Motorola Trunking Controller Virtualization

[Dax50]

Hey Guys,

does anybody tried to virtualize Motorola Trunking Controller like Smartnet, CPX2000, MTC etc. ?

The Controller is Sparc Hardware with Solaris 6. So virtualization could be possible with Qemu.

However, I fail because of the network interface that a real controller has.

Has anyone here ever done something similar?

The installation of the server software should not be a problem.

Thanks for all ideas

 

[jeepsandradios]

The entire P25 trunk system master and prime sites are virtualized now. Back in the Smartnet days most just added a Smart X box and used the ZC from the 7.x system.

 

[Dax50]

Interesting.
My Idea was to virtualize a Dimetra Gen1 Zone Controller because they are really rare.

 

[TampaTyron]

Was hoping this was a Cap Max discussion..... TT

 

[NavyBOFH]

However, I fail because of the network interface that a real controller has.

That will be the biggest issue to overcome. That will likely take custom configuration of Qemu and maybe some other Solaris config changes to get network mapping correct. Past that I don't see why the software technically couldn't run virtualized on modern hardware.

At the time of its release that hardware, OS, etc was chosen to ensure the most minimal compute latency for live audio/call processing. As long as you aren't running into resource contention issues on your virtualization host that shouldn't be a concern... but network mapping will be the tough one.

 

[Dax50]

That will be the biggest issue to overcome. That will likely take custom configuration of Qemu and maybe some other Solaris config changes to get network mapping correct. Past that I don't see why the software technically couldn't run virtualized on modern hardware.

At the time of its release that hardware, OS, etc was chosen to ensure the most minimal compute latency for live audio/call processing. As long as you aren't running into resource contention issues on your virtualization host that shouldn't be a concern... but network mapping will be the tough one.

I know which interfaces are needed for the ZC. There are four interfaces with different names. I can't even manage to create an interface for Solaris. The next problem is that qemu seems to support only one nic

 

[NavyBOFH]

I know which interfaces are needed for the ZC. There are four interfaces with different names. I can't even manage to create an interface for Solaris. The next problem is that qemu seems to support only one nic

Sadly that sounds like a limitation of the virtualization engine. I am used to Proxmox and other hypervisors that use Qemu in the backend but not sure if any of them allow more than one NIC.

The alternative would be using dedicated hardware and just finding out which surplus boxes out there run with the least drama - Solaris boxes are CHEAP right now.

 

[Dax50]

Sadly that sounds like a limitation of the virtualization engine. I am used to Proxmox and other hypervisors that use Qemu in the backend but not sure if any of them allow more than one NIC.

The alternative would be using dedicated hardware and just finding out which surplus boxes out there run with the least drama - Solaris boxes are CHEAP right now.

Right.
The other way could be resolve VLAN Inside of the Solaris OS. Qemu can handle one nic with multiple vlan