Is configuring with fixed memory for Windows-based VMs still an issue?

[cosmos]

Years ago one could create Linux VMs specifying a dynamic memory allocation (ie with a minimum memory setting different from the normal one). This did not work well on Windows VMs.

Has this been rectified in recent PVE versions?

 

[mr44er]

You want qemu-guest-agent running inside the VM, then ballooning works.

 

[leesteken]

AFAIK, you need the balloon driver installed and active to make it work. But most software and maybe Windows itself does not respond very well to Proxmox taking away memory (especially when it does it quickly). People always expect that Proxmox politely asks the VM for memory and the software inside the VM can decide (or at least negotiate) but instead Proxmox just takes (when the host gets to 80%) and people set the minimum memory way too low.