Enable nested virtualization on a template virtual machine in Azure Lab Services

• 10/04/2019
• 3 minutes to read
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Currently, Azure Lab Services enables you to set up one template virtual machine in a lab and make a single copy available to each of your users. If you are a professor teaching networking, security, or IT classes, you may need to provide each of your students with an environment in which multiple virtual machines can talk to each other over a network.

Nested virtualization enables you to create a multi-VM environment inside a lab’s template virtual machine. Publishing the template will provide each user in the lab with a virtual machine set up with multiple VMs within it. This article covers how to set up nested virtualization on a template machine in Azure Lab Services.

What is nested virtualization?

Nested virtualization enables you to create virtual machines within a virtual machine. Nested virtualization is done through Hyper-V, and is only available on Windows VMs.

For more information about nested virtualization, see the following articles:

• Nested Virtualization in Azure
• How to enable nested virtualization in an Azure VM

Considerations

Before setting up a lab with nested virtualization, here are a few things to take into consideration.

• When creating a new lab, select Medium (Nested virtualization) or Large (Nested virtualization) sizes for the virtual machine size. These virtual machine sizes support nested virtualization.
• Choose a size that will provide good performance for both the host and client virtual machines. Remember, when using virtualization, the size you choose must be adequate for not just one machine, but the host as well as any client machines that must be run concurrently.
• Client virtual machines will not have access to Azure resources, such as DNS servers on the Azure virtual network.
• Host virtual machine requires setup to allow for the client machine to have internet connectivity.
• Client virtual machines are licensed as independent machines. See Microsoft Licensing for information about licensing for Microsoft operation systems and products. Check licensing agreements for any other software being used before setting up the template machine.

Enable nested virtualization on a template VM

This article assumes that you have created a lab account and lab. For more information about creating a new lab account, see tutorial to set up a Lab Account. For more information how to create lab, see set up a classroom lab tutorial.

To connect to the template machine, see create and manage a classroom template.

The steps in this section focus on setting up nested virtualization for Windows Server 2016 or Windows Server 2019. You will use a script to set up template machine with Hyper-V. The following steps will guide you through how to use the Lab Services Hyper-V scripts.

1. If you're using Internet Explorer, you may have to add https://github.com to the trusted sites list.

   1. Open Internet Explorer.

   2. Select the gear icon, and choose Internet options.

   3. When the Internet Options dialog appears, select Security, select Trusted Sites, click Sites button.

   4. When the Trusted sites dialog appears, add https://github.com to the trusted websites list, and select Close.

      

2. Download the Git repository files as outlined in the following steps.

   1. Go to https://github.com/Azure/azure-devtestlab/.
   2. Click the Clone or Download button.
   3. Click Download ZIP.
   4. Extract the ZIP file

   Tip

   You can also clone the Git repository at https://github.com/Azure/azure-devtestlab.git.

3. Launch PowerShell in Administrator mode.

4. In the PowerShell window, navigate to the folder with the downloaded script. If you're navigating from the top folder of the repository files, the script is located at azure-devtestlab\samples\ClassroomLabs\Scripts\HyperV\.

5. You may have to change the execution policy to successfully run the script. Run the following command:

   Set-ExecutionPolicy bypass -force
   

6. Run the script:

   .\SetupForNestedVirtualization.ps1
   

   Note

   The script may require the machine to be restarted. Follow instructions from the script and re-run the script until Script completed is seen in the output.

7. Don’t forget to reset the execution policy. Run the following command:

   Set-ExecutionPolicy default -force
   

Conclusion

Now your template machine is ready to create Hyper-V virtual machines. See Create a Virtual Machine in Hyper-V for instructions on how to create Hyper-V virtual machines. Also, see Microsoft Evaluation Center to check out available operating systems and software.