Running Hyper-V Server/ESXi in Hyper-V role?

[riahc3]

Hello

I was thinking of running a VM on the Hyper-V role in 2012R2 that runs either ESXi or Hyper-V Server.

Is this type of nesting possible?

 

[Dahak]

Somewhat, there is some limitations/hacks that have to be done.

I had read that esxi running virtual esxi is possible but not supported

If you are running hyper-v (server or role) you will run into issues with networking and are limited to 32-bit guests as hyper-v will not pass along the visualization bits to the esxi vm guests.

Also you will have to customize the esxi iso to add the virtual nic drivers that hyper-v uses as they are not included any more in 5.5 or newer (can use 5.1 drivers)

I would not try this on your production server until you know what limitations/gotchas there are

 

[RFC Rudel]

what is your requirement?

hyperv in 2012r2 work very well, only problem is usb devices like software keys. (documented limitation), that can be mitigated using a usb sharig tool.