't work as well as on "real" hardware; for example, unless you configure things and all involved components support this, there will be hardly any graphics acceleration inside the guest. This can be a significant problem if you're using a GUI that heavily relies on that -- GNOME shell is one of these. Notice that this is not really much about CPU; it's about the way the VM and the outer world communicate, in two ways:

  • hardware acceleration
  • VM-to-human interface

The second point might, in many cases, simply be something like a framebuffer that you look at through something that is similar to a VNC connection.

Generally, I'm a big fan of virtualization, if done cleverly: These problems don't apply to VMs that have the primary job of offering some service or automated test platform. When shuffling around files, I'd simply consider using a remote access to my VM (eg. SSH/SCP, CIFS mounts, NFS), and doing that from my host system.