2.45. virtio-win

The virtio-win network driver of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 can stop working when a Microsoft Windows XP guest is transferred to a Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 host. To work around this problem, replace the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 drivers with the latest Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 drivers before or after migrating the guest to the new host. (BZ#913094)

Low performance with UDP messages larger than 1024 is a known Microsoft issue: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/235257. For the message larger than 1024 bytes follow the workaround procedure detailed in the above Microsoft knowledgebase article.

Installation of Windows XP with the floppy containing guest drivers (in order to get the virtio-net drivers installed as part of the installation), will return messages stating that the viostor.sys file could not be found. viostor.sys is not part of the network drivers, but is on the same floppy as portions of the virtio-blk drivers. These messages can be safely ignored, simply accept the installation's offer to reboot, and the installation will continue normally.