Over the years, the usage of Virtual servers is so popular among the enterprise segment, but in recent past tech people started to use Virtual Private Server(VPS) for better performance. Moreover, the usage of the virtual server is commonly high among Linux users. The main reason would be the easiness of using windows software in the Virtual Machine by the Linux users to avoid dual booting.
If you are a beginner to a virtual private server, then this might be your million-dollar question, whether I can boot my virtual private server? Well, we have detailed the answer to that question in the upcoming section along by elaborating on the usage of a Virtual Private Server(VPS).
Before getting in-depth, let us brush up on some basis.
What is a Virtual server(VPS)?
As the name suggests, it is virtual representation or emulation of a single physical computer that can literally be termed as a guest and the physical machine on which it runs referred to as the host. With the aid of a Virtual server, you can able to install an operating system inside an existing/installed operating system on a computer.
In general, Virtual Server categorized into three ways such as
- Private Virtual server: In basic, a person who creates a virtual server can only be able to view and manage. However, by using My Workspace group creators can able to add users.
- Shared Virtual server: As the name suggests, after creating a virtual server granting permission to other specific sets of users to view/manage the machine is known as a shared virtual server.
- Public Virtual server: It somehow similar to the shared virtual server, however, here there are no limits on sharing the virtual server and it’s totally open to all users.
Well, setting up a virtual server(VPS) on a physical computer is absolutely free and with some amount of tech mind, you can do is at easily.
Who Needs a Virtual server?
Creating a Virtual server can be done with the aid of available modern software like VirtualBox, VMWare Workstation PRO, Parallel Desktop, Virtualization Tool, and so. We are not getting into that topic since we are mainly focused on booting Virtual Private server(VPS).
However, you should be aware of these below listed practical advantages of using a Virtual Server.
- To try a New Operating System Within the Existing One
- To Run Old or Incompatible Software
- To Execute Malwares Deliberately
- To Create a Backup
- To Clone Your System To Another Machine
- To Develop/Test New Software/Application
- To Create a Personal Cloud Computer
Can I Boot Virtual Private server(VPS)?
Yes! You can boot. However, you need a few other additional software aids to boot successfully.
Wondering about how to boot a VMware virtual server from a USB Drive? Here are the steps to be followed for booting Virtual Private Server on your physical computer.
By default, VMWare software does not have any option in BIOS to boot from USB drives. Sometimes you may found that VMware is booting from some of your USB drives but VMware doesn’t support all the USB drives.
To Overcome this users can use PLOOP ISO image to access a boot menu which enables users to boot from USB drives but there is another alternative that you can try to boot your virtual server from USB Drive.
Steps To Follow
- First, connect your USB Drive open the settings window from the VM menu click the Add button click yes if prompted by user account control from the hardware types list select hard disk.
- Now click Next from the virtual disk type choose as C s I and click Next from the select disk window select use a physical disk for advanced users.
- By click Next from the device drop-down menu select the physical drive-by number to confirm which one is your USB Drive.
- Now open elevated command prompt type disk part and hit Enter key in disk part typeless disk and hit enter now note down the disk number and choose the same in VMware.
- In VMWare under usage option, choose to use the entire disk and click next to choose the default location to save your virtual disk file and click finish.
- From the VM menu select the power option and then click the ‘Power on to Firmware’ option or ‘Switch ON the Power’ on your virtual server and tap the F2 key.
- To enter into BIOS make sure you let the virtual server grab your keyboard by pressing ctrl + G key or clicking inside the virtual server when it get turns on or you can click grab input from the menu else the keystrokes may get ignored.
- In BIOS select the boot menu to select hard drive and press plus(+) sign to move it to upwards press ENTER on the hard drive and here move the hard drive that you created earlier to the top position by pressing plus sign from the keyboard that’s it.
- Now exit and save the changes in BIOS v and where we’ll assume your USB Drive as a second hard drive and we’ll start booting from it.
Ashok Arora is CEO and Founder of eWebGuru a leading web hosting company of India. He is a tech enthusiast with more than 25 years of experience in Internet and Technology.
Ashok is Master in Electronics from a leading Indian university.
Ashok loves to write on cloud, servers, datacenter, virtualisation technology.
