Earlier I shared the steps to allocate resource using cgroups and slice in Linux. Now with this article I will share different commands and files which can be used to check if server is physical or virtual on Linux and Unix platform. You can use the commands and from this article to check if server is physical or virtual either remotely or by directly connecting to the console of the server. There can be many more commands but these are some which I use on a day to day basis, if you know of any more commands then please do share in the comments section.
Check if server is Physical or Virtual
Below are list of some of the commands which can be used to check if server is physical or virtual
Method-1: lshw
Below are some sample outputs
On Physical Machine
# lshw -c system | grep product
product: ProLiant BL460c Gen9 (776320-B21)
product: PnP device PNP0b00
product: PnP device PNP0c02
For Virtual Machine
# lshw -c system
director.example
description: Computer
product: KVM
vendor: Red Hat
version: RHEL 7.0.0 PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996)
width: 64 bits
capabilities: smbios-2.4 dmi-2.4 smp vsyscall32
# lshw -c system | grep -i product
product: VMware Virtual Platform
product: PnP device PNP0c02
product: PnP device PNP0b00
product: PnP device PNP0103
product: PnP device PNP0c02
Method-2: dmicecode
Below are some sample outputs
On Physical machine
# dmidecode -t system
# dmidecode 3.0
Getting SMBIOS data from sysfs.
SMBIOS 2.8 present.
Handle 0x0009, DMI type 1, 27 bytes
System Information
Manufacturer: HP
Product Name: ProLiant BL460c Gen9
Version: Not Specified
Serial Number: SGH709S31R
UUID: 33363737-3032-4753-4837-303953333152
Wake-up Type: Power Switch
SKU Number: 776320-B21
Family: ProLiant
# dmidecode -t system
# dmidecode 2.12
SMBIOS 2.5 present.
Handle 0x0001, DMI type 1, 27 bytes
System Information
Manufacturer: FUJITSU
Product Name: PRIMERGY RX200 S6
Version: GS01
Serial Number: YL6S001919
UUID: 00000000-0000-0000-0000-00262D04D2F6
Wake-up Type: Power Switch
SKU Number: ABN:K1342-V101-2
Family: SERVER
On Virtual Machine
# dmidecode -t system
# dmidecode 3.0
Getting SMBIOS data from sysfs.
SMBIOS 2.4 present.
Handle 0x0100, DMI type 1, 27 bytes
System Information
Manufacturer: Red Hat
Product Name: KVM
Version: RHEL 7.0.0 PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996)
Serial Number: Not Specified
UUID: 7283C294-6449-404A-86EB-3CD3F6922773
Wake-up Type: Power Switch
SKU Number: Not Specified
Family: Red Hat Enterprise Linux
# dmidecode -t system
# dmidecode 3.0
Getting SMBIOS data from sysfs.
SMBIOS 2.5 present.
Handle 0x0001, DMI type 1, 27 bytes
System Information
Manufacturer: innotek GmbH
Product Name: VirtualBox
Version: 1.2
Serial Number: 0
UUID: 43F05102-8378-4C85-8D39-E38E358B4669
Wake-up Type: Power Switch
SKU Number: Not Specified
Family: Virtual Machine
Method-3: dmesg file
Below are some sample outputs
On Physical Machine
# dmesg | grep DMI
[ 0.000000] DMI: HP ProLiant BL460c Gen9, BIOS I36 02/17/2017
# dmesg | grep DMI
[ 0.000000] DMI present.
[ 0.000000] DMI: FUJITSU PRIMERGY RX200 S6 /D3031, BIOS 6.00 Rev. 1.10.3031 01/20/2012
On Virtual Machine
# dmesg | grep DMI
[ 0.000000] DMI: Red Hat KVM, BIOS 0.5.1 01/01/2011
# dmesg | grep DMI
[ 0.000000] DMI: innotek GmbH VirtualBox/VirtualBox, BIOS VirtualBox 12/01/2006
Method-4: System Files under /sys/class/dmi/id/*
node1:~ # cd /sys/class/dmi/id
node1:/sys/class/dmi/id # ls -l
total 0
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:06 sys_vendor
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:06 product_name
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:06 bios_vendor
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:06 uevent
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:06 modalias
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 0 Sep 19 21:09 power
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 product_version
-r-------- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 product_uuid
-r-------- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 product_serial
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 chassis_version
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 chassis_vendor
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 chassis_type
-r-------- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 chassis_serial
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 chassis_asset_tag
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 bios_version
-r--r--r-- 1 root root 4096 Sep 19 21:09 bios_date
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 0 Sep 28 16:37 subsystem -> ../../../../class/dmi
Below are some sample outputs
On Physical Machine
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/product_name
PRIMERGY RX200 S6
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/chassis_vendor
FUJITSU
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/product_name
ProLiant BL460c Gen9
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/sys_vendor
HP
On Virtual Machine
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/sys_vendor
Red Hat
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/product_name
KVM
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/chassis_vendor
Oracle Corporation
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/product_name
VirtualBox
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/sys_vendor
VMware, Inc.
# cat /sys/class/dmi/id/product_name
VMware Virtual Platform
Method-5: hwinfo
Below are some sample outputs
On Physical Machine
# hwinfo --all --log ~/hwinfo_dump.txt
Next go through the file to get the hardware details, below is a sample snippet
system.hardware.vendor = 'HP'
system.hardware.product = 'ProLiant BL460c Gen9'
system.hardware.version = ''
system.chassis.manufacturer = 'HP'
# hwinfo --all --log ~/hwinfo_dump.txt
Next go through the file to get the hardware details, below is a sample snippet
system.hardware.vendor = 'FUJITSU'
system.hardware.product = 'PRIMERGY RX200 S6'
system.hardware.version = 'GS01'
system.chassis.manufacturer = 'FUJITSU'
system.board.product = 'D3031'
system.board.version = 'S26361-D3031-A100 WGS02 GS0'
system.board.vendor = 'FUJITSU'
system.chassis.type = 'Rack Mount Chassis'
On Virtual Machine
# hwinfo --all --log ~/hwinfo_dump.txt
Next go through the file to get the hardware details, below is a sample snippet
system.firmware.release_date = '09/30/2014'
system.hardware.vendor = 'VMware, Inc.'
system.hardware.product = 'VMware Virtual Platform'
system.hardware.version = 'None'
system.chassis.manufacturer = 'No Enclosure'
system.board.product = '440BX Desktop Reference Platform'
system.board.version = 'None'
system.board.vendor = 'Intel Corporation'
system.chassis.type = 'Other'
system.formfactor = 'unknown'
Lastly I hope the commands from this article to check if server is physical or virtual in Linux or Unix was helpful. So, let me know your suggestions and feedback using the comment section.
