XCP-ng and Xen Orchestra Setup
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This post on "A-Z of XCP-ng and Xen Orchestra setup and VM Creation" walks through a complete, lab-friendly deployment of XCP-ng and Xen Orchestra, from installation on bare metal.
What the guide covers
Explains XCP-ng’s architecture (Xen hypervisor, Dom0, SR types) and points you to XCP-ng 8.3 LTS downloads and hardware requirements.
Shows how to build a bootable USB (Rufus/Balena Etcher) and install XCP-ng on workstation hardware, including storage choice (thin vs thick, EXT vs LVM), networking, and basic host configuration.
Demonstrates accessing management via XO Lite, deploying the Xen Orchestra Appliance (XOA), fixing certificate and login issues, and clarifying XOA’s licensing/production suitability.
Storage and ISO setup:
Details storage repository (SR) options (Local EXT, NFS, XOSTOR, iSCSI, etc.) and notes which are officially supported versus “as-is,” emphasizing file-based SRs and thin provisioning for backup efficiency.Shows how to create ISO SRs with and without XOA, including using /media or a dedicated folder, and provides CLI examples (mkdir, xe sr-create, scp) for importing ISOs.
VM creation and guest tools
Walks through creating VMs from both XO Lite and XOA, then importing an Ubuntu ISO and installing Ubuntu 24.04 with adjustable CPU, RAM, and disk resources.Covers installing XCP-ng guest tools (xe-guest-utilities) inside the VM to fix console resolution, enable graceful shutdown, and expose performance metrics in Xen Orchestra.
Xen Orchestra (XO) install
Introduces installing XO “from sources” on Ubuntu using Ronivay’s installer script, highlighting its advantages over the official manual method (single script, built-in SSL, easier updates).Guides you through cloning the repo, editing the config, generating self-signed SSL certificates, running the installer, logging into XO, and connecting it to the XCP-ng pool.
Cleanup and next steps
Shows how to remove the XOA appliance VM once XO is in place and reclaim space by deleting uploaded ISOs, with a note about planning shared ISO SRs later (e.g., NFS/SMB from Synology).The article positions this entire flow as a practical A–Z lab blueprint for evaluating XCP-ng and Xen Orchestra before moving to more production-ready, shared storage and backup designs.