VMs are now automatically connected to a virtual serial port, and we have exposed this serial port through the sipb-xen-console server. If you configure your VM to use this as a serial console, it is possible to remotely access your VMs serial console over ssh.

To enable the serial console for Debian or Ubuntu machines, there are excellent instructions at ​https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SerialConsoleHowto

Once you've enabled the serial console and rebooted your VM, you can access it by running

ssh MACHINE-NAME@sipb-xen-console.mit.edu

You will need to authenticate to the server using Kerberos tickets. If that doesn't mean anything to you, then be sure to ssh in from an Athena machine.

Note: console.xvm.mit.edu (as given in xvm.mit.edu/help) and sxc.mit.edu point to the same address as sipb-xen-console.